An influential pro-Iranian armed group in Iraq pledged on Thursday to stop attacking the US embassy for five days, subject to several conditions including that Israel stop strikes on parts of Beirut.
AFP reported no drone or rocket attacks so far on the US embassy in Iraq’s capital Baghdad between last night and this morning.
The country has been unwillingly drawn into the regional conflict triggered by the US-Israel attack on its neighbour Iran on February 28.
Strikes have targeted Iran-backed groups, which in turn have claimed near daily attacks on US interests in Iraq and across the region.
Kataeb Hezbollah said the group’s secretary-general had “issued orders to suspend operations targeting the US Embassy in Baghdad for a period of five days”.
In a statement the Iran-backed group—designated by Washington as a “terrorist organisation”—stipulated several conditions, including Israel “ceasing its bombardment” of southern Beirut suburbs, and “a commitment to refrain from bombing residential areas in Baghdad and other provinces”.
Whenever “the enemy violates” the truce “the response will be immediate”, it said, warning of an “escalation of strikes” after the five-day period.
The US embassy has been targeted by drone and rocket attacks several times in recent days, with air defences intercepting most of the projectiles.
A US diplomatic and logistics centre at Baghdad International Airport, which houses military personnel, has also been regularly targeted.
AFP journalists reported yesterday morning at least four explosions in the city of Erbil, the capital of the Kurdistan region.
It was unclear what the target was and the projectiles were intercepted over the city, home to a major US consulate complex, while its airport houses US-led coalition troops.
And a strike near Iraq’s western border with Syria on Wednesday killed three fighters from the former paramilitary coalition Hashed al-Shaabi, the alliance said.
The fighters from the alliance—also known as the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF), now part of Iraq’s regular armed forces—were hit in a US or Israeli strike that targeted their main command centre in Anbar province.
