Falluja: i Mujahideen ora controllano il 70% della città

Mujahideen With Fresh Fighters Now Control 70% Of Fallujah; Aid Gets In
Nov 30, 2004
By Omar al-Faris, JUS and Muhammad Abu Nasr, Free Arab Voice

More than 100 Resistance fighters have managed to gain access to Fallujah, joining up with hundreds of other fighters that have flooded into the city in recent days and joined the ranks of the city’s defenders.

According to a report filed at 12:50pm Monday local time by Mafkarat al-Islam’s in Fallujah, the US presence in the city is now limited and the Mujahideen now control more than 70 percent of the city. Fighters from ar-Ramadi have joined up with the fighters inside al-Fallujah and these fighters are said to be experts in urban warfare

The US forces have now erected barricades between demolished walls in the al-Jaghifi and al-Jawlan neighborhoods to try to prevent the further advance of the Mujahideen as the Americans are encountering increasing difficulty in withdrawing from the city. Occupation forces have once again closed the new bridge that links Fallujah with the tourist area, but the Americans were unable to close the old bridge which remains open, however it is unsafe.

At the time of this filing, the US columns are still trying to withdraw from the city as the Mujahideen continued to attack them. At about 2:15pm Sunday, US forces began to withdraw some of their columns in an operation that lasted until late Sunday night. Mafkarat al-Islam’s correspondents in al-Azraqiyah to the west of al-Fallujah, and in al-‘Amiriyah witnessed fires burning on those American columns, as they passed along the road to the US base in al-Habbaniyah, indicating that the Mujahideen were continuing to ambush the convoys as they were trying to retreat from the city.

Red Crescent Relief Convoys Get In Despite US Obstruction

An spokesman for the Iraqi Red Crescent reported that the IRC was able to get three relief convoys into Fallujah on Monday. The convoys carried medical supplies and nutritional supplements, blankets and bedspreads in order to give the residents of the city some protection against the intense cold that strikes Iraq at this time of year.

Firdaws al-‘Ibadi told Mafkarat al-Islam in Baghdad that the IRC also opened two centers inside Fallujah, the first in the al-Hadrah Mosque, and the second in the home of Shaykh Khalaf ash-Shadid al-‘Isawi, which is located in the ash-Shurtah neighborhood.

Al-‘Ibadi said that volunteers working in the two centers began on Sunday to provided three warm meals a day to the civilian residents of the city. The meals are provided in the two centers and residents may come to the centers to get them and take them home. Three Red Crescent cars in the city are trying to delivering some meals however US forces are currently preventing meal delivery for fear that some of the food might reach Mujahideen defending the city. Isma‘il Saqr, the Director of the Iraqi Red Crescent, announced that a fourth relief convoy would be sent into the city today.

Firdaws al-‘Ibadi said that the IRC would be sending three convoys into the city every week beginning next week. She also said that upon their request, 17 people had been evacuated to Baghdad on Red Crescent vehicles, including some pregnant women who were evacuated to Baghdad to receive proper medical attention.

Some sources in the city report that there are 150 families blockaded inside the city, but other sources say the number of civilians still there is higher. Mafkarat al-Islam reports that large numbers of Fallujah residents who have left the city, with 1,200 families now staying in al-Habbaniyah; 250 families in al-Halabisah and al-Bu ‘Alwan; 400 families in as-Saqlawiyah; 155 families in al-Majar; 3,500 families in ‘Amiriyat al-Fallujah, which was also the scene of fierce fighting on Sunday-Monday night. There are also crowds of refugee families in Baghdad and al-Karmah.

US Allows Fallujah Residents Four Hours To Bury Bodies

US forces had finally permitted the city’s residents to bury the bodies of their dead. They prohibited the burial of the dead in as-Saqlawiyah, however, where Fallujah’s victims had earlier been interred for ‘security out of control”, according to a report filed at 6:45pm local time Monday.

US forces gave Fallujah residents four hours starting at 8 o’clock and ending at 12 o’clock to bury their relatives and were told that American snipers would shoot them dead if they ventured out outside that four-hour window. Residents buried their dead among the “islands” that divide the streets of what is left of the city, in back yards of houses, and in any open ground.

US forces brought in workers from the an-Nasr as-Salam area between Fallujah and Baghdad to load other dead bodies into coolers and other refrigerated units. The workers also deposited the bodies of dead Allawi “national guard” troops in the same coolers. Interestingly, American Chinook helicopters evacuated dead Americans but left the corpses of their Allawi allies.