Between the upscale alleyways and fortified compounds of Jadriya in Baghdad, and the Iraqi Army medical facility at Al-Habbaniyah Air Base in Anbar province, two incidents—if confirmed—illustrate how Iran-aligned armed factions in Iraq are exploiting both civilian cover and official military infrastructure, adopting a new pattern of concealment.
On March 25, the Iraqi Army’s medical facility at Al-Habbaniyah Air Base in Anbar province came under an airstrike, which has not been definitively attributed to either the United States or Israel. According to a statement from Iraq’s Ministry of Defense, the strike killed seven Iraqi soldiers and wounded thirteen others.
This marked the first time the Iraqi army itself had been targeted in such a strike. The incident came as a surprise and raised numerous questions.
Alhurra sought further details about the targeting operation and managed to contact an Iraqi army colonel.
The colonel, who is stationed in Anbar province, said in a phone interview with Alhurra that “four members of Kataib Hezbollah were injured on Tuesday in an airstrike that targeted their headquarters in Al-Qaim, in far western Iraq.”
The officer, who requested anonymity for fear of retaliation, added that the wounded “were forcibly transferred to the Iraqi Army’s medical facility. We could neither remove them nor leave them there. We were aware of the risk, and what happened, happened.”
According to the officer, Kataib Hezbollah members were then quickly transferred to Al-Musayyib Hospital in Babil province, southern Iraq, where armed factions hold significant influence.
However, Brigadier General Tahseen Al-Khafaji, deputy head of Iraq’s Security Media Cell, denied these claims, telling Alhurra: “There is no hiding or presence of faction members inside Iraqi army barracks.”
In parallel, the United States on Thursday denied targeting Iraqi security forces. A spokesperson for the U.S. State Department told Alhurra that “any claims that the United States targeted Iraqi security forces are categorically false and inconsistent with the partnership between the United States and Iraq. They also misrepresent years of friendship and cooperation between American and Iraqi forces.”
The spokesperson added that the United States had “repeatedly requested in recent weeks that Iraqi authorities provide information on the locations of Iraqi security forces, in order to enhance the safety of forces on the ground that are not involved in attacks against the United States. However, the Iraqi government has not provided this information.”
This denial came after the Iraqi Joint Operations Command, for the first time, blamed both the United States and Israel for targeting a Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) site in Anbar on Tuesday, in a strike that killed 15 fighters, including a senior commander.
In a statement on Wednesday, the Iraqi prime minister’s office said the prime minister had instructed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to summon the chargé d’affaires of the U.S. embassy in Baghdad in response to attacks targeting “military sectors.”
Iranians and Faction Leaders Among Civilians
On March 17, a precision explosion destroyed a house in the Jadriya neighborhood—an area that hosts residences of senior state officials, political party leaders, and armed faction commanders.
Some accounts initially described the site as a civilian home, but Alhurra revealed who had been inside. The house was being operated as a “coordination center” linking Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, Lebanon’s Hezbollah, and Iraqi armed factions.
New information obtained by Alhurra indicates that the strike killed individuals identified by code names (“Ansari” and “Bagheri”), as well as an Iranian figure known as “Abdullah,” deputy head of the Iraqi portfolio within the Revolutionary Guard, who later died of his injuries.
A local resident whose home is about 40 meters from the targeted house said: “The house appeared like any advisory office or political bureau, but the suspicious activity and tinted vehicles indicated unusual operations.”
He added: “We now live in constant fear. Their presence among our families turns our homes into military targets without our knowledge.”
Approximately five days after the strike, “Abdullah” died in a Baghdad hospital, and his body, along with those of four other Iranian Revolutionary Guard members killed in the strike, was transferred to Iran, according to Alhurra sources.
“Their bodies were transported through the Qasr-e Shirin crossing, known on the Iraqi side as Al-Mundhiriya,” said a source in Iraq’s Ministry of Interior.
Raza Salehi, a researcher on Iraq at Amnesty International, stated that “under international humanitarian law, all parties to a conflict must take all feasible precautions to avoid harming civilians and civilian objects, and in all circumstances minimize such harm to the greatest extent possible.”
She added: “International humanitarian law also requires parties to avoid exposing civilians to danger by refraining, as much as possible, from placing military objectives within or near densely populated areas.”
Three days before the Jadriya strike, on March 14, the upscale Arasat district was also hit by a missile strike. The area lies close to Jadriya, separated only by a small street.
There, the secretary-general of Kataib Hezbollah, Abu Hussein Al-Hamidawi, along with a group of the movement, was targeted but survived the strike, according to Alhurra sources.
He had been hiding in a house within a densely populated residential alley. The location was not an official headquarters or office of the group, but rather a civilian home unknown even to local residents.
The article is a translation of the original Arabic.
