Suicide Blast Kills 7 Marines

A suicide car bomber killed seven Marines in a military convoy near the city of Fallouja on Monday in the deadliest attack on U.S. forces since April.

Three members of the Iraqi national guard also were killed during the bombing outside Fallouja, long a hot spot during Iraq’s 16-month-old insurgency against the U.S.-led force in Iraq.

The seven fatalities are the largest number of U.S. troops killed in a single attack since April 29, when eight soldiers died in a car bombing. That assault was in an area south of Baghdad that also had become a hub for insurgent activities, including roadside attacks and kidnappings.

The Marines killed Monday were members of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force from Camp Pendleton.

In another deadly attack on an American convoy, a U.S. soldier was killed late Monday near Baghdad by a roadside bomb, the military reported. No further details were immediately available.

U.S. forces have all but stopped entering Fallouja, hoping to minimize violent confrontations with the insurgents who hold sway in the city, about 35 miles west of Baghdad.

The U.S. military pulled back from Fallouja in April, after surrounding the city and engaging in days of bloody clashes. American officials agreed to put an Iraqi force, called the Fallouja Brigade, in control of security inside the city.

But that group has not worked out as planned and is widely believed to be acting in concert with the insurgency, which is made up of foreign and local Islamic militants and fighters loyal to ousted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. Since pulling back, U.S. forces have carried out regular airstrikes against suspected militant hide-outs in Fallouja.

A major concern among U.S. military leaders is that Fallouja has become a launching pad for a wide range of insurgent activities -- especially car bombings, which have grown in number and sophistication.

Insurgents also have carried out numerous kidnappings and killings of civilian foreigners in the area west and north of Baghdad, known as the Sunni Triangle, which includes Fallouja.

Persistent violence in Fallouja and a few other trouble zones is prompting authorities to consider excluding them from voting when Iraq holds landmark elections scheduled for January.

The latest deaths brought the unofficial tally of U.S. service members killed in Iraq since the start of the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003 to at least 990. At least 15 U.S. troops have died in the first six days of September.

The U.S. military said Monday that U.S.-led troops and Iraqi national guard forces were continuing to conduct joint operations on the outskirts of Fallouja.

“Our forces will continue to stay the course in order to ensure Iraqi security forces have everything necessary to set the conditions required to foster rule of law and revitalization of Iraq,” said a statement issued by the military.

In addition to the deadly attacks on the two convoys, U.S. officials said three bombings targeted American-led forces in eastern Baghdad during a one-hour period Monday morning. Three soldiers were wounded in one of those attacks.

Meanwhile, Iraqi government officials announced that a man detained by authorities a day earlier was not Izzat Ibrahim, a onetime aide to Hussein who is the highest-ranking official from the toppled regime to remain free.

A spokesman for Iraq’s Interior Ministry said that after more investigation, officials had determined that the man being held was not Ibrahim, who ranks sixth on the U.S. list of most-wanted figures from the former regime.

The detainee was not named, but is a relative of Ibrahim also wanted by authorities on unspecified charges, said the spokesman, Sabah Kadhim.

The reported arrest had spawned wildly conflicting official assertions and considerable confusion. Several senior officials had insisted that Ibrahim was seized during a raid at a medical clinic in the northern city of Tikrit, while others, including the defense minister, characterized the claims as baseless.

It was not the first time that reports of Ibrahim’s arrest had proved untrue. But the contradictory accounts offered Sunday -- including a report, also later disavowed, that said 70 people were killed during the raid while trying to protect Ibrahim -- were striking in their disharmony.

American officials did not deny the initial reports, but said the U.S. military was not involved in any operations in Tikrit that day.

The capture of Ibrahim would have been a boon for the interim government of Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, which took power two months ago.

In other developments, the group that kidnapped two French journalists last month issued fresh demands in exchange for their release, including a $5-million ransom.

In a declaration posted on an Islamic website, the Islamic Army in Iraq also demanded that France agree to a truce with Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and promise not to take part in military operations or commerce in Iraq.

The statement set a 48-hour deadline. It could not be immediately determined whether the statement was authentic.

The journalists -- Georges Malbrunot of Le Figaro and Christian Chesnot of Radio France International -- were captured Aug. 20 south of Baghdad. An Italian journalist, Enzo Baldoni, was seized last month in the same area and later killed. The Islamic Army claimed responsibility for his slaying.

French officials who worked to free the men during frenzied shuttle diplomacy last week said then that they had received word the captives were in good health. There were reports that Malbrunot and Chesnot had been handed off to a separate Sunni Muslim group that favored letting them go, leading to speculation that release was imminent.

But there was no word on the case for several days before Monday’s statement.

The kidnappers originally demanded that France repeal a new law banning Muslim head scarves from being worn in public schools. The government refused to reconsider the ban, which went into effect Thursday as schools opened for the first day of the new academic year.

Meanwhile, another group, calling itself the Islamic Resistance Movement, released Turkish trucker Mithat Civi. His company had announced Sunday that it would cease operations in Iraq as demanded by his kidnappers, who had threatened to behead Civi.