The Ongoing War on Truth in Iraq By Dahr Jamail Tuesday 18 April 2006 The people of England have been led in Mesopotamia into a trap from which it will be hard to escape with dignity and honor. They have been tricked into it by a steady withholding of information. The Baghdad communiqués are belated, insincere, incomplete. Things have been far worse than we have been told, our administration more bloody and inefficient than the public knows ... We are today not far from a disaster. -- T.E. Lawrence, The Sunday Times, August 1920 On Monday, April 17, my sources in Baghdad reported fierce fighting in the al-Adhamiya neighborhood of the capital city, as well as fighting in the al-Dora neighborhood. One source, who lives in the predominantly Sunni area of Adhamiya, had been telling me the situation was disintegrating for days leading up to this. There had been clashes every day for four days leading up to yesterday's huge clash there, with sporadic fighting between Sunni resistance fighters and members of the two largest Shia militias. The armed wing of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, the Badr Organization, and Muqtada al-Sadr's Mehdi Army have been launching ongoing attacks against fighters in the neighborhood. There is a shorter version of this description. Civil war. Yet we don't hear it described as such in the corporate media, nor from the Cheney administration. Their propaganda insists that Iraq is not yet in a civil war. But in Adhamiya, every night now for several weeks roads have been closed with tires, trunks of date palm trees and other objects to prevent "kidnappers and Shia death squads" from entering the area, according to one source, whom I'm keeping anonymous for security reasons. His description of the fierce fighting in his neighborhood is quite different from the reporting of it in mainstream outlets. "Sunday night at 12:30 a.m. clashes started just like on the four previous nights, but it was very heavy and from different directions. It was different from the other nights in quantity and quality; it was truly like the hell which I haven't seen even in the battles of the war between Iraq and Iran during the eighties," wrote my source. He added that mortars and rocket-propelled grenades were used, and so much ammunition that the sky was "glowing red." The situation went on until Monday morning. He said, "I usually have my cup of coffee in my small backyard to drink it in a good atmosphere, but the minute I opened the door someone from the interior ministry commandos shouted at me, telling me to get inside or he'd shoot me. Of course I stayed inside and the shooting continued in a very heavy way until 12:30 p.m., when the American forces came to start helping the militia's attack on al-Adhamiya after they were watching the scene from their helicopters." He went on to state very clearly that "these were members of the Badr militia and Sadr's Mehdi Army who were raiding the neighborhood." Another witness at the scene wrote, "Men in police uniforms attacked the neighbourhood. The Ministry of Interior claimed the uniformed men don't belong to the puppet [Iraqi government] forces, but local residents are quite sure they are special-forces from the Ministry of Interior, probably Badr brigades. The neighbourhood was sealed off and the mobile phone network was disconnected until 10:45 p.m. Electricity was cut off from 10 a.m. on." Meanwhile, Reuters obediently parroted the US military by reporting that "Insurgents mount bold attack in Baghdad," and saying, "About 50 insurgents mounted a brazen attack on Iraqi forces in Baghdad on Monday, prompting U.S. troops to provide support in a battle that lasted seven hours, a U.S. military spokesman said. The guerrillas attacked Iraqi forces in the mostly Sunni Arab district of Adhamiya in northern Baghdad overnight. Five rebels were killed and one member of the Iraqi forces was wounded. There were no U.S. casualties, said the spokesman." While this press report quoted an Iraqi police official as saying, "Adhamiya residents have taken up arms to prevent the Shi'ite militia from entering," and "Adhamiya residents said Shi'ite militiamen accompanied the Iraqi forces," it added that this could not be confirmed. An Iraqi in Adhamiya confirmed this immediately after the clashes ended by writing, "When the uniformed forces entered the neighbourhood, the National Guards that are usually patrolling the streets left. Young armed men from the neighbourhood fought side by side with mujahedin against the attacking forces to protect Al-Adhamiya. Several residents have been killed in the streets, but there are currently no figures available. US troops also entered the neighbourhood. At first, they only stood by and watched; later on they, too, fired at the locals, who tried to repel the attacks. Later in the day, rumours circulated that another fierce attack of Al-Adhamiya is planned on Wednesday, but ... couldn't confirm this information." Other news outlets directly contradict the aforementioned statement by the US military spokesman, when one reported that "gunmen clashed with residents in Baghdad's Aadhamiya district." Of course, the military spokesman also failed to mention that on the same day, "Four gunmen attacked a Sunni mosque killing a guard in the Adhamiya district of the capital." Instead, we hear reporting that "[US] Army officials said they had suffered no casualties, and plan to raid homes in search for the gunmen." Disturbingly, this obvious US-backed Shia militia invasion of a Sunni neighborhood may well be a prelude to what the US military is calling a "second liberation of Baghdad" which they will carry out with the Iraqi army when a new government is installed. The Sunday Times reports that US commanders both in Iraq and at an army base in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, are planning a "carrot-and-stick" approach by offering suffering populations "protection" from sectarian violence in exchange for "rooting out insurgent groups or Al-Qaeda." Sound like mafia tactics to you? The article states that "Sources close to the Pentagon said Iraqi forces would take the lead, supported by American air power, special operations, intelligence, embedded officers and back-up troops. Helicopters suitable for urban warfare, such as the manoeuvrable AH-6 "Little Birds" ... are likely to complement the ground attack." This is disturbingly similar to what just occurred in al-Adhamiya. Another glaring example of the Cheney administration/US military's ongoing war on truth in Iraq is the open wound which is Fallujah. Heavy-handed assaults by the US military continue in Fallujah, where as recently as this Monday three Iraqi civilians were killed, along with 10 wounded in the Jebail district of the city. Of the 10 wounded, three were women and two were children. According to Mustafa Karim, with an Iraqi security force in the city, "US forces fired on houses in the district following confrontations with armed groups in the vicinity." Karim added that residents of Fallujah have been demanding an easing of the tight security procedures imposed by Iraqi and US armed forces on the region since November 2004, which have obstructed the passage of civilians into and out of the region, and "Fallujah has been recently witnessing a renewed escalation of armed confrontations between US forces and armed Iraqi groups." In fact, fierce fighting in Fallujah has been ongoing since just a few months after the November 2004 US attack, which destroyed most buildings and homes in the city of 350,000 people. But the US military doesn't want people to see that American soldiers are dying there on nearly a daily basis as of late. Rather than calling it Fallujah when soldiers die there, they prefer a sort of Bermuda Triangle approach and use "Al-Anbar Province" for the location of these deaths. Let's have a brief glance at some soldiers killed recently in "Al-Anbar Province": * April 17, Department of Defense (DOD) announced (hyperlink 'announced' with http://www.defenselink.mil/releases/2006/nr20060417-12834.html ) the death of a Marine who "died April 14 from a non-hostile motor vehicle accident in Al-Anbar province, Iraq." * April 16, CENTCOM announced: "Camp Fallujah, Iraq - A Marine ... died due to enemy action while operating in al Anbar Province April 15." * April 16, Camp Fallujah, Iraq - Multi-National Forces (MNF) Iraq announced: "Three Marines ... died due to enemy action while operating in al Anbar Province April 15." * April 15, Camp Fallujah, Iraq - MNF Iraq announced: "Two Marines died and 22 were wounded due to enemy action while operating in al Anbar Province April 13 ... Ten wounded Marines ... were evacuated to a medical facility at Camp Fallujah." * April 15, DOD announced: "four Marines died April 15 when their HMMWV struck an improvised explosive device during combat operations in Al Anbar province, Iraq." * April 11, DOD announced: "Lance Cpl. Juana NavarroArellano, 24 ... died April 8 from wounds received while supporting combat operations in Al Anbar province, Iraq." * April 10, Camp Fallujah, Iraq - CENTCOM announced: "A soldier ... died from wounds sustained due to enemy action while operating in al Anbar Province April 8." * April 10, Camp Fallujah, Iraq - CENTCOM announced: "Two soldiers ... died due to enemy action while operating in al Anbar Province April 9." * April 8, Camp Fallujah, Iraq - MNF Iraq announced: "A Marine ... died from wounds sustained due to enemy action while operating in al Anbar Province April 7." Note the clue that several of these are issued from "Camp Fallujah, Iraq." This is hardly a complete list of US soldiers killed in Fallujah, and some of the aforementioned may not have actually been killed inside that city. However, military announcements of the deaths of soldiers in other places mention the name of specific cities, whether they occur in Samarra or Tal Afar or elsewhere. Obviously the US military is being intentionally vague when it comes to their admittance of losing American soldiers within the city limits of Fallujah. An email I received Monday from one of my sources in Fallujah sheds much light as to why this is the case, not only in Fallujah, but throughout Iraq. "Resistance [in Fallujah] is very active and all the destruction to the city by American soldiers did not succeed to stop them. You know the city was totally destroyed in the November attack and is still surrounded and closed for anyone other than citizens of the city. What is going on now is that the Americans are trying to conceal their failure here by not letting anybody in. There were at least five explosions today and more than one clash between resistance fighters and US soldiers. So all the military procedures, together with the thousands of casualties, were in vain. In short, the American Army seems to be losing control in this country and God knows what they will do in revenge. I expect the worst to come." Dahr Jamail is an independent journalist who spent over 8 months reporting from occupied Iraq. He presented evidence of US war crimes in Iraq at the International Commission of Inquiry on Crimes Against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration in New York City in January 2006. He writes regularly for TruthOut, Inter Press Service, Asia Times and TomDispatch, and maintains his own web site, dahrjamailiraq.com. http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/041806J.shtml
Point being we hear every day from the administration complaints about not hearing any of the good news from the MSM about Iraq. When in fact from the premise of the article, we are not even hearing the truth about anything that is happening in Iraq. I'm starting to doubt we are even getting any of the real news about what the situation is there anymore, good or bad.
Well if you're looking for objective reporting, I don't think you'll get it on truthout.org anymore than on CNN - probably less so.
I read 5 or 6 online newspapers a day, countless reputable bloggs and three news services what else would you suggest?
I'm not indicting you. I'm saying that the truthout.org article both in its rhetoric and its attempted logic does not appear to be trying for objectivity. btw: i'm always on the lookout for new material. What reputable blogs do you read?
That's the point I was trying to make. Who knows anymore what is objective when it comes to reporting the war? The administration keeps saying that progress is being made and that things are getting better, but by all indications from the news it isn't. Where does one go to find some semblance of objectivity anymore? We are getting such radically different views that even someone like myself that tries to stay informed is now becoming frustratingly confused as to what to believe anymore.
That's okay! Another friend of mine is on the RNC talking points email list and he updates me at least twice a day!
I really don't think so, Hayes. You aren't particularly conservative or liberal, GOP or Democrat. Not a dittohead or simple Bush supporter like TJ or Bigtexx. War and military solutions to numerous foreign policy problems seem to be your constant theme.
You know....isn't that a little over the top? I meant the extra "-er," lol. It's 'warmonger' - not warmongerer.
"Reason for Their Death Is Known" By Dahr Jamail Death in Iraq. It is relentless and incessant. Know what it is like when scores of your fellow citizens are being killed every single day while the world proceeds unheedingly on? As a journalist I've had but a taste of that poison during my eight months in Iraq. Try it out: be an Iraqi for a day, into your fourth year of being occupied, humiliated, tortured and killed, doing all you can just to survive. All communication with my Iraqi friends is punctuated by and smattered with their use of the words "praying," "God," and "Insha'allah" (God willing). Perhaps there is need to invoke something else altogether? And all the dead air is alive. With the smell of America's God. - Harold Pinter, "War With Iraq" On one of the days when multiple car bombs drained the blood and souls of scores in Baghdad, my closest friend wrote from there: "Dahr, This is a very sad letter I'm writing you as a friend. My tears are coming down due to the humiliation, suffering, frustration, thwarting defeat and discomfiture we the Iraqi are living in. Please let people know some of the news of what is happening to my country, my people and my religion." Death lurks everywhere in Iraq today. Keeping up with the numbers of dead is impossible. A doctor working at one of the larger hospitals in Baghdad recently called it a "camp" because the courtyard of the hospital is constantly filled with members of the Shia Badr militia, who continue to carry out their death squad activities of killing Sunnis and rival Shia. "The Badr are all over the hospital, looking for people," said the doctor. "The injured brought here sometimes die before even reaching the ward, because the Badr are being obstacles for us. One of the men running our morgue was killed by the Badr. My friends are warning me to be careful, to keep my mouth shut." The numbers are being hidden … and the Badr, operating out of the Ministry of Interior, which is funded by the US, are making sure the numbers remain shrouded. Yet on Tuesday of this week, a spokesman at that same hospital, speaking on condition of anonymity of course, announced that in the last 48 hours alone Yarmouk Hospital had received 65 bodies, most of them slaughtered by death squads in execution-style murders. That day they had received 40 bodies, and Monday, 25. Iraqis are at far greater risk when they speak out about the true number of the dead than western journalists. Those who speak out jeopardize their lives, like Faik Bakir, the director of the Baghdad morgue. Bakir fled Iraq fearing for his life in early March, after reporting that over 7,000 people had been killed by death squads in recent months. In an article in the Guardian on March 2nd, it was made clear by John Pace, a UN official who worked in Iraq until February, that "The vast majority of bodies showed signs of summary execution - many with their hands tied behind their back. Some showed evidence of torture, with arms and leg joints broken by electric drills." He said that the killings had been ongoing long before the rampant bloodshed that followed the bombing of the Shia shrine in Samarra. The article added, "Mr. Pace, whose contract in Iraq ended last month, said many killings were carried out by Shia militias linked to the interior ministry run by Bayan Jabr, a leading figure in the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (Sciri)." This past Saturday I received information from the main morgue in Baghdad from a doctor there, name withheld for security reasons. "Yesterday we received 36 bodies from the police pickups. All of them are unknown, without IDs, and we don't have refrigerators to put them in since all of ours are completely full already. So we had to keep them on the ground. 12 of them were handcuffed, most of them received between 2 and 10 bullets, some many more than 10. We are not going to put them into biopsy. Reason for their death is known. Most of them are between 20 to 30 years … This is the number that was brought directly to us in one day, plus there are the dead who are sent to the hospitals. They will be put in the hospitals' morgues. We don't receive bodies from hospitals nowadays, because we don't have a place to keep them. I can't tell the exact number of killed people now, but it depends on the situation. But what I can assure you of is that since the shrine explosion, deaths have almost doubled. Daily, we receive between 70 to 80 bodies … you can see within these 40 minutes that I've talked with you, we received 9 bodies. Nearly every morning the count will be doubled twice this number, for the police find them at night. Most are either found in the streets or killed without sending them to hospitals. Four days ago we received 24 bodies in just 2 hours." At this same morgue back in June 2004, I interviewed the aforementioned director, Dr. Faiq Bakir, who had to flee for his life. He said that their maximum holding capacity with the freezers was 90 bodies, and since January 2004 an average of well over 600 bodies each month had been brought there. The cause of death for at least half of these were gunshots or explosions. He also pointed out that those numbers did not include the heavy fighting areas of Fallujah and Najaf. In addition, he told me, "We deal only with suspicious deaths, not deaths from natural causes. And so many bodies are buried that never go to a morgue anywhere." According to Dr. Bakir, the rate of bodies brought to the Baghdad Morgue even back then was 3-4 times greater than it ever was during the regime of Saddam Hussein. "I am sure that not all of the bodies that should come here do," he continued before very diplomatically adding, "Because our legal system has some problems right now." Before the invasion, there was a coordinated system between Baghdad and the other governorates, which allowed his morgue to track deaths throughout the country, but this too had been smashed along with the rest of the infrastructure of his country. More recently, a doctor at another hospital shared information which puts this in clearer perspective. This past Sunday, a doctor from al-Numan hospital in the al-Adhamiya district of Baghdad reported to my source in Baghdad: "Every major hospital has either one or two refrigerators, depending on the population of the area. As for Adhamiya we have one refrigerator that holds a maximum of 10 bodies. Meanwhile there are two refrigerators in the Shula hospital. We have not less than 18 major hospitals inside Baghdad, in addition to the main morgue, which has 6 refrigerators that contain 20 bodies each. In the emergencies we use refrigeration trucks to put bodies inside - this is very familiar to the main morgue. I went there a week ago. I have seen three refrigeration trucks inside the yard. They were filled with bodies. They keep the bodies in the main morgue for not more than 15 days, and if no one asks for them, they send the bodies to the cemetery administration to deal with them. This administration hands the bodies to some individuals who will bury them, mostly in Najaf or in the cemeteries around Baghdad." Reuters recently ran a story titled, "In Baghdad, some killings get noticed, some don't." The story read, "When gunmen killed a sister of an Iraqi vice president on Thursday, it grabbed world headlines. A few streets away, however, another slaying, typical of hundreds in Baghdad in recent weeks, went all but unnoticed. Indeed it might never have been recorded had 73-year-old Khatab al-Ani not been shot outside the home of a journalist." The only part of this I would amend is "in recent weeks," because I know for a fact that random unreported killings have been the norm in the capital city of Iraq for over two years now. Another Iraqi source of mine works for an Iraqi relief NGO in Fallujah. He told me that from the April and November 2004 US assaults on Fallujah there were a minimum of 4,500 dead or missing (most of them dead), and "killings in Fallujah and Ramadi are a daily reality for us." According to this source, "Doctors in Fallujah estimate that an average of 3.5 people are being killed in Fallujah every day during 2006, while doctors we know in Baghdad estimate that the number there is between 150 and 200 per day." He went on to say, "The Lancet reported over 100,000 killed over a year ago. This was even before many of the crimes committed by US troops, the Iraqi so-called Army and the Government militias, who are all first class killers, came to light. This brings the number to over 200,000 at the least. On the other hand, those people (Bush and those claiming less than 100,000 dead) not reporting the correct number of civilian casualties - that is a major crime in itself. It looks like they don't give a damn how many Iraqi people get killed." Even the UN Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN) humanitarian news agency reported on April 26 that "More than 90 women become widows each day due to continuing violence countrywide, according to government officials and non-governmental organizations devoted to women's issues." Another extremely telling point in the IRIN report is that "Although few reliable statistics are available on the total number of widows in Iraq, the Ministry of Women's Affairs says that there are at least 300,000 in Baghdad alone, with another eight million throughout the country." The report said that at least 15 police officers' wives are widowed every day, and that local NGOs in Iraq said the situation had become much worse since the 2003 US-led invasion of the country, which has brought horrific violence on a level not seen before. "Saddam Hussein was responsible for killing thousands of men during his 25 years of brutal rule," said Ibtissam Kamal in the IRIN report. Kamal, a member of a local organization that works on the issue but prefers anonymity of the organization for security reasons, added, "But more people have died during the past three years, most of them men …" The vast majority of deaths in Iraq are not being counted. Anyone who has spent any time there knows this. It was and remains common knowledge amongst my colleagues who worked on the streets, rather than those "embedding" or conducting "hotel journalism." Several of my colleagues who have reported from Iraq feel the number of Iraqis killed during the occupation far exceeds 100,000. "If one counts excess mortality from collapsed healthcare, polluted water, poverty and the like - at least 100,000 Iraqis have died since the US invaded Iraq," Christian Parenti, author of the book The Freedom: Shadows and Hallucinations in Occupied Iraq wrote me this week. Parenti, who has reported for over 5 months from Iraq and is a regularly contributor to The Nation magazine, added, "How many people have been killed by US troops? How many in sectarian violence? It's impossible to say, but the point is this: Iraq has been destroyed by the US invasion and the process of its disintegration will go on for years. It is a horror no matter what the numbers are." David Enders, an American freelance journalist who has spent 18 months reporting from Iraq and author of the book Baghdad Bulletin, told me yesterday, "I visited the Baghdad morgue, and they were receiving between 30-40 bodies every day. That didn't include car bombs and people who'd died for obvious reasons. That was more than a year ago, and that was just for Baghdad. I think it's probably safe to say that well over 100,000 Iraqis have died during the occupation." Veteran Middle East correspondent Robert Fisk writes for the Independent in the UK and has reported from the region for over 30 years. He had this to say in a piece written on March 20th titled, "The Iraq War: Three Years On - The march of folly that has led to a bloodbath": "The Iraqis? Well, they are lesser beings whose casualties cannot be revealed to us by the Iraqi ministry of health, on orders from the Americans and British; creatures whose suffering, far greater than our own, must be submerged in the democracy and freedom in which we are drowning them; whose casualties "more or less" [mocking the infamous quote from George W. Bush] are probably nearer to 150,000. After all, if 1,000 Iraqis could die by violence last July - in Baghdad alone; and if they are being killed at 60 or 70 a day, then we have a near genocidal bloodbath on our hands. Iraqis, however, are now our Untermenschen for whom, frankly, we do not greatly care." By far and away the survey that comes closest to the true number of dead in Iraq to date was the one conducted for the Lancet. Yet even Les Roberts, the lead author of that report and one of the world's top epidemiologists with the Center for International Emergency Disaster and Refugee Studies at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, said this February that there might be as many as 300,000 Iraqi civilian deaths generated by the US invasion and occupation. So as not to skew the results, it is important to note that the survey did not include areas where major combat had occurred such as Fallujah, Najaf, and Sadr City - home to roughly three million Iraqis. Any news agency, government, or other organization reporting anything less are actively attempting to hide the level of slaughter and mayhem and thus aiding and abetting the ongoing war crimes in Iraq. My aforementioned friend in Fallujah is both frustrated and angry that most news agencies choose not to report the number of dead in Iraq more accurately. "I know there are some organizations who claim that they have an accurate count, which is less than 40,000 dead Iraqis," he wrote me recently. He went on to reference Bush Junior, "And as if that number itself isn't shameful enough for the US and the whole world to see. Anyone claiming that low number who calls himself a humanitarian is a shameful guy." we leave civilian dead as litter in the streets ignored by us their numbers unmarked as are their names - Labi Siffre Anyone who's been in a war zone knows what it feels like to lie in bed at night listening to the cracking of gunfire, or the sound of thudding bombs. Knowing that each report means death or maiming. It is true that the dead do not talk, but each shot fired or bomb detonated means someone is dead, and the killers know and must live with that knowledge forever - that they have killed a human being. And we cannot escape that knowledge either. Not hearing the sounds of death, but knowing that somewhere this instant in Iraq is a family that will have to suffer a loss in perpetuity. Your silence will not protect you … - Audre Lorde Dahr Jamail is an independent journalist who spent over 8 months reporting from occupied Iraq. He presented evidence of US war crimes in Iraq at the International Commission of Inquiry on Crimes Against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration in New York City in January 2006. http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/050306J.shtml
There you go again mc mark, posting articles from unnapproved news sources from the internet. You know if Bush can't scare the media outlet then it isn't a trustworthy newssource. Don't you remember that our mission was accomplished in Iraq over three years ago? Don't let a little case of domestic violence get you down. I'm sure eventually all of Bush's men, I mean Halliburton will put Iraq back together again, just like they are doing in New Orleans.
BUSTED!!! VIDEO: Rumsfeld Called Out On Lies About WMD Speaking in Atlanta today, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was sharply questioned about his pre-war claims about WMD in Iraq. An audience member confronted Rumsfeld with his 2003 claim about WMD, “We know where they are.” Rumsfeld falsely claimed he never said it. The audience member then read Rumsfeld’s quote back to him, leaving the defense secretary speechless. Watch it: http://www.rawstory.com/showarticle.php?src=http://thinkprogress.org/2006/05/04/rumsfeld-called-out/
The Lancet figure has already been thoroughly debunked. However, if you take the stats Fisk and his ilk so oft repeated about sanctions - then those were killing between 100,000 and 150,000 Iraqis per year. So I guess even if you use the bloated numbers from the Lancet et al, Iraq is still coming out ahead by 50,000 to 100,000 deaths a year.
This looks like promising news... Report: U.S. talking with representatives of Iraqi insurgents ROBERT H. REID, Associated Press Writer May 2, 2006 3:30 PM BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - U.S. officials have acknowledged for months they were in contact with Sunni Arabs who had ties to the insurgency, but stopped short of saying they were sitting down face to face with representatives of armed groups. That's quite different from a report Tuesday in a leading Arabic newspaper, Asharq Al-Awsat. It said U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad met seven times since Jan. 16 with representatives of 10 major insurgent groups to talk about their conditions for laying down their arms. The U.S. Embassy had no comment on the report. And in Washington, a State Department spokesman suggested any contacts fell short of talks with insurgent representatives. ''We have made it clear,'' spokesman Sean McCormack said, ''that we are interested in talking to people who know somebody who knows somebody who might be involved in insurgent activities in an effort to bring these people into the political process.'' The Arab newspaper, circulated throughout the Middle East, said Khalilzad's contacts began with a meeting Jan. 16 in Amman, Jordan, and continued in Baghdad, according to an unidentified insurgent official. The official was quoted as saying the insurgents presented several demands, including a halt to military operations, an end to arrests of ''innocent Iraqis'' and the release of prisoners ''who were arrested unjustly.'' According to the newspaper, the official said his group presented a memorandum to Khalilzad, who expressed interest and promised to respond. However, no response was received and the insurgents decided to break off the dialogue after the new government was announced April 22. Last weekend, President Jalal Talabani said officials from his office had met with insurgent representatives and he was hopeful they might agree to a deal. Talabani also said American officials met with insurgents. A goal is to persuade certain insurgent groups to join the political process under a new government with their Shiite and Kurdish countrymen. Khalilzad has spoken in several interviews about reaching out to the Sunnis but in an interview with the BBC last month, he also cautioned that the dialogue was ''a long way'' from a deal to end the fighting. Nevertheless, Khalilzad attributed a sharp drop in U.S. deaths in March to an ongoing dialogue with disaffected Sunnis. But both U.S. and Iraqi officials have avoided any overtures to two groups: Saddam Hussein loyalists and religious extremists such as al-Qaida in Iraq, led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The strategy is to isolate al-Zarqawi's group from other insurgents. U.S. troops raided a suspected al-Qaida hide-out Tuesday north of Baghdad, killing 10 militants and capturing one, a U.S. statement said. Three of the militants were wearing suicide vests. The troops searched for ''an al-Qaida terrorist leader'' in the pre-dawn raid at a safehouse about 25 miles southwest of the U.S. air base in Balad, the military said. The raid unfolded when troops surprised a guard and shot him before he could fire his pistol, the military said. As the insurgent fell, he detonated a suicide vest. Two more insurgents were killed inside the hide-out and the others outside as they tried to escape. Two of the dead were also found wearing explosive vests. One insurgent was wounded. The statement did not say whether al-Zarqawi was the target of the raid or whether anyone escaped. It was the fourth raid reported by the U.S. command against al-Zarqawi's network since April 16, when American troops stormed a house in Youssifiyah just south of the capital, killing six people, including a woman, and arresting five people, among them an unidentified al-Qaida official. However, CNN reported that the captives said al-Zarqawi had been in a nearby house. Since the drop in U.S. deaths in March, American casualties have been rising. April was the deadliest month of the year for American forces with more than 70 fatalities. A U.S. soldier was killed Monday in a roadside bombing south of Baghdad, the U.S. command said. At least 2,407 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. U.S. overtures to the Sunnis appear to have slowed in recent weeks as American diplomats and Iraqi politicians focused on speeding up formation of the new government, which had been deadlocked until the Shiites agreed to replace Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari with another Shiite, Nouri al-Maliki. Al-Maliki was officially appointed as prime minister-designate on April 22 and has pledged to complete his Cabinet this month. That will be the final stage in establishing the new government. U.S. officials believe a unity government can over time calm sectarian tensions and lure many Sunnis away from the insurgency. On Tuesday, Shiite officials reported a new snag emerged in the negotiations when Sunni politicians insisted on key posts, including deputy prime minister and a major ministry such as finance or education. Shiites, who hold 130 of the 275 seats in parliament, offered a lesser ministry but the Sunnis refused, according to Shiite politician Bassem Sharif. Talks were to continue Wednesday, he said. Sunni politicians are also eager for parliament to consider amendments to the new constitution. Sunnis oppose several provisions, including one allowing formation of regional governments. Many Sunnis fear that would lead to Iraq's breakup and deprive them of a fair share of the country's vast oil wealth. Shiites and Kurds agreed to study changes in the constitution during the first four months of the new parliament. However, Shiite officials said Tuesday they want to delay formation of the committee to study changes until the new Cabinet has been chosen. The issue is due for discussion during a parliament session Wednesday. In a speech Tuesday on state-run Iraqiya television, parliament speaker Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, a Sunni Arab, said all Iraqis must renounce violence, and that Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish political parties must rule ''by a common vision.'' ''Not an hour passes without Iraqis being stricken by the killing of our sons and loved ones in Baghdad and other areas, by booby traps, kidnappings, assassinations, armed clashes, roadside bombs and other brutal terrorist attacks,'' al-Mashhadani said. --- Associated Press correspondents Lara Sukhtian in Dubai and Qassim Abdul-Zahra in Baghdad contributed to this report.
