Kabul, Afghanistan ? President Hamid Karzai on Thursday urged U.S.-led forces to rethink their strategy in the escalating war against Taliban guerrillas, condemning the rising Afghan death toll.

In a pointed cry of frustration with the international community, Karzai said it was missing the causes of Taliban strength by focusing too much on combat operations. His government’s foreign backers must do more to rebuild the Afghan state and cut off the Taliban’s base of support in neighboring Pakistan, he suggested.

The U.S.-led coalition has launched offensives in the last two months aimed at clearing Taliban out of mountainous strongholds near the northeastern and far southern borders with Pakistan.

“It is not acceptable for us that in all this fighting, Afghans are dying,” said Karzai, who faces rising public anger on that issue.

Casualties are mounting on both sides. Four U.S. Army troops were killed Wednesday on the northeastern front, fighting Taliban among the mountains of Nuristan, the U.S. command here announced Thursday. The report gave no details, but the casualties brought the June death toll for U.S. troops to 15, about double the monthly rate of last year.

The Taliban ally and No. 2 leader of al-Qaida, Ayman al Zawahiri, fought Thursday for political support among Afghans with a three-minute videotape posted on the Internet.

The tape aimed to exploit the rising discontent reflected in anti-foreigner riots May 29 in Kabul, sparked when a U.S. military truck killed several Afghans in a traffic accident.

“I direct my speech today to my Muslim brothers in Kabul who lived the bitter events Thursday and saw by their own eyes a new proof of the criminal acts of the American forces,” Zawahiri said.

He also urged Afghans to revolt against “the infidel forces that are invading Muslim lands.”

Zawahiri’s incitement is a part of the war Karzai said the international community was failing.