This is the first message sent by the Iraqi Shiite militias and their Iranian godfather to the new American administration. Monday, February 15, in the evening, a rocket salute targeted an air base where American troops are stationed near the airport of Erbil, in Iraqi Kurdistan. A civilian employee was killed and eight others wounded, as well as an American soldier, announced the international coalition against the organization Islamic State (IS). Rockets also fell in surrounding residential areas, leaving at least five injured, according to the authorities of the Kurdish autonomous region.
The attack, claimed by a little-known militia by the name of Awliyaa Al-Dam (“Guardians of Blood”), was immediately condemned by authorities in Erbil and Baghdad, as well as by Washington. “I contacted the Prime Minister of the Kurdish regional government, Masrour Barzani, to discuss the incident and assured him of all our support to investigate and hold those responsible to account,” said US Secretary of State Antony Blinken. A US officer told Agence France-Presse that the projectiles were fired from a distance of eight kilometers west of Erbil.
This attack is the most severe cut in the truce decreed in October 2020 by the pro-Tehran Shiite militias in their harassment of American interests in Iraq. While attacks targeting Erbil were rare – Monday’s is the third in a year – pro-Iranian Shiite militias have carried out dozens of attacks since fall 2019 against US military and diplomatic facilities, as well as against military convoys. They thus exposed themselves to reprisals from Washington, the most scathing of which was the assassination in an American drone strike in Baghdad on January 3, 2020, of Iranian General Ghassem Soleimani and his lieutenant in Iraq, Abou Mahdi Al- Mohandes.
After this assassination and the vote in the Parliament of Baghdad of a non-binding resolution calling for the departure of American – and foreign – troops from Iraq, the rhythm of the attacks has increased. Claimed by a myriad of little-known Shiite militias, they are attributed to the formations most loyal to Tehran, like the Hezbollah Brigades (“Kataeb Hezbollah”) or the League of the Virtuous (“Asaib Ahl Al-Haq”) .
Vice grip
Citing the decline in the threat posed by ISIS in Iraq, the administration of Donald Trump has initiated a partial withdrawal of its troops. American soldiers and the anti-ISIS coalition evacuated a dozen bases in Iraq, while the American troops were reduced by more than half to 2,500 men. Almost all of them are stationed in the military complex near Erbil airport, which also serves as a rear base for operations in northeastern Syria.
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