Washington Post - Thursday, March 16, 2006

"The Americans have promised us a better life, but we get only death."

At least four and perhaps as many as 13 people were killed, including a number of women and at least one child, in a U.S. military operation Wednesday against a house where insurgent collaborators were believed to have taken refuge, local officials and the U.S. military said. Family members and local police officials said at least 11 people, including five children and four women, were killed in the attack, according to wire service reports from the area. Police Capt. Hakim Azzawi said in an interview that 13 people had been killed -- five children, six women and two men. Riyadh Majid, who identified himself as the nephew of the head of the family, Faez Khalaf, who was killed in the attack, told the Associated Press that U.S. forces landed in helicopters and raided the home early Wednesday. Khalaf's brother, Ahmed, said nine of the victims were family members who lived at the house and two were unidentified visitors. "The killed family was not part of the resistance; they were women and children," Ahmed Khalaf told the AP. "The Americans have promised us a better life, but we get only death."

Haifa Zangana (from Not One More Death)

Among the 'insurgents' killed that day (by a US F-15 fighter) were 6 year old Muhammad Salih Ali, who was buried in a plastic bag after relatives collected what they believed to be parts of his body; 4 year old Saad Ahmed Fuad; and his 8 year old sister, Haifa, who had to be buried without one of her legs, as her family were unable to find it.'

16/3: The US military has launched the biggest air attack on Iraq since the 2003 invasion Press release