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by Dahr Jamain & Ahmed Ali

The U.S. military launched Operation Arrowhead Ripper in Baquba, 50 km northeast of Baghdad, on Jun. 18. Baquba is the capital city of Iraq's Diyala province.

The stated goal of the operation was to eradicate al-Qaeda from the city and other areas in the province. The region has seen some of the highest number of attacks on U.S. troops.

Shortly after launching the operation, the U.S. military admitted that nearly 80 percent of al-Qaeda militants had fled the area.

Residents had been looking for an end to raids and abductions by criminal gangs and sectarian death squads, but the U.S. military operation brought no relief.

"People here feel afraid because the coalition forces always push al-Qaeda out of the cities, but unfortunately they return when the troops retreat," resident Mohammed Hulail told IPS. "So the coalition forces can provide no solution."

A Baquba city official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told IPS that al-Qaeda militants had already returned to parts of the city. "We are now sure that Iraqi police and army cannot defeat al-Qaeda who are well fortified in the streets and buildings."

Residents have learnt to fear enemies on all sides. "People are the victims of this war because they are in the middle point between the American forces and the fighters of al-Qaeda," Jabbar Ibrahim, a secondary school teacher in the city told IPS. "The fighters of al-Qaeda came to control the city, but when the U.S. troops came to fight them, they ran away, leaving civilians to face the shells and the bombs."

Many residents complain of indiscriminate arrests through the U.S. forces' search for al-Qaeda suspects. "Arrests are sometimes made wrongly; simple people who have nothing to do with fighting and violence were arrested, and those who were the real fighters ran away," a resident who declined to give his name told IPS.

The Iraqi Islamic Party has accused the Multi-National Forces operating in the area of killing many people in Baquba in the early weeks of the operation.

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