Author: 
Marwan Naamani, Agence France Presse
Publication Date: 
Mon, 2004-05-03 03:00

FALLUJAH, Iraq, 3 May 2004 — Under a scorching sun and with dust covering their faces, Iraqi soldiers of the newly-formed Fallujah Brigade watched scores of cars enter the restive city yesterday through a small road to bypass a US checkpoint.

Young fighters, brandishing AK-47 Kalashnikovs and rocket propelled grenade launchers greeted those returning home through the checkpoints decorated by Iraqi flags after a month of fighting with US Marines. Fallujah residents returned greetings by throwing candies to the fighters, who covered their faces with traditional checkered keffiyahs.

Others flashed “V” for victory as they drove their cars over slogans written on the asphalt denouncing the United States and its President George W. Bush. But at noon, a respected sheikh and tribal leader drove through the various checkpoints erected in the city and ordered the fighters to go home.

“There is an agreement. The battles are over now and you should go home and leave your weapons and go back to your normal life,” the sheikh, who declined to give his name, told a group of fighters. “By four o’clock we do not want any kind of armed presence,” he added.

Under an agreement reached with US marines, a retired Iraqi general believed to have been jailed for years under Saddam Hussein’s regime has been chosen to head the force trying to halt violence in Fallujah.

“We fought like men, but now we will rest and see how things will go. We had an agreement with the Americans to patrol the streets of the city but not to search houses,” said Ahmad, a 20-year-old fighter. US military officials have professed their wish to recruit on board Iraqi security veterans who do not have much blood on their hands, even if they flirted with the insurgency at one time.

Thin traffic returned to the streets of the city and policeman took control of the main roads. Most of the shops were still closed in Fallujah’s main market while civilians gathered on corners. Bullet-riddled walls and shell-scarred roofs marked almost all the houses of the southern Al-Shuhada neighborhood, testifying to the pitched battles the marines fought as they tried to push into the city.

The streets were pocked with craters left by US rockets, and they were littered with debris and downed electricity poles. A nearby football pitch has been turned into a mass grave and dozens of relatives paid their respects to the dead. Many wept while others stood and prayed silently.

At a crossroads at the Jolan district in the northwest of the city, considered the heart of the insurgency, fighters said the marines should withdraw from adjacent areas in the afternoon.

The US military has denied there are any plans to leave the city’s northern perimeter in the next few days. But the insurgents were sure the marines were leaving all areas of the city yesterday. “The marines are still there, but they will leave in the afternoon,” a fighter said.

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