Analysts mull coalition strategy in spat with Iran-backed forces

The Iraqi military said the US airstrikes on Thursday killed six people in Babil and Karbala. The UK foreign secretary praised the US decision to launch the strikes on Al-Hashd Al-Shaabi positions. (Reuters)
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Updated 16 March 2020
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Analysts mull coalition strategy in spat with Iran-backed forces

  • Current tactic will continue until cost becomes too great for Iraqi militias, UK expert tells Arab News

LONDON: Three days of attacks between US-led coalition forces and Iran-backed Iraqi militias continued with the second attack in a week on the coalition base at Camp Taji, north of Baghdad.

Missiles were fired at the base after US warplanes conducted a series of airstrikes on Iraqi militia positions in the provinces of Babil and Karbala on Thursday night.
The strikes came in retaliation for a missile attack on Camp Taji on Wednesday, on what would have been the birthday of Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, who was killed by a US drone strike in Baghdad in January.
Wednesday’s attack claimed the lives of two American soldiers — Juan Miguel Mendez Covarrubias and Marshal D. Roberts — and British Army reservist Brodie Gillon.
The Iraqi military said six people were killed in the US strikes, including three soldiers, two police officers and a civilian.
It added that the strikes had been launched against positions occupied by the paramilitary umbrella group Al-Hashd Al-Shaabi, a wing of the Iraqi security forces that includes the militia Kataib Hezbollah.
Jamal Jafar Muhammad Ali Al-Ibrahim, former Al-Hashd deputy chief and Kataib Hezbollah commander, was one of the senior figures killed alongside Soleimani.
Pentagon spokeswoman Alyssa Farah confirmed that the militia was the target, saying the US had “conducted defensive precision strikes against Kataib Hezbollah facilities across Iraq.”
A senior US commander has accused the militia of being behind the attacks on Camp Taji. Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, US Central Command chief, told a committee meeting of the US Senate: “The Iranian proxy group Kataib Hezbollah is the only group known to have previously conducted an indirect fire attack of this scale against US and coalition forces in Iraq.”

UK reaction
UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab praised the decision to launch airstrikes on Al-Hashd positions on Thursday, having previously stated, after confirmation of Gillon’s death, that those responsible for the attacks would be “held responsible.”
Raab said in a statement: “The response to the cowardly attack on coalition forces in Iraq has been swift, decisive and proportionate.”
He added: “UK forces are in Iraq with coalition partners to help the country counter-terrorist activity and anyone seeking to harm them can expect a strong response.”
However, the UK’s ability to hold people to account is complex, bound up in a multitude of issues including rules of engagement and interaction with coalition partners.
The UK’s role in the strikes is unclear — various sources, including USA Today, claimed that the airstrikes were “a joint operation with the British,” though US President Donald Trump is known to have given the final go ahead.
“We didn’t launch the strike,” a UK Ministry of Defense (MoD) spokesman told Arab News.
Michael Stephens, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute for Defense and Security Studies, said coordinated military responses with the US are the most likely course of action the UK will take.
“There are many ways that you can hold people to account. I think it’s a combination of messaging and action, and because we lost service personnel and we have joint operations going on in Anbar and the Kurdistan region as well, I don’t think it’s unusual, necessarily, to have a combination of US and UK activity,” he told Arab News.
“You can have UK assets doing ISTAR (intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance) whilst the US carries out the strike or vice versa, or you can have ad hoc missions. It’s not unusual for the UK to be involved in ‘kinetic activity’ in Iraq,” he said.

BACKGROUND

• The strikes came in retaliation for a missile attack on Camp Taji on Wednesday, on what would have been the birthday of Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, who was killed by a US drone strike in Baghdad in January.

• Wednesday’s attack claimed the lives of two American soldiers — Juan Miguel Mendez Covarrubias and Marshal D. Roberts — and British Army reservist Brodie Gillon.

“The lines are quite grey in terms of ‘is this going to be a UK-only response.’ It doesn’t really work like that. It’s more fluid, and it can simply be a day-to-day set of calculations that determine how we (the coalition) respond.”


Part of the complexity revolves around the fact that Al-Hashd is technically part of the Iraqi security forces, blurring lines about chains of command and responsibility. Stephens was scathing about the ability of diplomatic routes to resolve the situation.
“In terms of diplomatic pressure, the Iraqi government has absolutely no ability to respond when it comes to Kataib Hezbollah or Al-Hashd Al-Shaabi in general,” he said.
“I think this is something that a lot of countries are trying to work on, in terms of building the resilience of the Iraqi state,” he added.
“Vis-a-vis Al-Hashd Al-Shaabi, there’s not much you can do. If you start threatening more coercive diplomatic tactics or sanctions, you’re effectively just making a lot of innocent Iraqis suffer. It can be counterproductive, and the problem you’ve got is this very strange legal status for Al-Hashd, which just sort of attaches to the state when it wants to, and behaves as if it’s not part of the state at other times,” Stephens said.
“That’s a highly complicated equation. If you’re putting pressure on Baghdad, you may not get a result because Baghdad is both unwilling to do it and doesn’t have the actual leverage to do it either. You’ve then got to apply diplomatic pressure that doesn’t make the situation more difficult.”

Clear message
Military responses range in terms of method and intention. A source familiar with UK foreign policy told Arab News on condition of anonymity: “It can range from a Reaper (drone) to a team, and it can be subtle or it can be ‘shock and awe.’ Both have their uses, but the overarching message is clear: If US or UK forces want you, they’ll find you. How obvious they make it depends on the message they wish to send to other actors.”
Stephens suggested that may have been behind the very public way the coalition had struck Kataib Hezbollah.
“A straight military response (like this) shows ‘escalation dominance — they kill three, we kill 25.’ I don’t really think there’s any other way to deal with this,” he said.
“It makes sense to simply increase the cost on these militias. If they go outside the remit of the state — and their strikes kill Iraqi service personnel as well — they’re hurting themselves. But of course these militias are only thinking about themselves, not the wider Iraqi question.”
In terms of what might follow the latest attack on Camp Taji, Stephens believed little would change.
“That’s the response. I think more will come. Sure, summon the British ambassador, summon the US ambassador, but that won’t stop what’s going on here,” he said.
“Eventually I think this will come to a head and both sides will have to climb down when they realize the cost is getting too high politically — and from the militia’s side, they just lose too many people.”
The anonymous source said: “You simply won’t know the full extent of what’s going on. That’s the thing about secret military operations — they tend to stay that way.”
The UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office did not comment on whether the government had tried to undertake a diplomatic route in identifying the attackers.
The MoD declined to comment on whether the coalition had relayed its intention to the Iraqi government to strike Al-Hashd targets prior to the attack. “But we’re in constant communication,” its spokesman told Arab News.


Palestinian population in Gaza Strip decreased by 6% in 2024 during Israeli war

Updated 5 sec ago
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Palestinian population in Gaza Strip decreased by 6% in 2024 during Israeli war

  • 5.5m Palestinians reside in West Bank, East Jerusalem, Gaza Strip
  • 65% of them are under 30, only 4% above 65
  • Nearly 100,000 Palestinians have fled Gaza Strip since October 2023
  • Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics confirms deaths of 45,484 individuals in the Israeli war on Gaza, as of December 2024

LONDON: The population of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip decreased by 6 percent in 2024, while the total number of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, inside Israel, and globally reached almost 15 million.

The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics’ 2024 consensus published on Sunday reported that the Gaza Strip’s population decreased by 6 percent in 2024, resulting in a loss of nearly 160,000 Palestinians, bringing the total population to 2.1 million.

The report confirmed the deaths of 45,484 individuals during the Israeli war on the Gaza Strip, as of December 2024.

The casualties included 17,581 children, 12,048 women, and 11,000 individuals who were missing and believed to be dead under the rubble.

Additionally, 108,090 people were injured, and nearly 100,000 Palestinians have fled the coastal enclave since the Israeli military aggression began in October 2023.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said the figures were “terrifying,” and showed the extent of the Israeli occupation’s “brutality and its bloody massacres against our people,” the WAFA News Agency reported.

The total number of Palestinians reached 14.9 million in 2024, of which, according to the Bureau of Statistics, 7.3 million lived between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.

Of these, 5.5 million resided in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza, with 65 percent being under 30 and only 4 percent above 65.

About 3.4 million people lived in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, 2.1 million in the Gaza Strip, while 1.8 million were Palestinian citizens of Israel.

Around 6.4 million Palestinians resided across various Arab countries, including Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, the UAE, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia.

The remaining 1.2 million Palestinians belonged to the diaspora in Western countries, including Europe and North America.


Israel kills member of Palestinian security forces

Updated 27 min 53 sec ago
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Israel kills member of Palestinian security forces

  • The Palestinian security services identified Rabaiya as a first lieutenant in its Preventive Security force, saying he was killed while “performing his national duty”

JERUSALEM: Israeli forces killed a member of the Palestinian security services in the occupied West Bank whom they accused of being a militant. Tearful Palestinians on Sunday meanwhile laid to rest six people killed in Israeli strikes in the Gaza Strip the day before, including a teenager.
Israel’s paramilitary Border Police said they carried out an operation in the West Bank village of Meithaloun to arrest Hassan Rabaiya, describing him as a wanted militant.
They said he was killed in a shootout while trying to escape, and that the troops found a shotgun, weapons parts and around $26,000 in cash inside his home.
Meithaloun is near the northern West Bank city of Jenin, an epicenter of Israeli-Palestinian violence in recent years.
The Palestinian security services identified Rabaiya as a first lieutenant in its Preventive Security force, saying he was killed while “performing his national duty.”
The Palestinian Authority has been waging a rare crackdown on militants in Jenin in recent weeks, angering many Palestinians.
The internationally recognized Palestinian Authority exercises limited autonomy in parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank and cooperates with Israel on security matters. But Israel has long accused it of inciting violence and turning a blind eye to militants.
Meanwhile, Palestinians in Gaza held funeral prayers outside a hospital after six people were killed in two Israeli strikes the night before.
The mother and grandmother of the 15-year-old who was killed peeled back the white funeral shroud and kissed his cheeks as they sobbed. A few dozen people then gathered for prayers outside Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the central town of Deir Al-Balah.

 


Hezbollah leader Nasrallah was killed last year inside war operations room, aide says

A woman holds up a poster of the slain Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah during a ceremony.
Updated 05 January 2025
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Hezbollah leader Nasrallah was killed last year inside war operations room, aide says

  • Nasrallah “used to lead the battle and war from this location,” Hezbollah official Wafiq Safa told news conference near the site where Nasrallah was killed

BEIRUT: Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli airstrike last year while inside the group’s war operations room, according to new details Sunday disclosed by a senior Hezbollah official.
A series of Israeli airstrikes flattened several buildings in Beirut’s southern suburbs on Sept. 27, 2024, killing Nasrallah. The Lebanese Health Ministry said six people died. According to news reports, Nasrallah and other senior officials were meeting underground.
The assassination of Nasrallah, who had led Hezbollah for 32 years, turned months of low-level strikes between Israel and the militants into all-out war that battered much of southern and eastern Lebanon for two months until a US-brokered ceasefire took effect Nov. 27.
“His Eminence (Hassan Nasrallah) used to lead the battle and war from this location,” top Hezbollah security official Wafiq Safa told a news conference Sunday near the site where Nasrallah was killed. He said Nasrallah died in the war operations room. He did not offer other details.
Lebanese media had reported that Safa was a target of Israeli airstrikes in central Beirut before the ceasefire but appeared unscathed.
During the first phase of the ceasefire, Hezbollah is supposed to move its fighters, weapons and infrastructure away from southern Lebanon north of the Litani River, while Israeli troops that invaded southern Lebanon need to withdraw all within 60 days. Lebanese army soldiers are to deploy in large numbers and alongside United Nations peacekeepers be the sole armed presence in southern Lebanon.
Lebanon and Hezbollah have been critical of ongoing Israeli strikes and overflights across the country and for only withdrawing from two of dozens of Lebanese villages it controls. Israel says that the Lebanese military has not done its share in dismantling Hezbollah infrastructure.
Hezbollah’s current leader Naim Kassem in a televised address Saturday warned that its fighters could strike Israel if its troops don’t leave the south by the end of the month.
Meanwhile, Israel’s defense minister Israel Katz echoed similar sentiments should Hezbollah’s militants not head north of the Litani River and their infrastructure remain intact.
“If this condition is not met, there will be no agreement, and Israel will be forced to act on its own to ensure the safe return of the residents of (Israel’s) north to their homes,” he said.
Safa said that Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, who negotiated the ceasefire deal with Washington, told Hezbollah that the government will meet with US envoy Amos Hochstein soon. “And in light of what happens, then there will be a position,” said Safa.
Hochstein had led the shuttle diplomacy efforts to reach the fragile truce.


Syria monitor reports blasts at arms depots near Damascus

View shows abandoned Syrian Assad regime army position in Tal Ash Shahm near the border with the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
Updated 05 January 2025
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Syria monitor reports blasts at arms depots near Damascus

  • Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said the blasts in Kisweh, south of the Syrian capital, may be the result of an Israeli air strike

BEIRUT: A Syria war monitor said explosions on Sunday rocked an area near Damascus housing weapons depots used by the toppled government of Bashar Assad.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said the blasts in Kisweh, south of the Syrian capital, may be the result of an Israeli air strike.
The Israeli military, which has struck many military sites in Syria in recent weeks, told AFP in Jerusalem it did not attack the site.
The Britain-based Observatory, which has a network of sources in Syria, said that “loud blasts resonated in the wider capital area.”
The explosions occurred “at ammunition depots of the former regime forces... near the town of Kisweh,” sending a thick cloud of smoke billowing over the site, the Observatory said.
Israel, which rarely comments on its actions in neighboring Syria, has carried out hundreds of air strikes on military sites since Islamist-led forces ousted president Assad and seized Damascus last month.
Israel has said it was seeking to prevent weapons from falling into hostile hands.
Most recently, the Observatory said Israeli war planes hit sites of the now defunct Syrian army in the Aleppo area on Friday.
In late December, the Observatory said 11 people died in an explosion at an arms storage facility in the Adra area north Damascus, adding that it was possibly the result of an Israeli strike. Israel denied any involvement.


Israel releases Jordanian doctor detained during relief mission to Gaza

Updated 05 January 2025
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Israel releases Jordanian doctor detained during relief mission to Gaza

  • Jordan engaged in ‘intensive’ diplomatic efforts to secure release of Abdullah Balawi
  • Balawi said his mission as a doctor is to relieve those who need help

LONDON: Israeli authorities released Abdullah Balawi, 38, a Jordanian doctor who had been detained in December while attempting to cross into the Gaza Strip to take part in a medical relief mission.

Spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign and Expatriates Affairs Sufian Al-Qudah said that Jordan engaged in “intensive” diplomatic efforts via the kingdom’s embassy in Tel Aviv to secure the release of Balawi on Sunday, according to the Petra agency.

Israeli authorities arrested Balawi on Dec. 19 at Allenby crossing, also known as Sheikh Hussein Bridge, which borders Jordan with the Occupied West Bank.

He was returned through diplomatic channels at the Sheikh Hussein Bridge on Sunday, with Jordanian Embassy staff present, Petra added.

Balawi told Al-Mamlaka TV after his release that his mission as a doctor is to relieve those who need help. His family could not contact him for 11 days during his detention in Israel.

Al-Qudah said that Amman closely monitored Balawi’s detention and contacted his family.

Since October 2023, Jordan has launched several medical, airlift and aid relief missions to assist Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

Some of these missions have been supervised personally by King Abdullah in response to Israeli military operations that have damaged multiple hospitals in Gaza and resulted in almost 45,000 deaths.