Iranian commander calls for escalation against US forces at meeting in Iraq, sources say

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BAGHDAD, July 13 (Reuters) – A senior Iranian Revolutionary Guard commander urged Iraqi Shiite militias to step up their attacks on U.S. targets during a meeting in Baghdad last week, three militia sources and two said. Iraqi security sources close to the rally.

US forces in Iraq and Syria have been repeatedly attacked following visit by Iranian delegation led by Revolutionary Guards intelligence chief Hossein Taeb after deadly US airstrikes against supported militias by Iran at the Syrian-Iraqi border on June 27.

While encouraging retaliation, the Iranians advised the Iraqis not to go too far to avoid a big escalation, three militia sources briefed on the meeting said.

The Iranians, however, advised them to expand their attacks by retaliating against US forces in Syria, according to one of the three militia sources, a senior local militia commander informed of the meeting.

The conflagration comes as major differences cloud diplomatic efforts to revive the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, which was scrapped by former US President Donald Trump but which Iran wants to reinstate to allow it to resume its mainstream oil exports.

A senior official in the region, who was briefed by Iranian authorities about Taeb’s visit, said Taeb met several Iraqi militia leaders during the trip and conveyed to them “the message from the Supreme Leader to keep the pressure on. US forces in Iraq until they leave the Region “.

Since the US airstrikes, attacks on US troops and personnel or the bases where they operate have intensified in Iraq and spread to eastern Syria. Read more

Iran’s Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to Reuters questions about the story, and officials at the Revolutionary Guard’s public relations office were not immediately available for comment.

Iran’s envoy to the UN this month denied US accusations that Tehran supported attacks on US forces in Iraq and Syria, and condemned US airstrikes against Iran-backed militants there -low. Read more

There was no immediate response from the Iraqi government or the prime minister’s office to questions about the meeting.

Sources Reuters spoke to did so on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter.

US-IRANIAN RIVALITY

The largest Shiite-majority country in the Arab world, Iraq has been the scene of a US-Iranian rivalry since the US-led invasion that toppled Sunni leader Saddam Hussein in 2003.

The Shiite militias are waging a sustained and increasingly sophisticated campaign against the American forces which, after withdrawing in 2011, returned to Iraq in 2014 at the head of a coalition against the Islamic State group.

But attacks, including drones loaded with explosives, have shifted into high gear since the U.S. airstrikes, which Iran-aligned militias say killed four of their members.

The two Iraqi security sources familiar with the groups’ activities and operations said the Iranians handed their Iraqi allies air maps of US positions in eastern Syria during the July 5 meeting.

The Pentagon has said it is deeply concerned about the attacks, including a July 7 rocket barrage at the Ain al-Asad air base in which two U.S. servicemen were injured. Read more

A senior guard official, Taeb is a middle-ranking Shiite cleric considered by insiders and analysts of Iranian politics to be close to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The senior region official said Khamenei sent Taeb to Iraq after site visits by Brigadier General Esmail Ghaani, who was appointed to head the Guards’ expeditionary wing, the Quds Force last year, failed. failed to cause an escalation.

An Iraqi government official said it appeared Iran was looking to use its allies in Iraq to push for a return to the nuclear deal, under which severe US sanctions would be lifted in exchange for restrictions on Iran’s atomic activities.

A senior Iranian diplomat said Taeb’s visit to Baghdad indicated Khamenei was directly involved in Iraqi affairs after the murder of General Qassem Soleimani, a former Quds Force chief, in a US drone strike in Iraq at the beginning of last year.

A spokesperson for one of the Iranian-backed militias affected by the US airstrike last month confirmed the recent attacks were carried out by the Iraqi Islamic Resistance, a reference to Iran-backed Shiite groups .

“The military escalation against US forces will continue until all of their fighting forces leave Iraq,” Kadhim al-Fartousi, spokesman for the Kataib Sayyed al-Shuhada faction, told Reuters.

Saad al-Saadi, a senior official in the political bureau of the Iranian-backed group of Asaib Ahl al-Haq, said that if the Americans continued to hit the militias, more effective attacks against American forces could be expected. anywhere in Iraq and Syria. .

The meeting was held in the upscale Jadiriya neighborhood of Baghdad, at a villa just across the Tigris from the United States Embassy, ​​two of the local militia commanders said.

Iran and the United States began indirect negotiations in Vienna in early April to restore the nuclear deal. No date has been set for further talks, which adjourned on June 20.

Some Western and Iranian officials have said the talks are far from concluded, as disagreements over US sanctions should be lifted and over which nuclear commitments Iran should make and when they remain in place.

(This story has been passed on to reinstate the abandoned word “at” in paragraph 11)

Report from the Baghdad newsroom; Editing by William Maclean

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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