Multiple Iraqi militias known to serve as proxies for the Iranian terror regime issued statements this weekend threatening the United States in response to the ongoing military campaign against Iranian leaders by the nation of Israel.
Among those issuing threats were the Hezbollah Brigades or Kata’ib Hezbollah (KH), which lost its leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis in an American airstrike in 2020, also eliminating one of Iran’s most powerful terror masterminds, Qasem Soleimani. President Donald Trump ordered an airstrike on Soleimani, the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force, in January 2020 after Iran-backed militias in Iraq attacked America’s embassy in Baghdad, leaving graffiti on the premises reading, “Soleimani is our commander.”
“Duty requires the Iraqi government, the brothers in the Coordination Framework, and the sincere leaders to bear responsibility and take a courageous stance to prevent the expansion of the war zone,” KH said in a statement on Sunday, “by closing the embassy of the great Satan [US] and expelling the American occupation forces from the country.”
The KH statement reportedly added that it would attack American military bases and other stops in the region if it considered that America had “intervened” in the conflict.
“If America intervenes in the war, we will act without any hesitation against its interests and bases in the region,” the statement read.
KH is part of a broader coalition of militias known as the “Popular Mobilization Forces” (PMF) which were active against the Islamic State prior to the fall of that group’s “caliphate” in 2017. Since then, they have been integrated into the Iraqi armed forces, but many remain active terrorist organizations.
Some members of the PMF are now also believed to be part of a nebulous coalition known as the “Islamic Resistance in Iraq” which emerged following the gruesome invasion of Israel by another Iranian proxy group, Hamas, on October 7, 2023.
Israel initiated a kinetic operation targeting Iranian nuclear sites and senior Iranian terror leaders in the early morning hours of Friday, following the United Nations condemning Iran for illicit nuclear activities. The U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) passed a resolution on Thursday asserting that Iran had violated international laws regulating nuclear development with its rapidly expanding uranium enrichment program. The Israeli government later confirmed it had intelligence suggesting Iran was imminently close to constructing a nuclear weapon. The Iranian Islamic regime regularly threatens genocide against the Israeli people.
Iran has since retaliated against the Israeli attack, which eliminated several high-ranking members of the regime, by targeting Israeli population centers, killing at least eight civilians and injuring hundreds at press time. While the Trump administration has repeatedly insisted it played no role in the Israeli operation, Iran and its allies have threatened America with violence. The State Department began evacuating non-essential staff from its Baghdad embassy last week prior to the initiation of Israel’s “Operation Rising Lion” as well as reportedly offering to evacuate families of diplomats from Bahrain.
An apparent subgroup within the “Islamic Resistance in Iraq” calling itself the “True Promise Corps,” after Iran’s mission names for its attacks on Israel, issued a statement this weekend declaring all countries that support Israel are “targets” for terrorism.
“We declare that all the sites and camps of the entity [Israel] and anyone who supports it in the region are targets for us,” Mohammed Al Tamimi, the alleged leader of the group, said according to the Kurdish outlet Rudaw. The threat appeared to be directed at the United States; it is unclear if it also included nations with diplomatic relations with Israel, such as the United Arab Emirates (UAE) or Bahrain.
This group reportedly also threatened Iraqi Kurdistan, an autonomous region headquartered in the northern city of Erbil.
Rudaw also cited the KH statement and noted that several other known terror arms of the PMF — including Hezbollah Harakat Al Nujabaa, Kata’ib Sayyid Al Shuhada, and Asaib Ahl Al Haq — issued similar threats.
The Iraqi government, while opposing Israel, is reportedly concerned that these Iran-backed groups will embroil the already volatile country in conflict it cannot afford. An anonymous Iraqi diplomat told Rudaw that Baghdad had “made it clear to the Iranians that targeting the U.S. troops in Iraq, whether directly or indirectly, will complicate the situation and asked them not to consider this option.” The diplomat claimed that Iran “replied positively.”
The threats against America represent a significant change in approach by the PMF-affiliated militias. In April, Reuters reported that KH and several other Iranian proxies in Iraq were considering disarming entirely, rather than continuing to engage in terrorism on behalf of Tehran.
“Trump is ready to take the war with us to worse levels, we know that, and we want to avoid such a bad scenario,” an anonymous KH commander stated, directly tying the decision to potentially disarm to the return of President Trump to the White House.
Reports at the time also indicated that the successor of Soleimani as the head of the Quds Force, Esmail Qaani, visited Iraq in March and allegedly discouraged any unnecessary hostility towards America. Qaani has taken on a much lower profile than Soleimani — notorious for undermining the Iranian Foreign Ministry by conducting crypto-diplomacy with terrorist groups and rogue regimes such as that of Venezuela — so much so that his extended disappearances from the public eye have prompted rumors of death or defection.
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