Top general says Iraqi sectarian murders are down

Story Highlights

• U.S. strategy working, Gen. David Petraeus tells members of Congress
• Democrats say solution must be political, not military
• Briefings come hours before House vote on funding bill
• Bill includes timetable for withdrawal; Bush promises veto

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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, told reporters that sectarian murders in Baghdad have been reduced by about one-third since the beginning of the year.

"That is an important development, because sectarian murders can be a cancer in a neighborhood," he said after separate briefings in the Senate and House on Wednesday.

In addition, "progress in Anbar is something that is breathtaking," he said of the vast Sunni-dominated province where many U.S. troop deaths have occurred, including one Monday.

Huge inroads have been made, he said, in regard to learning a "great deal more" of the "nefarious" Iranian involvement in the war in Iraq. He did not elaborate on whether he meant the Iranian government or outside factions.

In other areas, such as car bomb networks, the general said, "we have work to do."

Indeed, attackers in Iraq killed at least nine people Wednesday: four in a suicide attack in Diyala province and five in scattered incidents in the Baghdad area, including a chlorine truck bombing.

Additionally, 17 unidentified bodies were found across Baghdad, according to an Interior Ministry official.

Paraphrasing Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Petraeus said that "al Qaeda in Iraq has declared war on all Iraqis." Attacks have been made on Iraqi Kurds, Sunnis, Shiites -- "no one has been outside their cross hairs," he said.

After listening to Petraeus, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said he thinks the fight in Iraq is not against al Qaeda but is "a virulent sectarian battle against various factions within the Iraq populace that has not been brought under control by the Iraqis themselves."

House Minority Leader John Boehner said what Petraeus was communicating is that progress had been made in Iraq but there are still "challenges ahead."

Boehner, R-Ohio, touched on what Petraeus told lawmakers about the "Iranian influence in Iraq," which Boehner called a "big source of sectarian violence."

Hoyer, D-Maryland, and Boehner were speaking just a few hours before the House approved, 218 to 208, a spending bill that includes a goal to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq by the end of March 2008.

President Bush has threatened to veto the $124 billion bill because it contains a timetable for withdrawal. (Watch Dick Cheney and Harry Reid square off over the bill )

Bush said the bill contains "some of the worst parts of the measures they had earlier passed with narrow majorities in the House and the Senate."

He also accused the newly elected Democratic leadership of playing party politics with the measure.

"They know I'm going to veto a bill containing these provisions, and they know my veto will be sustained," Bush said. "But instead of fashioning a bill I could sign, the Democratic leaders chose to further delay funding to our troops, and they chose to make a political statement."

If there is a veto, Hoyer said, the president "will not only be vetoing full funding of our troops but ignoring, in my opinion, the will of the American people."

Speaker Nancy Pelosi missed the Petraeus briefing because she was in her office working to round up votes for the spending bill. However, she spoke with him by telephone Tuesday, aides said.

Hoyer and Sen. Carl Levin, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said any solution in Iraq must be political, not military.

"We didn't hear anything [during Petraeus' briefing] that would give us any reason to believe that a political settlement of all the issues that would divide Iraqis is at hand," said Levin, D-Michigan. (Watch Sen. Joe Lieberman weigh in on the issue )

Petraeus is scheduled to give a news conference at the Pentagon on Thursday, the same day the Senate is due to vote on the bill.

If the Senate passes it, the bill could reach Bush's desk by early next week.

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