ANYONE EVER HEAR ANY MORE ABOUT THIS ONE????

I first posted this on March 16th. I thought about this when I read about the Haditha incident. I wonder how many times it's happened..... I don't recall ever hearing about this being investigated or the outcome of an investigation. Wait long enough, and it all goes away.... until the next time.


U.S. attack on house kills several civilians


Military says 3 died; witnesses say 11 killed

By John Johnson Jr.
Los Angeles Times
Posted March 16 2006


BAGHDAD · A U.S. raid Wednesday on a suspected militant hide-out in a rural region north of Baghdad resulted in the deaths of two women and a child as well as one insurgent, U.S. military officials said.

Neighbors and relatives in the Balad area near Samarra disputed that account, saying 11 members of a schoolteacher's family had been killed.

The military said troops conducting an operation to capture an al-Qaida organizer "were engaged by enemy fire" as they approached the building where the man was thought to be holed up.

"Coalition forces returned fire, utilizing both air and ground assets," the military said. The house and a vehicle were destroyed and an unidentified "foreign fighter facilitator" was captured, the military said.

Neighbors and local Iraqi police officials countered that the assault targeted innocent victims.

"At 5 a.m., we went to the house and saw the family members were hand-tied and shot in the head," said Mohammad Salih Mohammad, 35. "Even their cows died." Among those killed were four children, including a 7-month-old, the neighbors said.

Lt. Majid Shakir Ali of the Samarra police said that "according to our information those people have nothing to do with fighters or terrorists."

U.S. military spokesman Lt. Col. Barry Johnson said "there is a discrepancy" between the military account and accounts by the witnesses. "I don't have an answer yet" to explain it, he said, adding that the military was investigating the incident.

Relatives told The Associated Press that the 11 victims were wrapped in blankets and driven in three pickup trucks to the Tikrit General Hospital, about 45 miles to the north. AP photographs showed the bodies of two men, five children and four other covered figures arriving at the hospital accompanied by grief-stricken relatives.

On the eve of the first session of Iraq's parliament and within days of the third anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion, vehicles were banned from Baghdad's streets to prevent car bombings. Authorities in one of the Shiite holy cities, Karbala, imposed a six-day driving ban starting today in a bid to protect pilgrims this year during the Arba'een religious holiday.

Politicians, meanwhile, reported a stalemate over the next government. Continuing divisions among lawmakers suggested that today's session of the legislature may do little more than swear in members elected three months earlier.

There was little sign of progress after a second full day of meetings among leaders of the major political blocs, sessions brokered by U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and designed to speed agreement on the shape of the next government.

Across Iraq on Wednesday, a handful of civilians were reported killed and about 40 wounded in attacks, mostly from roadside bombs.

The U.S. military said a U.S. soldier was killed by mortar fire southwest of Baghdad.

One man was killed and two others wounded while placing a bomb along a road near Kirkuk. Witnesses said the men were shot from a military plane as they attempted to place the device.

A bomb in Basra targeted a British military convoy, wounding two civilians and a British soldier.

In a Baqouba neighborhood that has been the site of frequent assassinations, a roadside bomb killed the commander of an Iraqi police SWAT team, who was identified as Lt. Alaa Jalil.

In west Baghdad, a car bomb detonated on Harthiya Street, a heavily commercial district of food stores, pharmacies and restaurants, killing a civilian and wounding 15, including two police officers.

It was the second car bomb to explode in 24 hours. The toll would likely have been much higher if it had not been that most people had gone indoors in obedience to an 8 p.m. curfew imposed in anticipation of the opening of the parliament today.
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Who do you believe? I believe the citizens. What the hell are we doing? Tied up and shot in the head??? This is what your military is doing? A 7 month old baby???? God help us!

Question Girl