An Iran-backed militia calling itself the Islamic Resistance in Iraq has announced a purported $10 million reward for anyone who kills US President Donald Trump, citing the 2020 killing of Qassem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis as justification.
The Pentagon said the September pullout fulfils a 2024 agreement with Baghdad. American troop levels, once above 170,000 during the Iraq war, have steadily declined to a small advisory force ahead of the final withdrawal.
The most enduring consequence of a war is often not what happens on the battlefield, but what it reveals about the institutions that authorise it.
An explosion aboard the Panama-flagged MSC Sariska V has triggered competing narratives, with Iran claiming a retaliatory strike and Iraqi reports pointing towards a possible technical failure.
The attacks come as regional tensions continue to escalate, with the ongoing US-Israel conflict involving Iran entering its 36th day. Iran-backed militias have repeatedly targeted US military positions in Iraq and neighbouring areas in recent weeks.
Iraq's parliament speaker Mohamed al-Halbousi tweeted that the blaze was "clear proof of the failure to protect Iraqi lives"
Iran has struggled to fill in the gap left in the absence of Soleimani and al-Muhandis, who were commanding figures able to push factions into line and resolve disputes among them
President Biden’s three-pronged offensive is likely to impinge on multilateral geostrategy. In America’s reckoning, the certitudes of international law.
Political pardons cannot be a tool of self-protection or for furthering a partisan purpose they should remain a progressive tool for the larger good of society, civic evolution and societal heal, depending only on the circumstances, sensitivities and implications involved.
The meeting comes as attacks on American targets by pro-Iranian fighters have been on the rise, and with Tehran and Washington competing for influence in Iraq, the gulf between pro-Iranian factions and Baghdad’s US-friendly premier is growing.
