In Iraq, Peaceful Protests and Attacks

A wounded American soldier was treated after a rocket attack Monday outside a base in the Sadr City neighborhood of Baghdad.

BAGHDAD — Four American soldiers were killed by rocket or mortar attacks in Baghdad on Monday, a day after a dust storm blanketed the city and provided cover for fierce shelling of the fortified Green Zone and assaults on American and Iraqi forces.

Three of the soldiers were killed in the southeastern neighborhood of New Baghdad, the American military said. The other soldier died in Kadhimiya, in the northern part of the capital.
A rocket attack also wounded American soldiers on Monday at a small frontline base in the Sadr City neighborhood, where American and Iraqi troops have been battling militia fighters loyal to the Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr for more than a month. American military officials said that for security reasons, they could not confirm the injuries.
On Sunday afternoon, as a dense and gritty orange cloud of dust settled over Baghdad, grounding military helicopters, a hail of shells arced toward the Green Zone, with the barrage continuing into the early hours of Monday. Sporadic rocket and mortar fire continued throughout the day. No American casualties were reported.
American forces, using Abrams tanks, also fought off a large group of militia fighters on Sunday evening at an Iraqi checkpoint at the edge of Sadr City, killing 22 of the attackers. The assault on the Green Zone came a few days after American military officials contended that their operations in Sadr City had brought about a sharp decline in rocket and mortar attacks on the zone, which houses the United States Embassy and the central Iraqi government.
Col. Allen Batschelet, chief of staff of the American division that operates in Baghdad, said on Wednesday that the attacks had been carried out mainly from Sadr City by “inept” groups using “basic” systems, and that the joint Iraqi and American military operation in the neighborhood had significantly reduced the rocket attacks.
Although most attention has focused on rocket and mortar attacks against the Green Zone, the vast majority of rockets and mortar shells fall on American military bases and Iraqi targets. Of 697 rounds between March 23 and April 20 in Baghdad, 292 struck American bases, 291 hit Iraqi neighborhoods and 114 hit in the Green Zone, according to figures compiled by the American military.
One victim of Monday’s attacks was a taxi driver who was traveling through the Green Zone when his car was hit by a shell and burst into flames.
Ali Mansour, 30, an employee of Iraq's Defense Ministry, said he was going to work shortly after 8 a.m. when four mortar shells or rockets landed nearby.
“I was a few meters away from them when I tried to hide somewhere safe,” he said.
Mr. Mansour said that he saw the taxi driver, known as Abu Fared, driving fast in order to escape the attacks, when a shell hit the back of his taxi and then exploded on the ground.
“He was burned alive inside the car,” Mr. Mansour said.