“Your relationship with God gets stronger and stronger with every missile and every bomb your enemy drops on you.” While he spoke, the mosque compound shook as some 15 bombs and missiles crashed into an area northwest of Baghdad.

The rumble of explosions, mixed with a barrage of Iraqi anti-aircraft fire, compounded the rage of worshipers but did not stop them from pursuing their service. Instead, preacher and worshipers began chanting Islam’s rallying chant of Allahu Akbar (God is Great). “To you faithful: Our country is passing through the second week of a fateful Islamic battle. The war that you are fighting against the infidels — the British and Americans — is an ideological one. They want to extinguish in us the light of Islam,” the preacher said.

Despite a night of relentless bombardment and fear of more strikes, thousands of worshipers flocked to Friday prayers to seek strength for what many believe will be a protracted war.

The preacher told them that a week of Iraqi resistance had destroyed a widespread myth that the mighty American and British armies would conquer and sweep through Baghdad in two days.

At Baghdad’s Abu Hanifa Mosque, the preacher said: “The banner of Islam will remain raised over this capital even if this battle costs us hundreds of thousands of dead. No matter how long this battle takes, be patient! Victory is coming with the help of God.” He said Muslims were passing through a critical and fateful time in their history and that it was the duty of Muslims to put aside their differences and unite to fight “the enemies of God”.

Baghdad residents spent a night in terror under a sky lit up by the heaviest US bombing yet, falling asleep only in the wee hours yesterday after taking sleeping pills or finally being overwhelmed by fatigue. “Nobody could sleep,” said Fahd Alawi, a 38-year-old upholstery-shop owner, who had huge bags under his eyes.

“We even had to give Valium pills to the children to force them to rest and stop hearing the bombings that made them scream hysterically,” he told AFP.