Fighters kidnapped 15 Iraqi women and children after rival Sunni Arab militants repelled their attack on two villages in a fierce battle today in which 32 people were killed, police said.
About 200 al-Qaeda fighters raided the villages of Sheikh Tamim and Ibrahim Yehia in restive Diyala province, north of Baghdad, in the early hours of today after launching a mortar attack on the area, police said.
A villager wounded by Al Qaeda fighters is wheeled into a hospital in Baquba, northeast of Baghdad. Image: Reuters.
Brigadier-General Ali Delayan, the police chief of Baquba, said that 22 residents had been killed in the fighting along with 10 al-Qaeda fighters.
Several wounded residents said villagers were loyal to the Sunni Arab insurgent group, the 1920 Revolution Brigade.
Delayan said the attackers had escaped with eight women and seven children as hostages.
A mosque that served the two villages was destroyed in the fighting and its imam was among those killed, he added.
He said the gun battle with fighters loyal to the 1920 Revolution Brigade, which has recently distanced itself from al Qaeda, was triggered by the execution of four men, including the mosque imam.
Police said they arrested 22 of the attackers.
Meanwhile, US intelligence agencies said today that Iraqi prime minister Nuri al-Maliki's government will become more precarious over the next six to 12 months, while security will improve modestly even as sectarian violence remains high.
Declassified findings of the National Intelligence Estimate said there had been "measurable but uneven improvements" in Iraqi security since January, under the US troop increase ordered by President George W. Bush this year.
US political leaders have assailed Mr Maliki's ability to govern Iraq. The unpopular war has featured prominently in the campaign for the November 2008 presidential election with Democrats and some Republicans urging a US troop withdrawal.
The report cast doubt on Mr Maliki's ability to heal sectarian divides as specified by US milestones for progress.
"Broadly accepted political compromises required for sustained security, long-term political progress and economic development are unlikely to emerge unless there is a fundamental shift in the factors driving Iraqi political and security developments," it said.
The Office of the National Intelligence Director issued the report a day after Bush sought to correct impressions that his support for Mr Maliki was wavering and ahead of a mid-September assessment by the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker, and the top US commander there, Gen. David Petraeus.
The evaluation by Crocker and Petraeus is widely seen as the potential trigger for a change in US policy in Iraq.