Iraq also seething in the shadow of Haniyeh's assassination
As Hamas’s top political leader was being eliminated, the United States carried out a raid against pro-Iranian Iraqi Popular Mobilization Forces, which Tehran summoned for a meeting to plan retaliation. Meanwhile, Haniyeh was buried in Doha, Qatar.
Milan (AsiaNews/Agencies) – While the Middle East looks on with concern at Iran’s threatened response to the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, head of Hamas’s political bureau, tensions are rising again in Iraq.
Just as Israel struck the top Palestinian leader in Tehran as well as Fuad Shukr, one of Hezbollah's senior military commanders, in Beirut, US troops in Iraq carried out a raid in Babil against the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF), the local pro-Iranian militias, killing four people.
The action came after rockets were fired at the Ain al-Assad base, which houses US troops in Iraq's western Anbar province.
Iraq was irked by the US military action. “The Iraqi government will proceed with a legal complaint before the Security Council and international organisations,” said Sabhan Mula Chyad, political advisor to Iraqi Prime Minister Mohamed Shia al Sudani, speaking to Rudaw.
The US “targeted a part of the Iraqi security forces," he explained, adding that the US operation was taken without the approval of the Iraqi government and could undermine cooperation to fight the Islamic State (IS), which is rearing again its head in the country in the shadow of the Gaza conflict.
The phase opened by Haniyeh’s elimination in Tehran is likely to have profound repercussions in Iraq as well, where Baghdad has long questioned the presence of US forces in the country.
According to sources cited by Reuters, the Popular Mobilisation Forces – together with the Lebanese Hezbollah and Yemen’s Houthis – have been called to Tehran to a meeting to hammer out Iran’s “response” to Israel’s action.
It should be noted that in January Iranian rockets struck Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan, in a "harsh response" to the Kerman massacre, which took place a few days earlier, during the commemoration of the killing of the head of the Revolutionary Guard Qasem Soleimani.
Meanwhile, after his funeral in Tehran yesterday, Haniyeh was buried in Doha, Qatar, where Hamas's political bureau is headquartered and where he had lived since 2019.
This is why Qatar is key to negotiations for the release of hostages and the ceasefire in Gaza.
In his first comment of the situation, US President Joe Biden yesterday said that Haniyeh’s killing was not helpful.
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