end attacks by insurgents, who also targeted several churches in recent days. The Voice
of America (VOA) network quoted Iraq’s interim national security minister Qassem Dawoud as saying that over "1,000 insurgents have been killed." That figure could not be immediately verified.
It came after insurgents, made up of Islamic militants and remnants of the former regime, stepped up violence against Iraq’s Christian minority and others perceived as supporting the United States-led coalition, ahead of upcoming elections in January.
In Baghdad, Christians prepared for church services after car bombs at two churches and outside a hospital treating the victims of those attacks reportedly killed at least eight people and wounded dozens earlier in the week. There were no church members among those killed, as the attacks happened outside church hours, news reports said.
CHURCH BLASTS
The American Forces Press Service (AFPS) said the first blast exploded near the St. George Church in southern Baghdad at about 6:25 p.m. the second suspected car-bomb blast detonated about five minutes later, less than a mile (1,6 kilometer) east of the first attack, outside the St. Matthew Church in southern Baghdad.
"These are not military operations targeting military objectives. These are simply terrorists attacking innocent people, … innocent Iraqis," AFPS quoted U.S. Army Lt. Col. James Hutton, the chief spokesman for the 1st Cavalry Division, as saying.
While some Christians stay away from churches, many reportedly continue to defy the militants." It would be better to die in church than anywhere else," The Associated Press news agency quoted Baghdad Christian Dana Georee as saying Pentagon officials have cautioned that the Fallujah offensive will not stop attacks by insurgents, as many of them are believed to have fled the Sunni stronghold.
AL QAIDA TERRORIST
In addition the al Qaida-connected terrorist leader Abu Musab Al Zarqawi, who U.S. and Iraqi officials said was operating out of Fallujah, has not been found. As marines continued house-to-house searching operations in Fallujah, Aljazeera, the Arabic news channel, aired comments from a desperate doctor trapped inside a hospital.
"Nobody knows when to get out of their homes, there is shooting everywhere," he said. Marines were seen fighting gun battles in several streets as part of what has been called the biggest urban military operation since the Vietnam war. However American officials said the military was heading towards complete control over Fallujah.
American President George W. Bush, speaking Saturday, November 13, in his weekly radio address, said American Marines and soldiers were clearing mosques of weapons and explosives and restoring order for law-abiding citizens in Fallujah.
BUSH WARNS
Despite the offensive against what Bush called a base of operations for terrorist attacks, the defeat of the insurgency there will not stop violence elsewhere in Iraq. "As those elections draw near, the desperation of the killers will grow, and the violence could escalate," the president said.
"The success of democracy in Iraq would be a crushing blow to the forces of terror, and the terrorists know it." The prospect of more terror, was no music in the ears of Ameera Dawoud a Christian in Mosul. As soon as the Islamic month of Ramadan began, she traded her pants, fitted skirts and uncovered hair for oversize clothes and a veil.
"They say you have to cover your hair or we will kill you," Dawoud told The Associated Press (AP) news agency. Pascale lsho Warda, a Christian who is the interim government’s minister for displacement and migration, has reportedly estimated as many as 15,000 out of Iraq’s up to 1 million Christians have left the country since August attacks on churches.
Analysts say under Saddam Hussein, militant Islamists were not able to gain clout, but that Islamic fundamentalism increased after his ouster and initial anarchy.
