From Reuters via the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

In the northern Iraqi city of Samarra four Iraqi civilians have been killed in two separate incidents.

A mortar round apparently intended for a US military base hit a house and killed a man and his child.

Another man and a child have died in shooting that followed a roadside bomb attack on a US patrol.

From Reuters via the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

Nine people have reportedly been killed and 13 wounded after a suicide bomber rammed a car into an Iraqi forces checkpoint south of Baghdad.

A National Guard officer at the scene says a suicide attacker drove his vehicle at high speed into the checkpoint, on the north-eastern entrance to the town of Latifiya.

Traffic was heavy at the time and the blast destroyed around five civilian cars.

He said National Guards and police manning the checkpoint, near the main road linking Baghdad to the south, as well as civilians were among the dead.

From the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

A car bomb has exploded in a town south of Baghdad, reportedly leaving many people dead or wounded.

Medical officials say the blast has occurred in Mahmudiyah.

The local hospital director says there are many casualties, but no further details are immediately available.

UPDATE : From the ABC :

…a fuel tanker blown up in Mahmudiya, also south of Baghdad, has reportedly killed at least five people and wounded 20 others.

The blast ripped through a predominantly Shi’ite district in the mainly Sunni Muslim town, where there are numerous stores and homes.

Local hospital officials say the tanker was rigged with explosives, but the US says that is not confirmed.

From Reuters via The Australian :

US Marines have detained 43 suspects in a series of raids south of Baghdad, the latest in a sweep that has netted around 600 militants, the military said today.

Troops from the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, backed by Iraqi security forces, rounded up 21 suspected insurgents around the town of Yusufiya, a rebellious stronghold about 40 km south-west of Baghdad.

In related searches in the nearby town of Haswah, Iraqi police and Marines detained 13 people.

Nine other suspects were seized in raids near the militant town of Mahmudiya, at the centre of what has been dubbed the “triangle of death”.

In the past five months, since Marines took over from Polish troops in the northern Babil province that runs south from Baghdad, more than 850 people have been detained, the statement said.

Of those, nearly 600 remain in prison.

From the AFP via The Australian :

A US soldier has been killed and two others wounded in a roadside bombing in western Baghdad.

”A Task Force Baghdad soldier was killed and two others were wounded when an improvised explosive device detonated in western Baghdad at approximately 8 am on December 23,” the military said in a statement.