American and Iraqi forces clashed with gunmen in a Sunni stronghold north of the heavily fortified Green Zone on Wednesday, and officials said at least one civilian died and nine suspects were captured in the fighting.
According to the AP, the U.S. military said Iraqi army and American troops had launched targeted raids to clear the area in an operation dubbed Tomahawk Strike 11. "Iraqi army and Multi-National Division-Baghdad soldiers commenced a pre-planned security operation early this morning on Haifa Street," the military said in a statement, adding the operation was aimed at restoring Iraqi security force control in the area.
The fighting between the Iraqi and US forces and attackers armed with machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars started about 5 a.m., witnesses said. A spokesman at the Cultural Ministry, Jabbar al-Mashhadani, told The Associated Press that U.S. and Iraqi forces rushed into the building on the edge of Haifa Street at 9 a.m. and told all the employees to go home as they fanned out and sent snipers to the roof.
Meanwhile, four of the five Americans killed when a U.S. security company's helicopter crashed in a dangerous Sunni neighborhood in central Baghdad were shot execution style in the back the head, an Iraqi military official said Wednesday.
The senior Iraqi military official said the helicopter had been shot down. The Iraqi said the helicopter was hit by a machine gunner over the Fadhil neighborhood on the east side of the Tigris River. The Americans said they did not know what caused the aircraft to crash.
The Qatar-based Al-Jazeera television reported that the 1920 Revolution Brigades group claimed responsibility for shooting down the helicopter and showed a video taken by a cell phone.
Another Sunni group, the Ansar al-Sunnah Army, also claimed responsibility for the same attack and posted identity cards of men who were on the helicopter on a Web site, including at least two that bore the name of Arthur Laguna, who was later identified by his mother as among those killed.
The helicopter was believed to have been flying escort above a VIP convoy on the ground as it headed away from the heavily fortified Green Zone to an undisclosed destination. A report in the Washington Post, also citing unnamed U.S. officials, said one of the Blackwater victims was killed as he traveled with the convoy on the ground.
Elsewhere, Iraq's higher education minister, a Sunni, escaped an assassination attempt Wednesday after gunmen opened fire on his motorcade as he was traveling in southern Baghdad, a spokesman said. The gunmen were hiding in nearby orchards when they struck the motorcade carrying Higher Education Minister Abed Theyab, killing one guard and seriously wounding another, ministry spokesman Basil al-Khatib said.
The attack occurred in the lawless neighborhood of Dora, a Sunni stronghold in the capital.
