In the front yard of a half-built house in Falluja, a dozen fighters sat in a semicircle. With Kalashnikovs in their laps and copies of the Qur'an in their hands, they stared at us suspiciously. The silence was punctuated by the sound of mortar shelling. With each explosion, the fighters would cry, "But mostly they were interested only in converting us to Islam. They were still describing the pains I would go through in hell when another fighter, a short thin teenager, appeared. He was still dressed in his white pyjamas and rubbed his eyes as he listened to the conversation. "What are you doing?" he asked one of the fighters.
"We are preaching to them about Islam," said the fighter.
"Why? They are not Muslims?"
"No."
The young man looked with puzzlement at the other fighter and said: "But then, why don't we kill them?"
"We can't do that now. They are in a state of truce with us," the fighter said.
The fighters belonged to Tawhid and Jihad, the group that has claimed responsibility for most of the violence sweeping Iraq. Eradicating these men is one of the prime objectives of the US offensive on Falluja. At first sight, they all looked and behaved the same; young men in trainers and tracksuits preaching Islam. As time passed, they became more relaxed and open about who they were and why they were there. It became apparent that they were an odd bunch of people from different places and with different dreams.