{"id":22363,"date":"2024-01-08T01:55:13","date_gmt":"2024-01-08T07:55:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=22363"},"modified":"2024-01-08T01:55:19","modified_gmt":"2024-01-08T07:55:19","slug":"iraq-wants-to-kick-out-us-troops","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=22363","title":{"rendered":"Iraq wants to kick out US troops"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">Baghdad has accused Washington of breaching its sovereignty with yet another summary assassination<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al Sudani has promised to launch a process to expel international coalition forces from the country, after a US airstrike killed a high-ranking militia commander in Baghdad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">An attack hit the headquarters of the Popular Mobilization Forces, an Iraqi state-sponsored umbrella organization composed of dozens of armed factions, on Thursday. At least two people were killed, including Mushtaq Taleb al-Saidi, the leader of Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba (HHN), which Washington has listed as a terrorist group and claims is backed by Iran.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe Popular Mobilization Forces represent an official presence affiliated with the state, subject to it, and an integral part of our armed forces,\u201d&nbsp;the Iraqi&nbsp;prime minister&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/IraqiPMO\/status\/1743192432479482202\">stated<\/a>&nbsp;on Friday.&nbsp;\u201cWe condemn the attacks targeting our security forces, which go beyond the spirit and letter of the mandate that created the international coalition.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">Pentagon Press secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder defended the January 4 strike as a \u201cnecessary, proportionate act,\u201d&nbsp;amid a wave of attacks on&nbsp;American military&nbsp;installations in the region.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">The Pentagon insists that its troops are in Baghdad at the invitation of local authorities to help fight Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS). The 2,500 troops who&nbsp;remain the country a decade later are free to act in&nbsp;\u201cself-defense,\u201d&nbsp;according to Washington.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">Baghdad has argued that the time has come to review the terms of that invitation, with Al Sudani promising to&nbsp;\u201cstart the dialogue through the bilateral committee that was formed to determine the arrangements for the end of this presence.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWe affirm our principled position in ending the existence of the international coalition after the justifications for its existence have ended,\u201d&nbsp;he said,&nbsp;adding that Baghdad seeks to restore full&nbsp;\u201cnational sovereignty over the land, sky, and waters of Iraq.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">American military bases in Iraq, as well as illegal outposts in neighboring Syria, have come under drone and missile strikes on more than 110 occasions since October, amid regional tensions stemming from the Israeli war in Gaza. While the attacks were mostly carried out by unidentified parties, Washington has&nbsp;accused Tehran&nbsp;of pulling the strings behind the scenes and has reserved the right to retaliate as it deems fit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWe have repeatedly emphasized that in the event of a violation or transgression by any Iraqi party, or if Iraqi law is violated, the Iraqi government is the only party that has the right to follow up on the merits of these violations,\u201d&nbsp;the Iraqi prime minister said. He accused Washington of routinely violating Iraq\u2019s sovereignty, recalling another&nbsp;\u201cheinous act\u201d&nbsp;committed by the&nbsp;US four years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\">Soleimani, a revered figure in Iran, was killed in a drone strike authorized by former US President Donald Trump in Baghdad on January 3, 2020. Washington claimed at the time that Soleimani was planning an&nbsp;\u201cimminent\u201d&nbsp;attack on US forces. On the&nbsp;fourth anniversary of his death, two explosions ripped through a memorial in Iran killing nearly 100 people and injuring hundreds more. IS terrorists claimed responsibility for the atrocity in a Telegram post, while the US has insisted that Washington played no role in the bombings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rt.com\/news\/590208-iraq-expel-us-troops\/\">Rt<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Baghdad has accused Washington of breaching its sovereignty with yet another summary assassination Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al Sudani has promised to launch a process to expel international coalition forces from the country, after a US airstrike killed a high-ranking militia commander in Baghdad. An attack hit the headquarters of the Popular Mobilization Forces, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":22364,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[8097,5150,5571,9243,5180,4051,2373,24356,8429,1227],"class_list":["post-22363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-assassination","tag-baghdad","tag-blame","tag-desire","tag-expulsion","tag-invasion","tag-iraq","tag-sovereignty","tag-us-troops","tag-washington"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22363"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22363\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22365,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22363\/revisions\/22365"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/22364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}