Martyrs' Cemetery
Encyclopedia
The Martyrs' Cemetery is the chief burial site of Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....

is killed during the First Battle of Fallujah, both insurgents and civilians. It was formerly the soccer field of the Falluja Sports Club, and was converted into a cemetery after US troops blockaded attempts to reach the city's main cemetery.

A sign outside the cemetery reads "This cemetery is given by the people of Fallujah to the heroic martyrs of the battle against the Americans, and to the martyrs of the Jihad
Jihad
Jihad , an Islamic term, is a religious duty of Muslims. In Arabic, the word jihād translates as a noun meaning "struggle". Jihad appears 41 times in the Quran and frequently in the idiomatic expression "striving in the way of God ". A person engaged in jihad is called a mujahid; the plural is...

i operations against the Americans, assigned and approved by the Mujahideen Shura council in Fallujah.
"

The cemetery holds between 250 and 500 bodies, only one of which is identified as a foreign fighter, a Tunisian
Demographics of Tunisia
The majority of modern Tunisians are Arab-Berber orArabized Berber, and are speakers of Tunisian Arabic. However, there is also a small population of Berbers located in the Jabal Dahar mountains in the South East and on the island of Jerba...

. At least 22 of the dead were from a single US mortar
Mortar (weapon)
A mortar is an indirect fire weapon that fires explosive projectiles known as bombs at low velocities, short ranges, and high-arcing ballistic trajectories. It is typically muzzle-loading and has a barrel length less than 15 times its caliber....

-attack in June 2004.

The road leading to the cemetery has been named Martyrs' Cemetery Road, and according to the Mafkarat al-Islam was the site of an August 26 2006 attack against a US convoy on the road headed to the cemetery, which destroyed a Humvee and killed three American troops, wounding two others, and a similar attack nine days later.

Another soccer field in the city was used for similar purposes.
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