Iraqi Holy City  Left Broken by Urban Warfare
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U.S. troops' pinpoint fire and munitions restrictions have ensured that Najaf's Imam Ali shrine remains all but unscathed. But the core of the city around it, dear to millions of Shiite Muslims, has been mauled by combat.
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A year ago, the bombing of this city's revered Shiite mosque set off a spasm of sectarian violence that has pushed the country toward a full-scale civil war. The mosque remains closed, its golden dome still a mound of rubble and wires amid the wave of hatred that has made renovation work too dangerous to begin.
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BAGHDAD, Iraq - When US forces pushed through southern Iraq in the war last year, Najaf was just another spot on the map to Baghdad. But during the past two weeks of fighting in Najaf, the dusty city proved to be a glaring example of the ...
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Britain LONDON -- US-led forces, using Iraq's ancient city of Babylon as a military base, have caused "substantial damage" to one of the world's most renowned archeological treasures, a British Museum report said. The report, quoted in today's Guardian newspaper, said US and Polish military vehicles had crushed 2,600-year-old pavements in the city, a cradle of civilization and home to ...
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NAJAF, Iraq  - US warplanes pounded areas near a shrine where radical Shi&#39;ite militiamen were holed up early Friday after their leader, Moqtada al-Sadr, defied a final demand from Iraq&#39;s interim prime minister to disarm.
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NAJAF/KERBALA, Iraq  - Suicide car bombers struck  Iraq's two main Shi'ite holy cities of Najaf and Kerbala  Sunday, killing at least 44 people and wounding more than 100,  six weeks before a historic election.
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NAJAF, Iraq  - At least five loud explosions on  Thursday echoed from near holy sites in the Iraqi city of Najaf  where a radical Shi'ite cleric has remained holed up despite  earlier agreeing to leave a sacred shrine.
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The attack signaled that the cycle of violence following the destruction a Shiite shrine has not entirely unfolded.
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FALLUJA, Iraq  - Air and artillery strikes shook  the rebel-held Iraqi city of Falluja on Friday night after U.S.  forces, using leaflets and loudspeakers, urged civilians to  leave.
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CAIRO, Egypt - An audiotape purportedly by key terror suspect Abu Musab al-Zarqawi boasts that Islamic holy warriors have humiliated the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq.    The speaker noted recent battles between American forces and militiamen loyal to a radical Shiite cleric in the holy city of Najaf, indicating that it had been made recently...
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Suspected al-Qaida bombers toppled the towering minarets of Samarra's revered Shiite shrine on Wednesday, dealing a bold blow to Iraqi hopes for peace and reopening old wounds a year after the mosque's Golden Dome was destroyed.
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NAJAF, Iraq -- A Shi'ite Muslim insurgency appeared to be weakening last night as Iraqi forces moved to within 200 yards of the revered Imam Ali Shrine and Iraq's defense minister once again demanded fighters loyal to a radical cleric surrender or face a violent raid.
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The two minarets of the al-Askari shrine in Iraq, one of the holiest sites in Shia Islam, are damaged by several explosions, officials say.
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BAGHDAD -- Tens of thousands of Shi'ite Muslim pilgrims headed to a shrine city south of the capital yesterday amid heavy security as the daily toll of casualties mounted in a sectarian war without respite.
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Intensified insurgent attacks on Shiite holy cities have sparked renewed fears of sectarian strife.
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Sunday&#39;s bombings in Shiite holy cities - the deadliest insurgent attacks since July - appeared aimed at sparking sectarian strife.
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SPORADIC gunfire, explosions and a US bombing raid shook the city of Najaf yesterday as militants retained control of a revered shrine, raising fears that a plan to end the crisis could collapse amid bickering between Shiite leaders.