US marine among 17 killed in Iraq gunbattles
Foreign Desk Report

BAGHDAD—At least one US marine and 17 alleged Al-Qaeda fighters were killed as US and Iraqi forces moved house-to-house in their fight to take control of a town near the border with Syria. A force of 1,000 Iraqi soldiers and 2,500 US marines, sailors and soldiers launched an operation early Saturday focusing on the far western Iraqi town of Husayba in an attempt to flush Al-Qaeda fighters from the region.
The sweep, called Operation Steel Curtain, is aimed at preventing foreign fighters from entering the country. US officials have long held that Al-Qaeda affiliated fighters cross into Iraq from Syria, usually through the upper Euphrates valley where Husayba is located. “While conducting clearing operations in Husayba, (the marine) was killed by enemy small arms fire,” the military said Monday.
At least 17 suspected insurgents have been killed since Steel Curtain began. “Many more are suspected of being killed, but coalition forces haven’t been able to confirm those numbers yet,” the military said late Sunday. US and Iraqi soldiers are “clearing the city, house by house, as the Al-Qaeda in Iraq-led insurgents continue to plant improvised explosive devices throughout the city and fire on the marines and Iraqi soldiers,” said the statement. The goal of Steel Curtain “is to restore security along the Iraqi-Syrian border and destroy the Al-Qaeda in Iraq terrorist network operating throughout this area,” Brigadier General Donald Alston told journalists in Baghdad.