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All praise and thanks are due to Allah, and peace and blessings be
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U.S. Soldier killed, A 'Number' Wounded In Iraq Attacks

BAGHDAD, August 29 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - One U.S.
soldier was killed and three wounded in a rocket-propelled grenade and
small arms attack in Iraq Friday, August 29, U.S. Central Command
said, as an undetermined number of U.S. soldiers were injured in
another attack.

"One 4th Infantry Division soldier was killed and three were wounded
in a rocket-propelled grenade and small arms fire attack one kilometer
(less than a mile) north of As-Suaydat at approximately 9:15 am (0515
GMT) today," a Central Command statement said, according to Agence
France-Presse (AFP).

As-Suaydat is near the hotspot town of Baquba, some 65 kilometers (40
miles) northeast of Baghdad, where U.S. soldiers regularly come under
attack.

"The wounded soldiers were taken to the 21st Combat Support Hospital
for treatment," the Centcom statement said.

A witness earlier told AFP he had heard an explosion caused by the
firing of rocket-propelled grenades and seen four American soldiers
lying on the ground.

"I rushed out (after hearing the blast) and saw a vehicle on fire and
four soldiers lying on the ground. One was dead covered with a
blanket, and three were receiving first aid," said Hussein Sadr, a
shopkeeper.

U.S. helicopters buzzed overhead after the incident, he said.

In another attack, an undetermined number of U.S. soldiers were also
wounded Friday in Ramadi a day after a British soldier was killed in
southern Iraq and eight U.S. troops were wounded as resistance to the
U.S.-led occupation showed no letup five months after the fall of
Baghdad.

In Ramadi, an undetermined number of U.S. soldiers were wounded Friday
when a bomb went off as they drove through the flashpoint town of
Ramadi, 100 kilometers (60 miles) west of Baghdad, witnesses said.

"A bomb went off under two U.S. vehicles driving by the Saddam Great
Mosque in the center of Ramadi at around 7:00 am (0300 GMT),
destroying one vehicle, damaging the other and injuring a number of
soldiers," Qusay Ismail al-Suwaidawi, a resident of the town, told
AFP.

U.S. troops called in reinforcements and two helicopters were seen
hovering over the scene of the attack, he said.

The wounded soldiers were evacuated as troops cordoned off the site,
Suwaidawi added.

On Thursday, August 28, many U.S. soldiers were wounded, four in an
attack in the flashpoint town of Fallujah, 60 kilometers (40 miles)
west of Baghdad, and the others on a road north of the capital, a
military spokesman said.

A military convoy also came under fire on the road between Kirkuk and
Balad, north of Baghdad, leaving four people wounded, the spokesman
said.

The attack late Wednesday, August 27, followed the earlier killings
of two U.S. soldiers around Baghdad, a regular battlefield in the war
of attrition between the U.S. occupation forces and guerrilla
fighters.

The British soldier was killed and another wounded in the southeastern
province of Maysan, near the border with Iran, when a convoy of troops
were confronted by a mob, a British military spokesman said.

The troops were returning from a raid on the town of Ali al-Gharbi,
where they had arrested two men for "anti-coalition" activities,
spokesman Major Charlie Mayo said.

The death brought to 11 the number of British soldiers killed in Iraq
since Washington declared major combat over on May 1.

This comes as European countries opened debate on helping with the
peacekeeping effort after Washington said it might hand some
responsibilities over to the United Nations, with France calling for a
"real international force" in Iraq.

The U.S. army's 4th Infantry Division, meanwhile, detained 17 more
people north of Baghdad as it scoured the countryside for criminals
and Saddam Hussein's henchmen on the third day of its Operation Ivy
Needle, a military spokesman said.

The unrest in the south came as U.S. marines were preparing to hand
over five provinces in south-central Iraq to a 9,000-troop Polish-led
multinational force. The handover is to be complete by September 3.

Intelligence Needed

The ground commander in Iraq, Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, said
that the coalition does not need more troops in Iraq but more human
intelligence on anti-coalition activities.

"This environment is an environment that requires intelligence ... It
is clear to me at this point in time given the missions and given the
tasks, it is not a matter of additional soldiers. That's not going to
solve the problem when I don't have the intelligence to act on,"
Sanchez told reporters.

"It's an issue of being able to work with the Iraqi people, and
getting the Iraqi people to help us.

Sanchez dismissed the notion that more soldiers could stabilize a
shaky environment around Baghdad and north and west of the capital,
which climaxed in last week's devastating bombing of the U.N.
headquarters in Baghdad.

Sanchez also bluntly dismissed a Washington Post report that said the
coalition was recruiting former members of Saddam's secret service for
a new intelligence network.

"I can tell you unequivocally: I'm not ... recruiting an intelligence
service, and I'm not involved in rehiring any of the Iraqi
intelligence service former personnel and they will not be brought
onto any future intelligence service that Iraq may consider in the
future," Sanchez said.

U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Monday the United States
would send more troops to Iraq "in a minute" if the top U.S.
commander in the region asked for them.

Real International Force

French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin told a gathering of
French ambassadors in Paris that "whatever measures are taken cannot
simply be an increase or an adjustment of the current occupation
forces.

"It involves putting in place a real international force under a
mandate from the UN Security Council," he said.

His comments, a reiteration of France's position, came after US Deputy
Secretary of State Richard Armitage said this week Washington might be
willing to accept U.N. leadership of an international force in Iraq if
a U.S. general remained in command.

France, Germany, India, Russia and other countries have so far refused
U.S. pleas for troops and would do so only under the U.N. flag.

De Villepin said elections should be held before the end of the year.

The Dutch government faced a grilling in parliament from opposition
parties demanding to know why it agreed to lend political support to
the U.S.-led war in Iraq.

Leftwing MPs wanted answers on whether The Hague had based its
decision on controversial intelligence reports about Iraq's weapons
that have since been called into question.

Spain's opposition lashed out at U.S. activity in Iraq, demanding that
not one euro go toward "occupation" even as 1,300 Spanish soldiers
took over security duty from U.S. troops in southern Iraq.

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Scottish Anti-USA