KARBALA, Iraq — The U.S. military attacked a mosque in this holy city late Tuesday in its largest assault yet against the forces of the young rebel Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, even as the first signs emerged of a peaceful resolution to the five-week-long standoff with him.
The strike on the Mukhaiyam Mosque brought hundreds of U.S. soldiers and their armored vehicles to within a third of a mile of two of the holiest sites in Shiite Islam, the ornate shrines of the martyrs Hussein and Abbas. A building behind the mosque was fired on, detonating a huge weapons cache, and soldiers stormed the mosque, chasing insurgents out into a hotel and alley. The number of casualties could not be immediately determined.
By 3:30 a.m., some 30 insurgents had taken up positions around the Shrine of Abbas, and they appeared to be lobbing mortars from that area to the Mukhaiyam Mosque. Special Forces soldiers began organizing groups of Iraqi forces to counterattack.
Until now, U.S. forces had kept out of Karbala and nearby Najaf, another holy city, fearing to further inflame Iraqis against the occupying forces.
Before the attack, Col. Peter Mansoor, commander of the 1st Brigade of the 1st Armored Division, said military officers had met with Karbala's leaders and believed they would support the operation because they want al-Sadr's Mahdi Army run out of town. U.S. forces may be banking on the belief that al-Sadr is loathed by the country's mainstream Shiite leaders and that many Muslims disagree with his use of mosques as something like military bases. On Tuesday, several hundred Iraqis marched in Najaf to demand that he and his militia leave.
Thirteen more were killed in overnight fighting near Najaf.
The mosque attack came as news emerged that Adnan al-Zorfi, the U.S.-appointed governor in Najaf, had offered to delay attempts to capture al-Sadr if he agreed to disband his militia, which seized control of Najaf and Karbala last month.
The offer, Zorfi said, was made after consultations with U.S. authorities, suggesting that U.S. leaders are reconsidering their stated goal of "killing or capturing" al-Sadr.
In leaflets handed out by his office in Najaf on Tuesday, al-Sadr appeared to respond favorably, saying he would end his rebellion if the "occupation forces" agreed to enter talks overseen by the Shiite religious leadership.
"I am ready to end everything if the occupation forces officially ask for negotiations, on the condition that these negotiations are just and transparent and under the stewardship of the Shiite religious authorities," the leaflets said. The leaflets bore al-Sadr's signature.
Knight Ridder Newspapers reported that in a conciliatory gesture, the U.S. Army general battling al-Sadr said he would consider accepting al-Sadr's top militia deputies and other fighters in a new security force he is forming to patrol the holy Shiite city of Najaf.
Maj. Gen. Martin E. Dempsey's idea regarding the black-clad militiamen, dozens of whom have been killed in recent days by U.S.-led forces, was made public Tuesday.