U.S. air strikes targeting pro-Iranian military factions in Iraq killed one civilian and five security personnel early on Friday, the Iraqi military said, warning that the raids risked a bloody escalation for the war-battered country.
The Pentagon said the strikes were in retaliation for rocket fire against an Iraqi base on Wednesday night that killed one British and two U.S. military personnel in the deadliest such attack in years.
The strikes battered positions belonging to both the Iraqi Army and the state-sponsored Hashed al-Shaabi paramilitary network.
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Among them were areas controlled by Kataeb Hezbollah, a hardline Hashed faction that the U.S. has blamed for several attacks on foreign troops in Iraq.
The Iraqi military said its preliminary death toll from the air strikes was three Iraqi soldiers, two policemen and one civilian working at an unfinished airport south of Baghdad.
There were no Hashed members among the dead but the toll could rise as some bodies were still stuck under the rubble, the statement said.
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Hashed fighters were among 11 Iraqi fighters wounded in the bombardment, some of them critically. One civilian was also wounded.
The military warned the air strikes risked “escalation and deterioration of the security situation in the country, and exposes everyone to more risks and threats”
President Barham Saleh condemned them as a violation of the country’s sovereignty that could “slide Iraq into anarchy and chaos”.
In its statement, the Pentagon said the strikeswere “defensive, proportional and in direct response to the threat posed by Iranian-backed Shia militia groups who continue to attack bases” hosting foreign troops in Iraq.