4/10/2004 08:10:00 AM

U.S. Forces Want Al-Jazeera Out Of Fallujah

The channel... is probably the only media in Fallujah, where its correspondent seized hours of the channel’s air time to convey the deteriorating situation over the past few days.

The correspondent in Fallujah said that even besieged local inhabitants of the town follow the latest developments in their bastion of resistance through al-Jazeera.

Corpses are littered in the streets as U.S. warplanes hit the only hospital and other makeshift medical centers, he added.

As Brig Gen Mark Kimmitt, the deputy director of U.S. military operations in Iraq, was speaking by phone on al-Jazeera and insisting that American forces declared a unilateral ceasefire in Fallujah, the channel was airing live images of continued air raids by F16 fighter jets on residential neighborhoods of the town.

Kimmitt later dismissed the coverage of the channel for the crisis as a "series of lies". However, asked by al-Jazeera anchor about the live images, the U.S. commander said he was not accusing al-Jazeera of faking the images, but rather “looked at things differently”.

He said the attacks by F16 fighter jets and helicopters were meant to take out “armed insurgents firing at our troops”. The anchor reminded Kimmitt, however, that “live coverage showed children and women killed by the missiles, not armed insurgents”.

Observers see the U.S. highly unusual demand for al-Jazeera to leave Fallujah as a sign of crisis of credibility the U.S. forces face in the eyes of the Iraqis as well as people all over the Arab and Islamic world.

Known for its quality programs, professionalism and independence, "the CNN of the Arab world" is the most-watched channel in this part of the world.