U.S. frees 42 Iraqis in al-Qaida hideout

BAGHDAD – American forces freed 42 kidnapped Iraqis – some of whom had been hung from ceilings and tortured for months – in a raid Sunday on an al-Qaida hideout north of Baghdad, the U.S. military said.

Military officials said the operation, launched on tips from residents, showed that Iraqis in the turbulent Diyala province were turning against Sunni insurgents and beginning to trust U.S. troops.

“The people in Diyala are speaking up against al-Qaida,” said Maj. Gen. William Caldwell, the top U.S. military spokesman in Iraq.

Elsewhere in Diyala, a U.S. soldier was killed when an explosion hit his vehicle and a second soldier was killed in an explosion in Baghdad, the military said.

A barrage of mortar rounds struck houses in a Shiite village just northeast of Baghdad, killing three women and a child and wounding seven other children, Baghdad police said.

A suicide car bomber attacked an army checkpoint in Musayyib, about 40 miles south of Baghdad, killing two Iraqi soldiers.

Gunmen also killed the renowned Baghdad calligrapher Khalil Mohammed al-Zahawi in a drive-by shooting in a Shiite dominated area in eastern Baghdad, police said.

Some of the freed captives suffered broken bones. Some had been captive for as long as four months. One said he was 14 years old, Caldwell said.

The 42 freed Iraqis marked the largest number of captives ever found in a single al-Qaida prison, he said.