AFP Baghdad
Baghdad
Updated Sunday, January 21, 2024-09:29
More than a dozen missiles were launched on Saturday in Iraq against a military base housing US troops and the
international anti-jihadist coalition
, US Central Command and an Iraqi police official said.
"The Ain Al Asad base was the target of
15 rockets"
fired from the province of Ambar, where this Iraqi military base is located, a police official in the region told AFP, on condition of anonymity.
This source assured that
13 of the projectiles were shot down
by the anti-aircraft defense, while "two fell at the air base."
The United States Central Command (Centcom) confirmed hours later that
"Iranian-backed militiamen"
had launched "multiple ballistic missiles and rockets in western Iraq against the Al Asad air base."
"Several US personnel are being evaluated for traumatic brain injuries.
At least one Iraqi soldier was injured
," the agency wrote on social media.
The attacks were claimed in a statement by the
"Islamic Resistance in Iraq
", a group that brings together different armed factions allied to Iran.
Since mid-October, international coalition forces led by the United States to fight the Islamic State group have been the target of dozens of attacks.
Most were claimed by this group.
The attacks come against a backdrop of
high tensions in the region,
fueled by the war in the Gaza Strip between Israel, an ally of the United States, and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, supported by Iran.
On Monday, Iran fired ballistic missiles into Iraqi Kurdistan, claiming to have attacked a site used by "spies of the Zionist regime (Mosad)."