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Iranian militias, US trade blows as tensions rise
[Jpost] No casualties were reported, according to Iraqi police. Other reports claim that three people were maimed.

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 Arclight airstrike
...KABOOM!...
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 maimed 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 djinn-infested Mosul
... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn...
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.

A rocket fell in the Green Zone in Baghdad near where the US embassy is located. Five people were maimed in the attack, according to Sky News Arabia.

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 maimed in the attack on the Balad air base, according to Al Arabiya.

Five people were maimed in a separate mortar attack in Jadriya, Baghdad, according to Iraqi police.

Iraqi-Kurdish sources also reported US helicopters and warplanes "flying intensively" over the Balad airbase, as well as Tikrit
...birthplace of Saddam Hussein...
and Taji in northern Baghdad.

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.

Red flags were raised over mosques in Syria and Iran
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan, the abbreviation IRGC is a cognate form of Stürmabteilung (or SA), the term Supreme Guide is a cognate form of either Shah or Führer or maybe both, and they hate Jews Zionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol...
to signify that Dire 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.
The Times of Israel adds:
NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Originally it was a mutual defense pact directed against an expansionist Soviet Union. In later years it evolved into a mechanism for picking the American pocket while criticizing the cut of the American pants...
on Saturday said it has suspended a training mission for soldiers in the Iraqi army in the wake of the killing of Soleimani.

The military alliance said in a statement that even if the Canadian-led mission is to continue in the future, security concerns for its personnel were "paramount."

"We continue to take all precautions necessary," NATO front man Dylan White said in a statement. "NATO’s mission is continuing, but training activities are temporarily suspended."

The Iraqi mission consists of several hundred staff from allied nations and non-NATO countries.

Tensions boiled over on Friday when the US struck Soleimani’s convoy as it drove out of the airport and US diplomats and troops across Iraq had been bracing themselves for more rocket attacks.

Related: Gateway Pundit has a roundup of tweets on the two attacks.
Rudaw was liveblogging the day. Key headlines:
  • Kataib Hezbollah warns Iraqi forces to move away from US bases by tomorrow

  • PM Adil Abdul Mahdi announces national days of mourning for Soleimani and Muhandis


Posted by: trailing wife 2020-01-05
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=560217