BAGHDAD, Iraq - Dr. Ahmed Ghanim's nightmarish week began with a phone call in the operating room of a triage center in downtown Fallujah.

On the line was the manager of the city's General Hospital. Iraqi national guardsmen and U.S. Marines, the manager said, had entered the hospital, handcuffed the doctors and were forcing the patients out to the parking lot.

The guardsmen "stole the mobile phones, the hospital safe where the money is kept and damaged the ambulances and cars," said Ghanim, an orthopedic surgeon who works at the hospital. "The Americans were more sympathetic with the hospital staff and . . . untied the doctors and allowed them to go outside with the patients."

But the worst was yet to come. In the coming days, Ghanim would narrowly escape a bombing, then run through his city's battle-torn streets. He would walk hungry and scared for miles, carrying with him memories of the people he could not save.

The fight for Fallujah began Nov. 7. The hospital, the city's main medical center, was seized that night by U.S. and Iraqi troops. Military commanders said it was taken to ensure that there was a medical treatment facility available to civilians and to make sure that insurgents could not exaggerate casualties.

As fighting raged for a week, few civilian accounts of the battle have been available, and there have been only scattered reports on casualties. But as combat eased, Ghanim and other survivors emerged and began to tell their stories.

"We were kicked out by the (Iraqi National Guard); even the Americans weren't as harsh as them," said Farhan Khalaf, 58, who had been at Fallujah General Hospital when it was seized.

"They were roughing up patients and tying up the doctors, hitting them in some instances,"he added. "They stole whatever valuables they could get their hands on, including money and cell phones. This is unacceptable. How could they do this against their own people?"

Last Monday came and went. On Tuesday, the bombing came closer to the city center. The doctors were busy.

"I was doing amputations for many patients. But I am an orthopedic surgeon; if a patient came to me with an abdominal injury, I could do nothing," he said, eyes cast down, close to tears. "We would bring the patient in, and we would have to let him die."

Electricity to the city was cut off. There was no water, no food, no fluids for the patients, Ghanim said. But the patients just kept coming.

"We were treating everyone. There were women, children, mujahids. I don't ask someone if they are a fighter before I treat them. I just take care of them," he said.

Late Tuesday, a bomb struck one side of the triage center. Ghanim ran out of the building.

A second bomb hit, crashing through the roof and destroying most of the facility. Ghanim believes it killed at least two or three of the young resident doctors working there and most of the patients.

"At that moment, I wished to die," he said. "It was a catastrophe."

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