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At least 200 Shiite zealots, including a cult leader claiming to be a descendant of the Prophet Mohammed, were killed in a fierce battle with Iraqi and US forces near Shiite Islam's holiest city of Najaf, officials said.
An Iraqi official said the militants, who called themselves “Soldiers of Heaven,” planned to attack Shiite clerics and seize control of holy cities.
Iraq was also rocked on Monday by a spate of attacks that left 36 people dead as Shiite pilgrims observed the mourning rite of Ashura in the shrine city of Karbala on the eve of the most sacred ceremony on their religious calendar.
Police, meanwhile, recovered 25 bodies of people killed in sectarian attacks, 22 of them from Baghdad.
Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said that among those killed in the Najaf battle was a sect leader who reportedly claimed to be a lieutenant of Imam Mahdi, a ninth-century Shiite spiritual leader who vanished as a boy and who Shiites believe will come again to rule in justice and peace.
In the battle US and British jets attacked the fighters with guided bombs, rockets and cannon fire, a US military statement said.
The fighting left between 200 and 300 dead in one of the biggest confrontations in recent months, according to various tolls given by officials.
Defence ministry spokesman Mohammed al-Askari said 200 were killed and around 250 arrested, many found hiding in tunnels, while Najaf government spokesman Ahmed Duaible said around 300 militants were killed and 13 arrested.
Their leader was variously identified as Iraqi national Samer Abu Kamar, Ali bin Ali bin Abi Talib, or Ahmed bin al-Hassan, nicknamed Al-Yamani.
Police said he established his cult after buying eight farms in Zarqa, north of Najaf, two years ago.
“He always wore a black turban, and was proud of being a 'sayyed',” or descendant of the Prophet Mohammed,” said Ahmad al-Kufi, a Zarqa resident who often came in contact with Kamar. “We called him the sheikh.”
Until Sunday, “everything was normal,” Kufi said.
“The only troubling detail was that they forbid us to enter their property, and there was a constant coming and going of cars and brand new pick-up trucks they said brought supplies.”
Abdel Hussein Attan, deputy governor of Najaf, said the slain militants were linked to Al-Qaeda in Iraq.
“I have come to the total conviction from what I have seen with my own eyes on the ground that Al-Qaeda is behind this group,” Attan told reporters.
“Based on the confessions of interrogated militants and other information, this well-structured group intended to attack Shiite clerics and take control of Najaf and its holy sites,” he added.
Al-Qaeda in Iraq is made up of Sunni extremists who profess an extreme hatred of Shiites, whom they consider heretics.
Dabbagh said the group appeared to have both “internal and external terror links”, adding: “The quantity of weapons they had indicated a considerable amount of support.”
On Sunday, a US helicopter crashed in the area where the fighting took place, killing two crewmen, the military said without specifying whether it had been shot down.
Duaible said three policemen were killed and 30 wounded in the firefight.
The battle erupted as tens of thousands of Shiite pilgrims from across Iraq and neighbouring countries flocked to Karbala for the annual Ashura mourning ritual.
Ashura, a commemoration of the seventh-century killing of the Prophet Mohammed's grandson Imam Hussein on the orders of Sunni caliph Yazid, culminates on Tuesday in Karbala where Hussein was decapitated.
Every year men, women and children dressed in black and carrying flags attend the rite, which also marks the definitive schism between Shiite and Sunni Islam.
About 10,000 Iraqi security personnel will be posted in and around Karbala to protect pilgrims paying homage at the tomb of Hussein.
On Monday, at least 36 people were killed in a wave of attacks across Iraq, including 12 when mortar fire slammed into a Baghdad district, a security official said.
The shells fell close to a procession of Shiite pilgrims commemorating Ashura but hurt no one, he added.
