The White House has denied reports that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi may have been killed during a gunfight in Mosul.
US forces sealed off a house in the northern city of Mosul where eight suspected al-Qaeda members died in a gunfight - some by their own hand to avoid capture.
On Saturday, a police official said the raid came after a tip that top al-Qaeda operatives, possibly including al-Zarqawi, were in the house in the northeastern part of the city.
During the gunbattle that followed, three insurgents detonated explosives and killed themselves to avoid capture, Iraqi officials said. Eleven Americans were wounded, the US military said. Such intense resistance often suggests an attempt to defend a high-value target.
But a White House spokesman, said reports of al-Zarqawi's death were "highly unlikely and not credible".
Al-Zarqawi has narrowly escaped capture in the past. US forces said they nearly caught him in a February 2005 raid that recovered his computer.
In May, it was claimed he was wounded in fighting and was taken out of the country for treatment. Within days, it reported he had returned - though there was never any independent confirmation that he was wounded.
AP