Wedding party video casts doubt on American version of attack that killed 42

US military commanders came under new pressure yesterday to account for an attack on an Iraqi village that killed more than 40 people when a video emerged showing a wedding party at the scene hours before the raid.

Since the attack on the village of Mukaradeeb, near the Syrian border, last Wednesday the US military has insisted it targeted a "suspected foreign fighter safe house".

Several witnesses at funerals and in hospital after the attack insisted that the raid came just hours after a wedding celebration and killed dozens of wedding guests and musicians, including women and children. A total of 42 people died.

The video footage, obtained by Associated Press Television News, showed several men and women arriving in pick-up trucks at the desert village and then dancing and singing inside carpeted tents. Several men were shown sitting in a row inside the tent, listening to music as children danced in front of them. Two men were standing and singing through a microphone.

The bride, wearing a white dress and veil, was shown stepping out of a car decorated with ribbons.

One musician was shown playing a Yamaha electronic organ. He was reportedly identified as Mohaned al-Ali, the brother of Hussein al-Ali, a popular Iraqi singer who witnesses said performed at the party. Both men were killed in the raid.

Unbroadcast footage from the video taken after the bombing apparently showed the body of the keyboard player wrapped in a white burial shroud.

Some reports suggested yesterday the video was shot at least a day before the raid.

Witnesses at funerals in Ramadi, 60 miles west of Baghdad, told the Guardian last week that two separate weddings, uniting two tribal families, were taking place in the same house over several days.

They said a party ended at 10.30pm on Tuesday and that the raid followed at 3am when the guests were asleep.

Footage shown by APTN after the attack showed the bodies of dead women and children and shredded tents and musical instruments. A doctor at the nearest hospital, in al-Qaim, told the Guardian last week that the dead included 11 women and 14 children. The US military insists no children were killed.

Despite the new evidence casting doubt on the American version of events, the US military yesterday continued to insist its operation had been properly targeted.

A senior American military official said an investigation was under way and would probably take weeks. The official admitted there were "some inconsistencies that still need to be worked out" but their view that the raid intelligence was right was "unchanged".