42 Iraqis, 4 US Soldiers Killed on June 20, 2007

The Iraq News Agency (INA) reported that four US soldiers were killed on June 20, 2007.

- Four US soldiers were killed and three Iraqi civilians were injured in an attack on a US Hummer military vehicle, in Al-Wahda neighborhood, south of Baghdad.

The (US) Associated Press news agency (AP) reported that 42 Iraqis were killed on June 20, 2007, and 127 were killed yesterday. The AP reported the following news.

Gunmen blew up two Sunni mosques Wednesday south of Baghdad, causing heavy damage but no casualties, police said, in an apparent retaliatory attack a day after a suicide truck bombing devastated a revered Shi'i mosque in the heart of the capital, killing at least 87 people.

Thousands of U.S. and Iraqi troops, meanwhile, pressed forward on the second day of an operation (against Iraqi fighters) northeast of Baghdad. The U.S. military said at least 30 Iraqi fighters were killed and several bombs and weapons caches destroyed as the soldiers fought their way through the streets of Ba'aqouba.

The U.S. military operation that involves some 10,000 American soldiers in Diyala province matched in size the force that American generals sent against the city of Fallujah 2 1/2 years ago. By late Tuesday, the military had reported only one American death, a Task Force Lightning soldier killed by an explosion near his vehicle.

Iraqi forces also have joined the battle in Diyala. Iraqi Defense Ministry spokesman Mohammed al-Askari said about 5,000 Iraqi soldiers and 2,000 paramilitary police were fighting, while the military said about 1,000 Iraqi soldiers and an equal number of police were involved. The differing numbers could not be immediately reconciled.

Gunmen detonated a bomb inside a Sunni mosque in Haswa, 30 miles south of Baghdad, at about 1 a.m., then in another mosque near Hillah, about 60 miles south of the capital, about six hours later, local police officers said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of security concerns.

The attackers near Hillah also targeted the imam's house near the mosque, but the cleric fled when he saw them coming, according to the police.

Battles also continued south of Baghdad between Iraqi security forces and Shi'i militiamen loyal to cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Four Iraqi soldiers were killed and a Humvee was burned in nearly two hours of clashes in the town of Numaniyah, 77 miles southeast of Baghdad, police said. The fighting erupted hours after five other Iraqi soldiers were killed and three were wounded by a roadside bomb in the town of Mada'in, on the southeastern outskirts of Baghdad.

Further south, the U.S. military said three Iraqi fighters had been killed, including a senior leader of al-Sadr's Mahdi Army, and 45 detained after two days of clashes in Nassiriyah, about 200 miles southeast of Baghdad. Iraqi police and hospital officials put the casualty toll at 35 killed and 150 wounded.

In all, 142 people were killed or found dead in sectarian violence Tuesday, a toll reflecting carnage associated with the months before the U.S. security crackdown in the capital began Feb. 14.

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