IRAQ: Fresh fighting erupted between US troops and militiamen loyal to rebel Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in the holy Iraqi city of Kerbala yesterday, residents said.
Gunfire echoed from narrow streets just a few hundred metres from the Imam Hussein mosque, one of Shia Islam's most revered shrines, which sits in the centre of the city. A column of black smoke rose from behind the mosque.
A correspondent at the scene said militiamen had attacked a US Abrams tank with rocket-propelled grenades and damaged it seriously. There was no immediate confirmation from US commanders.
The clashes followed a lull in fighting for several hours after fierce fighting on Wednesday, when the US military said up to 20 militiamen might have been killed.
Fighters said they lost seven dead and claimed to have inflicted heavy losses in an ambush on of soldiers of the new Iraqi Army and the Iraqi Civil Defence Corps fighting alongside the Americans.
There was no official confirmation of any casualties from US commanders.
But Dr Muntzer Saad of the city's main hospital said 15 bodies had been brought in on Wednesday. Some of them were fighters, but the majority were civilians, including women, he said.
On Thursday, seven wounded people were taken to the hospital, at least three of them young, bearded men typical of Sadr's militiamen. Two were seriously wounded.
US forces and the militia, known as the Mahdi Army, have skirmished repeatedly in recent days, not just in Kerbala but in Najaf, to the south, and several other Shia-dominated cities.
The US military has pledged to destroy the Mahdi Army, a force estimated to be around 5,000 strong and formed in the last year.
Despite its far greater strength, US forces have found it difficult to tackle the militia, with fighters hiding out in back alleys and inside religious buildings.
Madhi Army fighters claim to have hundreds of men armed with mortars and rocket-propelled grenades and say they expect a long drawn-out battle for Kerbala.
US commanders say they will avoid being drawn into fighting too close to shrines such as Imam Hussein and other important mosques in Kerbala and Najaf, fearing that could infuriate Shias further and lead to a greater backlash.
Al-Qaeda supporter Abu Musab al-Zarqawi probably was the one who beheaded American Nick Berg on a video shown this week on an Islamist website, a US official said yesterday.
US intelligence agencies have been analysing the video, which has poor audio quality, and while the technical analysis was not complete, it was "quite probably" Zarqawi who wielded the knife, the official said.
The intelligence analysis so far is leaning toward "Zarqawi personally \ the voice heard on the tape and that the person whose voice is on the tape is also the person who wields the knife," the official said on condition of anonymity.
Nick Berg's father, Michael, directly blamed President Bush and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld for his son's death.
"My son died for the sins of George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld. This administration did this," Mr Berg said in a radio interview. He also said his son probably would have felt positive even about his executioners until the last minute.
"I am sure that he only saw the good in his captors until the last second of his life," Mr Berg said.