PENTAGON (AP) - The Pentagon says the past two days of fighting in Iraq have claimed 14 American lives.
Yesterday's count of eleven dead is the highest one-day total in more than a-half year. Officials say most of those deaths came in a wave of attacks in Baghdad and southwest of Fallujah.
Iraq's interim prime minister has declared a nighttime curfew in Baghdad and its surroundings. This, a day after a string of insurgent attacks in Baghdad that killed nine Iraqis and wounded more than 80.
US soldiers in central Fallujah
PENTAGON (AP) - American soldiers are in the heart of Fallujah.
Officials say some of the troops are engaging clusters of guerrilla fighters while still others are going house-to-house, looking for insurgents and weapons.
Pentagon offcials say the fighting has been lighter than expected in the northwest part of Fallujah, a location that's been a insurgent stronghold for months.
That may not be a good thing, though.
Some defense officials are taking that as a sign that significant numbers of insurgents have left Fallujah, with plans to fight another day in another location.
There are new reports that hundreds of guerrillas are roaming the streets of nearby Ramadi, in hoods and masks brandishing weapons.
Clerics call for Iraqi elections boycott
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Sunni Muslim clerics are calling for a boycott of Iraq's national elections in January.
It's intended to protest the US-led offensive in Fallujah.
The secretary-general of the Association of Muslim Scholars says the election would be held "over the corpses of those killed in Fallujah and the blood of the wounded."
The group had threatened before to call for a boycott if an all-out assault on Fallujah took place.
The boycott is unlikely to gain much support among the majority Shiite population. Shiites make up about 60 percent of all Iraqis.
US officials and others fear, though, that a lack of Sunni participation could raise questions about the vote's legitimacy.
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