Gunmen and bombers launched three attacks on US-backed neighbourhood security patrols in Baghdad on Saturday, killing at least three of the patrol members and wounding 17. US forces in Iraq have increasingly relied on neighbourhood patrols to keep peace in mainly Sunni Arab parts of Iraq as part of a strategy that has helped bring violence levels down dramatically over the past several months.
But the patrol members, who are paid by US forces and not officially part of the Iraqi security forces, have increasingly come under attack by militants. In one incident on Saturday, bombers killed two patrol members and wounded 10 in a strike on their headquarters in the Adhamiya neighbourhood of northern Iraq, until recently a Sunni Arab militant stronghold.
Gunmen attacked a patrol in another northern area, killing one patrol member and wounding four. In the southern Doura neighbourhood, another former Sunni militant stronghold, gunmen wounded three patrol members manning a checkpoint.
US forces are trying to isolate al Qaeda fighters by recruiting Sunni Arabs who have turned against the radical Sunni Arab militants, and by launching regular offensives with Iraqi forces against their hideouts.
The latest offensive started early on Saturday in the Babel province south of Baghdad. It involves Iraqi army soldiers and US troops from the 4th Brigade Combat Team, part of the 3rd Infantry Division, the US military said.
Operation is focused on "flushing out al Qaeda extremists and weapons smugglers operating" near the town of Iskandariya, 40 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad, the military said in a statement.
US commanders said last week the assault would involve around 1,400 US troops and will target Sunni Islamist fighters in small hamlets and fishing villages along the Euphrates River valley in Babel province. By Saturday afternoon, the troops had faced no resistance as they moved to the target area, the statement said.