WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump on Wednesday said the US military will hit Iran “hard” after a missile attack against US bases in Jordan, Fox News reported. “We’ll be hitting them hard. They’re going to get a beating,” Fox’s correspondent quoted Trump as saying.
Trump also told Fox that US-Saudi bombing of a pro-Iranian group overnight inside Iraq had been coordinated with the authorities in Baghdad — despite the Iraqi government publicly condemning the attacks. Trump “says those strikes were coordinated with the Iraqi government,” the Fox correspondent said after talking with the US leader.
The Iraqi presidency said it “denounces the bombing that targeted the Hashed Al Shaabi bases and it considers it an unacceptable attack and a blatant violation of Iraq’s sovereignty, targeting its official institutions.” It also said it rejected the use of Iraqi territory to launch attacks on neighbouring countries. The sudden flare-up in the now five-month US war against Iran came after earlier insistence by Trump that he wanted to seek a negotiated solution.
Iran said that it had fired missiles at US military facilities in Jordan, while Jordan’s US-backed army said it had intercepted five Iranian missiles. The joint air operation in Iraq followed attacks by what Saudi Arabia called “terrorist groups loyal to Iran” on its oil facilities. Riyadh had previously reported intercepting drones it said were launched by the groups. The US military said logistics and weapons sites belonging to an Iran-aligned group were targeted in the Iraq strikes.
US-Saudi strikes on Iraq on Wednesday killed at least 20 members of the Hashed Al Shaabi, an armed Iraqi alliance that includes pro-Iran groups, the alliance said. The United States and Saudi Arabia said they had struck Iran-backed militants in Iraq in response to attacks on US forces and Saudi oil facilities. Washington and Tehran are Iraq’s main allies, but their enmity has long turned the country into a proxy battleground and left successive governments struggling to maintain a delicate balance between the foes.
A general view of damaged structures at the site of a strike in Bartalla in the northern Iraqi Nineveh province
The Hashed Al Shaabi, also known as the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF), said that at least 20 fighters “were martyred and another 32 wounded according to a preliminary toll”. The Hashed alliance was created in 2014 to fight militants before it was formally integrated into the armed forces. It includes brigades belonging to Iran-backed groups reputed for acting unilaterally.
US President Donald Trump said the strikes were coordinated with the Iraqi government. They follow growing US pressure on Baghdad to disarm pro-Iran armed groups which have frequently targeted US facilities in the country and have long called for the withdrawal of US troops. Iraq’s new Prime Minister Ali al Zaidi, who came to power this year with Washington’s blessing, vowed to ensure those groups would hand over their weapons, but has faced pushback from some powerful factions. Earlier this month, Zaidi visited both the United States, where he met Trump, and Iran.
Meanwhile, Iranian state television on Wednesday said the United States struck a city in the country’s northwest on the border with Iraq. “A few minutes ago, a location in the Piranshahr border area was attacked by American enemy air strikes,” state television reported. Fars news agency had earlier quoted an official in West Azerbaijan province as saying a missile hit an uninhabited area, leaving no casualties.
The attack came hours after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said its aerospace force “targeted a US airbase and the US Central Command Centre in Jordan with several ballistic missiles”, according to a statement carried by state TV. “As long as the threats against the Islamic Republic of Iran continue… the resistance will continue,” the statement added. Jordan’s army said it intercepted “five missiles coming from Iran targeting the kingdom’s territory”.
The developments came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Washington to meet with US President Donald Trump. The attacks are the first since Washington and Tehran paused strikes last weekend, following a fortnight of renewed hostilities.
Damage at a site belonging to Iraq’s Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF) following air strikes in Bartella, Iraq
