Iranian-backed militias and US forces traded blows on Saturday night, as rocket attacks targeted Baghdad’s Green Zone and a base housing US forces, followed by a series of attacks on bases housing Iranian and pro-Iranian forces in Iraq and Syria. The attacks came as Iranian militias and officials ratcheted up threats against American forces in the region after the US airstrike that killed IRGC Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani.
An air strike targeted a site on the Iraq-Syria border within Syrian territory on Saturday night, according to Al Mayadeen. Militias along the border are on high alert. Multiple people were injured and killed in the airstrike targeting a base belonging to the Shi’ite Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) along the Iraqi-Syrian border, according to Al Arabiya.
Local news source Deir Ezzor 24 published video of large fires in the area of Al-Bukamal near the Iraq-Syria border and reported that it’s believed that there was an air strike in the area. Al-Bukamal is home to an Iranian base. Al-Hadath also reported airstrikes on Iranian targets in Al-Bukamal.
Earlier, six rockets were fired towards the presidential palace in Mosul where American forces are located on Saturday night, according to Al Mayadeen.
Another explosion was reported Saturday evening near the al-Kindi camp in northern Mosul by Al Arabiya. An Iraqi commander later denied that there had been any attack on the al-Kindi camp or the presidential palace, according to the Iraqi Al Sumaria news.
A rocket fell in the Green Zone in Baghdad near where the US embassy is located. Three people were injured in the attack, according to Al-Sumaria.
Two loud blasts were heard early Saturday evening shortly after IRGC Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani’s funeral kicked off, after having been assassinated during a US airstrike in Baghdad International Airport.
Multiple rockets fell inside the Iraqi Balad air base housing US soldiers on Saturday evening. Three Iraqi soldiers were injured in the attack on the Balad air base, according to Al Arabiya.
The United States-led military coalition fighting Islamic State said early on Sunday that there were two attacks near Iraqi bases housing its troops on Saturday night but that none of its troops were harmed.
The attacks potentially harmed Iraqi civilians, it said.
Iraqi Kataib Hezbollah Brigades warned Iraqi security forces to be at least 1,000 meters (3,280 feet) away from all American bases starting Sunday evening. The brigades cautioned Iraqi forces from serving as human shields for US forces.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo responded to the calls by the brigades, tweeting that “Iranian-owned Kata’ib Hizballah thugs are telling Iraqi security forces to abandon their duty to protect @USEmbBaghdad and other locations where Americans work side by side with good Iraqi people.”
“The Iranian regime telling Iraq’s government what to do puts Iraqi patriots’ lives at risk,” warned Pompeo. US President Donald Trump warned in a tweet on Saturday night that if Iran targeted Americans or American assets, the US would strike a list of 52 Iranian targets “(representing the 52 American hostages taken by Iran many years ago), some at a very high level & important to Iran & the Iranian culture, and those targets, and Iran itself, WILL BE HIT VERY FAST AND VERY HARD. The USA wants no more threats!”
Red flags were raised over mosques in Syria and Iran to signify that revenge that would be taken for the killing of Soleimani, according to Arab media.
IRGC commander Hossein Salami warned that the response to Soleimani’s killing would be carried out in a “vast geography throughout time and with determining impacts” and would “end the US presence in the region,” according to the Iranian Fars news agency.
An Omani envoy who visited Iran was told that Tehran is not interested in any mediation and left without meeting with officials on Saturday, according to Al Mayadeen.
Solemani and Iraqi militia commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, along with at least 10 other people, were killed in a US air strike in Baghdad on Friday.
“At the direction of the President, the US military has taken decisive defensive action to protect US personnel abroad by killing Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force, a US-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization,” the Pentagon wrote in a statement.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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