18A
NEWS
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAS
IRAQ
MONDAY, AUGUST 13, 2007
Sunni extremists target moderates in recent attacks
BY BUSHRA JUHI ASSOCIATED PRESS
BAGHDAD — Five American soldiers were killed south of Baghdad, including four in a single roadside bombing, the military said Sunday.
The blast that killed the four soldiers and wounded four others occurred Saturday during combat operations south of the capital, the military said. Another soldier was killed Saturday by small-arms fire during a foot patrol southeast of Baghdad.
All the soldiers were assigned to Task Force Marne, which operates in an area with a volatile mix of Sunni and Shiite extremists.
The troops also have been cracking down on networks allegedly smuggling explosively formed penetrators, or EFPs, from Iran to the Baghdad area. The precision-crafted explosives have become a growing threat to American troops, and the Pentagon has struggled to find ways to protect vehicles against their deadly power.
The deaths announced Sunday raised the death toll to at least 3,690 members of the U.S.military since the Iraq war started in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
U. S. and Iraqi forces elsewhere reportedly staged raids in a Shite stronghold in Baghdad and the holy city of Kufa.
A police officer said two civilians were killed and four wounded when the joint forces, backed by helicopters stormed into houses in Baghdad's Shiite district of Sadr City.
The officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to release the information, also said 16 people were detained. The U.S. military said it was looking into the report.
AP Television News footage and
photos showed a crumpled white car and a truck pockmarked by shrapnel, with a pool of blood on the street. Dozens of men carried a black coffin in a funeral service for one of the purported victims.
Joint U.S.-Iraqi forces backed by air power also raided the house of an aide to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in the holy city of Kufa, 100 miles south of Baghdad, according to al-Sadr's office.
The U.S. military had no immediate word on that report either. Sheik Foud aad-Turfi was detained.
according to an official and a relative who declined to be identified because he feared retribution.
U. S. - led forces have routinely carried out raids
searching for Shiite militants since they launched a Baghdad security crackdown nearly six months ago. On Wednesday, U.S. aircraft and soldiers attacked Shiite militia bomb makers accused of links to Iran, killing 32 suspected militants and detaining 12 others.
Followers denied the cleric was linked to the alliance in Anbar province, but he issued his own call against al-Qaida last week during a funeral prayer for two nephews believed killed by extremists.
The raids have sent a strong message that U.S. forces plan no letup on suspected Shiite militia cells despite risks of upsetting the Shiite-led government.
The deaths announced Sunday raised the death toll to at least 3,690 members of the U.S. military since the Iraq War started in March 2003.
Al-Qaida-linked Sunni extremists, meanwhile, praised the attack on a moderate Sunni cleric who had recently spoken out against the terror network. Sheik Wathiq al-Obeidi was seriously wounded and three relatives were killed.
in western Iraq.
A Sunni insurgent umbrella group threatened an-Obeidi on Tuesday, calling him a traitor and accusing him of working with the U.S.-backed alliance of Sunni tribal leaders, who are fighting al-Qaida
The al-Qaida front group the Islamic State of Iraq did not officially claim the attack, but Web sites it generally uses to put out messages said it had been carried out by its militants.
Al-Obedi was one of two Sunni leaders who took public stances
against al-Qaida in Iraq to be attacked Saturday, in a sign the carrier network may ramp up retaliation against local chiefs who oppose it.
A local tribal leader in Albu
Khalifa was gunned down by militants who broke into his home late Saturday, police said.
Sheik Fawaq Sadda al-Khalifaiw had recently joined the antial-Qaida alliance in Anbar, said a police officer in the town of Karmah. The police officer declined to be identified for fear of more reprisals.
The United States has pointed to an anti-al-Qaida alliance of local Sunni leaders as a sign of turnaround. The attacks showed the high risks local leaders face by joining.
A powerful roadside bomb also killed the governor and police chief of a southern province that was torn by fierce fighting between Shiite factions, Al-Maliki ordered an investigation and urged residents to show restraint and not launch reprisals.
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Craig Molenhouse/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Known entertainer and entrepreneur Merv Griffin died of prostate cancer on Sunday. Griffin was a talk show host, actor, pianist and singer. After the success of game shows "jeopardy" and "wheel of fortune," Griffin moved into real estate. He was 82.
Merv Griffin: dead at 82 Cancer claims'Jeopardy!'and'Wheel of Fortune'creator
BY BOB THOMAS ASSOCIATED PRESS
LOS ANGELES — Merv Griffin, the entertainer turned impresario who parlayed his "jeopardy" and "Wheel of Fortune" game shows into a multimillion-dollar empire, has died. He was 82.
Griffin died of prostate cancer, according to a statement from his the family that was released by Marcia Newberger, spokeswoman for The Griffin Group/Merv Griffin Entertainment.
From his beginning as a $100-a-week San Francisco radio singer, Griffin moved on as vocalist for
Freddy Martin's band, band, sometime film actor in films and TV game and talk show host. His "The Merv Griffin Show" lasted more than 20 years, and Griffin's said his capacity to listen contributed to his success.
had become the hottest game shows in television, Griffin sold the rights to Coca-Cola, then owner of Columbia Pictures for $250 million in 1986, retaining a share of the profits. He started spreading the sale money around in treasury bonds, stocks and other investments.
He made Forbes' list of richest Americans several times and started putting money in treasury bonds, stocks and other investments. But he went into real estate and other ventures that "I was never so bored in my life."
"I said, I'm not going to sit around and clip coupons for the rest of my life," he recalled in 1989. "that when Bonner Hilton said
"I said, I'm not going to sit around and clip coupons for the rest of my life.'"
MERV GRIFFIN "Jeopardy!" Creator
"If the host is sitting there thinking about his next joke, he isn't listening," Griffin reasoned in a recent interview.
'Merv, do you want to buy the Beverly Hilton?' I couldn't believe it.
But his biggest break financially came from inventing and producing "Jeopardy!" in the 1960s and "Wheel of Fortune" in the 1970s. After they
Griffin bought the slightly passe hotel for $100.2 million and completely refurbished it for $25 million
Then he made a move for control of Resorts International, which operated hotels and casinos from Atlantic City to the Caribbean.
That touched off a feud with real estate tycoon Donald Trump. Griffin eventually acquired Resorts for $240 million, netting a reported paper profit of $100 million.
"I love the gamesmanship" he told Life magazine in 1988. "This may sound strange, but it parallels the game shows I've been involved in."
a lifelong crossword puzzle fan, he devised a game show "Word for Word," in 1963. It faded after one season, then his wife, Julann, suggested another show.
"Julian's idea was a twist on the usual question-answer format of the quiz shows of the Fifties," he wrote in his autobiography "Merv." "Her idea was to give the contestants the answer, and they had to come up with the appropriate question."
"jeopardy!" began in 1964, became a huge moneymaker for Griffin, as did a more conventional game show, "Wheel of Fortune," starting in 1975.
He was born in San Mateo, south of San Francisco on July 6, 1925, the son of a stockbroker. His aunt, Claudia Robinson, taught him to play piano at age 4, and soon the boy was staging shows on the back porch of the family home.
Griffin and Julann Elizabeth Wright were married in 1958, and a son, Anthony, was born the following year. The couple divorced in 1973 because of "irreconcilable differences."
"It was a pivotal time in my career, one of uncertainty and constant doubt," he wrote in the autobiography. "So much attention was being focused on me that my marriage felt the strain." He never remarried.
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