A car bomb attack has killed eight U.S. Marines near the Iraqi city of Fallujah -- in the bloodiest day for the U.S. military in Iraq in nearly six months.
Nine other Marines were wounded, amid preparations for an offensive against the militant stronghold of Fallujah. U.S. warplanes and artillery pounded the city.
Another car bomb attack on the Baghdad office of al-Arabiyah television killed seven people and wounded 19. It was the worst attack on a news organization since the war started in March last year.
A group calling itself the "1920 Brigades" claimed responsibility for the al-Arabiyah attack.
South of Baghdad (near the town of Haswa), more than a dozen people were killed in an exchange of gunfire, but circumstances surrounding the incident were not immediately clear.