Word: cordoned
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...troops kept a tight security cordon around the town. Late in the week, helicopter gunships attacked a group of insurgents trying to flee the city by boat...
...Sadr's Mahdi Army slept and patched up their wounds and died. But their determination never faltered, even under the withering firepower of the vastly superior army outside. Haidar, 23, had come to join the fight from his family's house just on the other side of the U.S. cordon encircling the shrine. "I was a history student, but now I have this," he said, waving aloft his Kalashnikov. He said he didn't expect to see his family again. A fighter in the shrine claimed to have seen a vision of the Imam Ali during a power blackout...
...Monday morning, a day before our walk into the old city of Najaf, we had gone to see Abu Mohammed, a commander in the al Mahdi Army. He was to be our connection with the underground network of Iraqis who knew how to navigate the American cordon around Najaf. Abu Mohammed explained that we would have to wait for a lull in the fighting if we wanted to cross the lines. The commander also said we might have to wait a long time before we got our chance. Young Mahdi Army fighters with wild eyes stopped by the office...
...have to pass through the line of fire of both vehicles. Thorne pulled out a white cloth and we raised our hands and then stepped out into the empty street. Our translator Yasser, Talib, myself and Thorne, all walking slowly, had just crossed the first ring of the US cordon on the southern edge of the city...
...block inside the cordon, there was no traffic, the no man's land between the front lines was ruled by a horrible silence broken by sudden explosions. It was deserted except for a few Iraqi men hiding in doorways who offered refuge and tea. We started to see signs of fighting, blown out windows and burned buildings, but this was just the edge of the battlefield; it would get much worse as we went deeper into the city. We walked another block and saw three teenagers near the charred remains of a car who asked us where we were going...