Three women and a child from one family were killed and six others wounded when gunmen attacked a house near the city of Fallujah in Anbar province early on Wednesday, a provincial police source said.
Unidentified gunmen at dawn stormed the house of Rahhal Hussien, a follower of a Sunni Muslim religious group named al-Kasnazaniyah, and opened fire from their assault rifles and hand grenades on the family members, killing three women and a girl, along with wounding Hussien himself and five more of his family member, the source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.
Iraqi security forces sealed off the scene and started an investigation to discover who were behind the attack that took place in a village outside Fallujah, some 50 km west of Baghdad, the source said.The al-Kasnazaniyah is a branch of Islam called Sufism which believes that there is mystical path to God through dance and music, which contrasted to the Qaida religious worship that follows an extremist brand of Islam.The Sunni province of Anbar has been a major stronghold for al- Qaida militants in Iraq after the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.Situation began to go in favor of the U.S. military and Iraqi government after the Sunnis shifted side and turned their guns against al-Qaida members in 2006 because they opposed to the indiscriminate terror attacks on civilians.
