2 women killed in attack on house of anti-Qaida leader in western Iraq

RAMADI, Iraq, Jan. 28 (Xinhua) -- Two women were killed in a gunmen's attack on the house of a local Awakening Council group leader in Iraq's western province of Anbar on Saturday, a provincial police source said.

The attack occurred in the morning when gunmen stormed the house of Shiekh Dhiyab Mahmoud, leader of the government backed Awakening Council group in the town of Grama near the city of Fallujah, some 50 km west of Baghdad, the source from Anbar's provincial operations command told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.

The attackers shot dead Mahmoud's wife and daughter, while Mahmoud himself escaped the attack unharmed as he was not at home at the time of the attack, the source said.

The Awakening Council group, also known as Sons of Iraq movement or Sahwa, consists of mostly anti-U.S. Sunni insurgent militant groups, who turned their rifles to fight al-Qaida network after Sahwa's leaders became dismayed by al-Qaida's brutality and religious zealotry in the country.

Posted in: Baghdad, Fallujah, Iraq, Ramadi, Sunni Islam