Maitham Tammar mosque hurt, Ayatullah’s office attacked

By: Ismail Zabeeh

KUFA, Iraq: Maitham At-Tammar Mosque was damaged during fierce fighting on Saturday night (night between Friday and Saturday) between US forces and Moqtada Sadr's Mehdi Army militia in the city of Kufa.

For three hours overnight, American forces and militiamen clashed around the mosque - named after a revered companion of Imam Ali bin Abi Talib (pbuh), Maitham At-Tammar and erected on the place where At-Tammar was hanged for uttering truth - and court house, just 10 kilometres (six miles) east of the holy city of Najaf.

Doctor Muhammad Abdel Kazem at Kufa hospital said one person was killed and 12 wounded in the violence.

A huge hole had been torn in the outer wall of the mosque compound. Part of the court building opposite was blackened and gutted by fire, with caked blood smeared on the windows, said an AFP correspondent.

In the holy city of Najaf, four mortars crashed into the office of Ayatullah Hafiz Bashir An-Najafi, the second most senior cleric in Najaf, Friday evening, but no one was killed or wounded, according to a statement from his office.

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