Salih Saif Aldin, 32, was reporting on the violence that has plagued Baghdad's Sadiyah neighborhood Sunday afternoon when he was shot in the forehead. According to residents of the neighborhood and the Iraqi military officers at the scene, he was taking photographs on a street where several houses had been burned when he was killed. His wounds appeared to indicate he was shot at close range. ...

He left The Post's Baghdad bureau Sunday afternoon in a taxi to interview residents in Sadiyah about clashes between militiamen and insurgents. A Washington Post colleague received a telephone call just after 4 p.m. from a man who said he was a police officer and who was using Saif Aldin's cell phone. The man said he was standing next to Saif Aldin's body, which later was observed lying on the street, covered with newspapers. ...

 
In July 2005, he received a note threatening his life if he did not quit journalism and leave the city. He refused. "This is my city, and I'm a journalist," he told colleagues.

Shortly after, he was attacked by two men, who beat him with their fists, a metal pipe and the butt of a pistol, leaving him with bruises all over his body and opening a gash in his head that required eight stitches. After he was released from the hospital, The Post implored him to leave Tikrit. When he refused, Omar Fekeiki, the newspaper's former office manager and special correspondent, said he was told he would be fired if he didn't leave.