Iraq: Anger was seething yesterday on the streets of Baghdad as 10,000 Iraqis gathered to protest against a night of violence in the capital which left two American soldiers and two Iraqis dead, writes Jack Fairweather in Baghdad
In the run-down district of Sadr City where the shootings took place, the crowd chanted "No, no to America; yes, yes to the martyrs" as the two coffins of the dead Iraqis were held aloft before the gathering.
The Iraqis were shot by an American soldiers as they guarded a prayer centre in the mainly Shia neighbourhood. Twenty minutes earlier, a US convoy had been ambushed nearby, killing two soldiers and wounding four.
Witnesses described how an American patrol drove up the entrance to the prayer centre, the headquarters of a radical Shia cleric opposed to the US occupation, and began shooting under helicopter cover.
Jalil Khadim, a guard at the centre said: "They weren't targeting their weapons, they were just shooting in all directions." Others at the scene claimed there was an exchange of fire between security men and American soldiers after a US patrol came to arrest a Shia cleric who had complained about a local police station.
Earlier in the day a devastating suicide bombing left nine dead at the station.
A US military spokesman yesterday appealed for calm in Sadr City. "We regret the loss of life on both sides. Our soldiers are trying to restore order in the area."
However at the prayer centre yesterday, Sheikh Abdul Haji al-Darraji - aide to the radical Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr - issued a fiery proclamation.
"It is forbidden for the American to enter Sadr City. They intimidate and incite the people," he said. "The Americans laugh at the laws and spiritual traditions of the Iraqi people."
Sheikh Darraji, an aide to the radical Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr - son of murdered Ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq al-Sadr and a strong critic of the US military occupation - earlier compared the Americans to "wolves". "They come at night and disappear in the day," he said. "They want to eliminate every believer who stands against their mistakes."
Tensions have been high among followers of al-Sadr after one of their clerics was arrested for hiding weapons in his mosque and calling for attacks against Americans.
Locals however insist that they are not responsible for Thursday's attacks. Fars Daoud, a construction worker in Sadr City, said: "We want to live in peace here under our own laws, but the Americans are making people nervous. They don't respect our customs and traditions."