Word: afare
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...itself without compounding the damage done to U.S. interests in the region? After a month in the al-Qaeda-dominated Syrian border region, TIME spent 10 days on the front lines of the war, having lived with U.S. and Iraqi troops as they prepared for the battle of Tall 'Afar, one of al-Zarqawi's biggest strongholds and, intelligence officers say, a place where he was detected in recent weeks. Waiting for the Americans were hundreds of hardened local fighters, small bands of foreign zealots and, in the notorious Sarai quarter of the city, a labyrinth of medieval alleyways laced...
Nestled close to Syria, Tall 'Afar is at the center of a vast border region rife with smuggling and anti-American sentiment. After the U.S. invasion, it became a gateway for foreign fighters entering Iraq. In time, homegrown insurgent cells came under the control of al-Zarqawi's al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia organization, which transformed the city into a training and command base for foreign jihadis and a hideout for al-Zarqawi and his deputies. After the fall of Fallujah, the town became a propaganda tool for the resistance, with attacks on U.S. forces in the city featured heavily...
Although U.S. officers had known for months about the atrocities taking place in Tall 'Afar, they were powerless to do anything about them. Stretched thin fighting rebels in places like al-Qaim and Mosul, the military dedicated just a single infantry battalion to an area twice the size of Connecticut. In May, however, more than 4,000 troops of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, a unit with a unique combination of tanks, Bradleys and helicopters that is back for its second tour in Iraq, were hastily rerouted from the south to the Tall 'Afar region, where they began disrupting...
...Dragoons re-enter Tall 'Afar at 6 a.m. the next day, linking up with two Iraqi army infantry companies of Kurdish peshmerga and the U.S. special-force teams attached to them. The mission is to begin "draining the pond," as U.S. officers call it--clearing civilians from what is about to become a battlefield so that the insurgents could not blend back into the fold. The scenes are heart wrenching: the Kurds burst into houses as families gather for breakfast, ordering them at gunpoint onto the street with only the possessions and provisions they can grab in a few seconds...
...Berets looking to the east, sparking another long fire fight. When things quiet down, it isn't for long. Although the U.S. inflicts heavy punishment on al-Zarqawi's men, the Americans also absorb losses. During a raid by Delta Force operators of Task Force 145 in western Tall 'Afar, insurgents put up fierce resistance at a house believed to be sheltering one of the city's top al-Qaeda operatives. Eight Delta men are wounded, two so seriously that an AC-130 Spectre gunship has to give a medevac covering fire to get the wounded to a combat-hospital...