BAGHDAD, Iraq – American forces sealed off a house in the northern city of Mosul where eight suspected Al Qaeda members died in a gunfight – some by their own hand to avoid capture. The White House said yesterday that it was “highly unlikely” that the terror leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was among the dead.

Insurgents, meanwhile, killed an American soldier and a Marine in separate attacks over the weekend, and a British soldier was killed by a roadside bomb in the south.

On Saturday, police Brigadier General Said Ahmed al-Jubouri said the raid was launched after a tip came in that top Al Qaeda operatives, possibly including Mr. al-Zarqawi, were in the house in the northeastern part of the city.

During the intense gunbattle that followed, three insurgents detonated explosives and killed themselves to avoid capture, Iraqi officials said. Eleven Americans were wounded, the American military said. Such intense resistance often suggests an attempt to defend a high-value target.

But a White House spokesman, Trent Duffy, said reports of Mr. al-Zarqawi’s death were “highly unlikely and not credible.”

American soldiers controlled the site yesterday, and residents said helicopters flew over the area throughout the day. Some residents said the tight security was reminiscent of the July 2003 operation in which Saddam Hussein’s sons, Odai and Qusai, were killed in Mosul.

The elusive Mr. al-Zarqawi has narrowly escaped capture in the past. American forces said they nearly caught him in a February 2005 raid that recovered his computer.

In May, the group said he was wounded in fighting and was taken out of the country for treatment. Within days, it reported he had returned – though there was never any independent confirmation that he was wounded.

The American soldier killed yesterday near the capital was assigned to the Army’s Task Force Baghdad and was hit by small arms fire, the military said. The Marine, assigned to Regimental Combat Team 8, 2nd Marine Division, died of wounds suffered the day before in a village outside Fallujah to the west of the capital, Karmah.

In the southern city of Basra, a roadside bomb killed a British soldier and wounded four others, the British Ministry of Defense said. The ministry said 98 British soldiers have died in Iraq.

The American military also said yesterday that 24 people – including another Marine and 15 civilians – were killed the day before in an ambush on a joint American-Iraqi patrol in Haditha, 140 miles northwest of Baghdad in the volatile Euphrates River valley.

Meanwhile, four women were killed last night when gunmen stormed their home in a Christian district of eastern Baghdad, police said, adding that valuables were stolen and the motive for the attack appeared to have been robbery.

In Cairo, Egypt, Iraq’s president said yesterday he was ready for talks with anti-government opposition figures and members of Saddam Hussein’s outlawed Baath Party, and he called on the Sunni-led insurgency to lay down its arms and join the political process.

But President Talabani, attending an Arab League-sponsored reconciliation conference, insisted that the Iraqi government would not meet with Baath Party members who are participating in the Sunni-led insurgency.

“I am the president of Iraq, and I am responsible for all Iraqis. If those who describe themselves as Iraqi resistance want to contact me, they are welcome,” Mr. Talabani told reporters. “I want to listen to all Iraqis. I am committed to listen to them, even those who are criminals and are on trial.”

Mr. Talabani made clear in his remarks, however, that he would talk with insurgents and “criminals” only if they put down their weapons.

In Baghdad, hundreds of Sunnis demanded an end to the torture of detainees and called for the international community to pressure Iraqi and American authorities to ensure that such abuse does not occur.

Anger over detainee abuse has increased sharply since American troops found 173 detainees at an Interior Ministry prison in Baghdad’s Jadriyah neighborhood. The detainees, mainly Sunnis, were found malnourished and some had torture marks on their bodies. Sunni Arabs dominate the insurgent ranks.

Iraq’s Shiite-led government has promised an investigation and punishment for anyone guilty of torture.