A market in Baghdad's Sadr City was badly damaged in an alleged air raid by US helicopters [AFP]

But Iraqi police and hospital officials said seven civilians died when US helicopters fired on homes and shops in the capital's Sadr City district early on Saturday.
 
Sadr City is a principal stronghold of the Mahdi Army militia of Muqtada al-Sadr, the Iraqi leader.
 
Government forces supported by the US military have been fighting to gain control of the district of 2.5 million people for nearly two weeks.
 
Missile strikes
 
The US military said on Saturday that Abrams tanks and drone-launched Hellfire missiles were used to quell attacks on US and Iraqi soldiers.
 
It said the clashes began when a security force convoy was attacked in Sadr City on Friday night "by multiple roadside bombs, and small-arms fire from adjacent high-rise buildings".

At the same time, around 9pm local time (1800 GMT), soldiers setting up a checkpoint came under fire from small arms, snipers, machine guns and RPGs after their vehicles were hit by six roadside bombs.
 
A fierce firefight ensued in which four fighters were killed, the statement said.
 
Meanwhile, Iraqi authorities ordered residents off the main streets of Sadr City, warning they are littered with bombs primed to explode.
 
"Groups of people have planted roadside bombs on the majority of the roads of Sadr City," the Baghdad military command said in a statement.
 
"For the protection of our citizens and media personnel, we are warning people to stay off the streets until they have been cleared by the security forces."
 
Najaf curfew
 
The Sadr City clashes came a day after police imposed a curfew in the city of Najaf in the wake of the killing of a senior aide to al-Sadr near his home.
 
Riyadh al-Nouri, who was the director of al-Sadr's office in Najaf, was killed as he drove home from Friday prayers in the nearby city of Kufa.
 
Al-Nouri's death was preceded by fresh US air raids that killed at least 12 people in two of Iraq's main cities, Baghdad and Basra.

US aircraft have been carrying out air raids in Baghdad and Basra in recent weeks [AFP]

Police in Najaf set up blockades, ordered people off the streets and closed shops after the incident, a Reuters news agency reporter said.
 
The curfew was lifted on Saturday.

Haider al-Turfi, another Sadr official in Njafa, said that armed men were waiting for al-Nouri near his home in the city's eastern neighbourhood of al-Adala.
 
"When he arrived from the prayers, they opened fire on him, killing him instantly," Turfi said.

Al-Nouri's sister was married to al-Sadr's brother Murtada who was killed in 1999.
 
Along with Sheikh Mustafa al-Yacoubi, another al-Sadr loyalist, al-Nouri was detained by American forces in April 2004 over the killing of Sheikh Abdul-Majid al-Khoei, a Shia leader, in Najaf shortly after the US-led invasion.
 
The two men were released in 2005.

US 'responsible'

Dr Maha al-Duri, a representative of al-Sadr's bloc in Iraq's parliament, blamed the US military for al-Nouri's killing.

"This is one of the conspiracies contrived by the US occupation and their collaborators in Iraq against the al-Sadr movement," she said.
 
Al-Duri demanded an investigation into the killing but reaffirmed that al-Sadr's followers were committed to maintaining the ceasefire with Iraqi forces.

"We have proved that we only have a national agenda, despite the continuation of the siege imposed on us," she said.

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