Shiite Militia Declares a Cease-Fire

A radical Shiite Muslim faction that has fought U.S. forces in southern Iraq declared a halt to all combat activities Friday as Iraqis jockeyed for power and tried to rein in violence in the days before the transfer of power from occupation authorities.

At Friday prayers in a Baghdad neighborhood, the Al Mahdi army, a militia loyal to cleric Muqtada Sadr, announced that it had unilaterally ceased all combat activity until further notice. It said that anyone who violated the moratorium would be expelled from its ranks and punished.

In the holy city of Najaf, a power struggle among Shiite factions prevented anyone from leading the Friday prayer session at the Imam Ali Mosque, an important Shiite shrine.

The public dispute between clerics with ties to the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq and a Sadr faction reflected political maneuvering before the scheduled hand-over Wednesday. It also illustrated the strains on the religious leadership as it tries to find a course between the U.S.-led occupation and the anti-American insurgency.

At a mosque in Sadr City, the Baghdad suburb that is Sadr’s power base, Shiite leaders condemned the beheading this week of a South Korean contractor as “disfiguring the image of Islam.” Sheik Jabir Khafaji, who led prayers at the mosque, said the hostage should have been released.

The intensity of insurgent attacks Thursday may have given pause even to some militant groups. Only three of the 105 people killed in attacks in five cities were U.S. soldiers. The rest were Iraqis, including civilians.

Much of the violence was in Baghdad and primarily Sunni Muslim areas to the west and north, rather than the heavily Shiite south. But groups such as Sadr’s Al Mahdi army have been viewed as indifferent to, if not complicit with, insurgents operating in the Sunni areas.

Sadr loyalists have announced previous cease-fires, and fighting with U.S. forces has tapered off in recent weeks after heavy combat this spring. In Sadr City, where U.S. troops have fought running battles with Shiite militiamen, a top U.S. military official welcomed the announcement.

“I think this is a very positive step in reducing the cycle of violence in and around Sadr City,” said Army Col. Robert B. Abrams, commander of the 1st Brigade Combat Team of the 1st Cavalry Division in Baghdad. He said it reflected the sentiment of most of Sadr City’s people, who number more than 2 million, that it was time for peace.

“This announcement may reflect the people telling the Mahdi army and the Sadr bureau that enough is enough,” Abrams said.

U.S. warplanes launched the third airstrike in a week Friday against a suspected stronghold of the insurgency’s alleged mastermind in a neighborhood of Fallouja, west of Baghdad. Abu Musab Zarqawi, a Palestinian born in Jordan, is suspected of leading a group affiliated with the Al Qaeda terrorist network.

Army Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, the chief U.S. military spokesman, estimated that up to 25 people had been killed in the airstrike. Several residents, however, reported by telephone that the air raid had flattened one house but inflicted only a handful of minor injuries. At the local hospital, nurse Abbas Ali said that no one brought there had serious injuries.

Five masked gunmen claiming to be attacking coalition forces from Fallouja appeared on the Al Arabiya television channel, denying that this week’s violence was the work of Zarqawi. They said the attacks had been carried out by Iraqis bent on driving out occupiers.

“The invading American forces allege that Zarqawi and other Arab fighters are in our city. It is insulting the intelligence of people throughout the world,” the group said in a statement read during the broadcast. “We, the people of Fallouja, are the ones defending our city.”

Armored vehicles engaged militants on the outskirts of Fallouja on Friday; an Iraqi policeman was killed in a bombing in Baghdad and mortar rounds detonated throughout the capital, but the day was considerably less violent than preceding ones.

Leaders of the interim government vowed to defeat the insurgents and accused them of crimes against Islam.

“It is the responsibility of every Iraqi to cooperate with us to remove this cancer,” Interior Minister Falah Nakib told journalists.

Defense Minister Hazem Shaalan added that the interim government was prepared to impose what would amount to martial law if security continued to deteriorate in the final days before the return of sovereignty. Coalition officials have suggested that such a measure might be illegal under Iraq’s interim constitution, but Shaalan said an “emergency plan” had been drafted, just in case.

“Our culture, our customs have been destroyed. The time has come for a showdown,” Shaalan warned.

Times staff writers Patrick J. McDonnell and Edmund Sanders contributed to this report.