Bombings, ambush kill eight US troops in Iraq

BAGHDAD -- US forces in western Iraq are facing fierce resistance to their new effort to take control of the Syrian border, with car bombs and an apparent ambush killing eight American troops in a single day, Army and Marine officials said yesterday.

The deadly series of attacks Monday included the ambush of six Marines on a foot patrol outside of Haditha, Marine officials said. Five of the Marines were killed by small-arms fire in the initial assault. One was later found dead a couple miles away, a Marine statement said. Officials declined to say whether he was taken hostage before he was killed, and the military was investigating the incident.

A seventh Marine was killed by a car bomb in nearby Hit. All of the slain Marines were assigned to Regimental Combat Team-2 of the 2d Marine Division.

A US Army soldier was killed near the Syrian border in a car bombing that also injured an Army Times reporter.

The eight deaths Monday bring to more than 1,800 the number of US troops killed since the start of the March 2003 invasion. In an Internet statement, the Army of Ansar al Sunna insurgent group claimed responsibility for killing the Marines, Reuters reported.

There was no word from the military on whether any insurgents were killed in the attacks in western Iraq. The deaths of the Americans, though, highlight the intensity of the fighting in the area following a recent order by Army General George W. Casey, the top US commander in the country, to control Iraq's western border by November.

Army troops with the 1st Brigade of the 25th Infantry Division two weeks ago began setting up the first long-term US outpost in the northern Euphrates River valley, in the small city of Rawah, and are seeking to wrest control of a historic smuggling route. Military officials say intelligence reports suggest that insurgents have been using the route to ferry in as many as 200 foreign fighters each month from Syria, along with bomb-laden cars and trucks, east toward Baghdad and other city centers.

US military officials generally agree that foreign fighters make up less than 10 percent of the insurgency, but play a prominent role in coordinating and directing major attacks. A majority of the insurgents, US authorities say, are Sunni Arabs from Iraq.

As the military pressed on with its campaign in western Iraq, families in the impoverished Baghdad neighborhood of Abu Disheer mourned the deaths of 22 Shi'ite Muslim men who were executed and left Monday in a trash heap in the nearby Um Maalif area.

On Tuesday, a dozen shuttered shops bore black signs announcing the deaths of their owners in a neighborhood dotted with signs from earlier incidents. The men were shot in the head and chest, and police said some showed signs of torture.