TAKE A BREAK, MOOK:

Sadr orders militia heads out of Iraq : president (Ross Colvin, 2/15/07, Reuters)

Radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has ordered heads of his Mehdi Army militia to leave Iraq and asked the government to arrest "outlaws" under a U.S.-backed crackdown, Iraq's president said on Thursday.

President Jalal Talabani made the remarks after Iraq closed its borders with Iran and Syria and as U.S. and Iraqi troops tightened their grip on Baghdad, searching neighborhoods and setting up checkpoints that searched even official convoys.

Baghdad sweep targets Sunni strongholds (BRIAN MURPHY, 2/15/07, Associated Press)

Most of the latest resistance has come from Sunni factions, which perceive their
Saddam Hussein-era influence slipping away as the majority Shiites extend their political muscle and bolster ties to powerful Iran.

In Baghdad's Dora neighborhood -- a longtime Sunni militant hotbed -- two parked cars wired with explosives were triggered as a joint U.S.-Iraqi patrol rolled past. The convoy was unharmed, but the blast killed at least four civilians and wounded 15.

Control of the Dora district, a once upscale neighborhood favored by Saddam's regime, is important as a gateway between Baghdad and the Shiite-dominated south. Two other car bomb blasts came as security forces moved through the capital, killing at least three civilians.

Outside Baghdad, troops also faced Sunni ambushes. In Buhriz, about 30 miles northeast of the capital, Sunni gunmen and soldiers from the 1st Squadron, 12th Cavalry Regiment engaged in a 20-minute firefight.

U.S. Bradley fighting vehicles fired 25mm rounds into homes shielding the gunmen, said an Associated Press reporter traveling with the unit.

No U.S. casualties were reported, and the militant toll was not known. Separately, however, a U.S. Marine was killed in combat in Iraq's western Anbar province, a Sunni militant stronghold.

Even the first steps of the security operation display the sectarian divides complicating any plan to calm Baghdad -- which is key to begin stabilizing the rest of the country.

A leader of the main Sunni bloc in parliament, Adnan al-Dulaimi, claimed the U.S.-led sweeps have "started to attack" mostly Sunni areas. "It should concentrate on those who are perpetrating the violence and terrorist acts in all districts," he said -- an apparent reference to the Shiite militia stronghold of Sadr City.

Kinda slow on the uptake there, fella.

MORE:
Iraqi terror leader reported wounded (CNN, 2/15/07)

The leader of al Qaeda in Iraq has been wounded and his top aide killed in a clash with police, an Iraqi Interior Ministry spokesman told CNN Thursday.

Brig. Gen. Abdul Karim Khalaf said Iraqi police got into a firefight with insurgents on the road between Falluja, west of Baghdad, and Samarra, north of Baghdad, and wounded Abu Ayyub al-Masri.

Abu Abdullah al-Majamiai, al-Masri's top aide, was killed, he said.

Posted by Orrin Judd at February 15, 2007 5:37 PM