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Several US troops were wounded in a suspected rocket attack by Iran-backed militias on a base in Iraq, underscoring the threat to American forces amid intensified diplomatic efforts to de-escalate tensions between Iran and Israel.
US defence secretary Lloyd Austin said the attack on Ain al-Assad, the main base hosting American forces in Iraq, “marked a dangerous escalation and demonstrated Iran’s destabilising role in the region”, according to a Pentagon readout of a call with his Israeli counterpart.
The assault on Monday was the first time in months that American troops in Iraq have been wounded, and followed a US strike against Iran-backed Iraqi militias last week. The Ain al-Assad attack took place as Washington and its Arab allies sought to reduce soaring regional tensions in the wake of the back-to-back assassinations of senior leaders of the Lebanese militant movement Hizbollah and Hamas last week.
Both Iran and Hizbollah have vowed to retaliate against Israel after Fuad Shukr, a Hizbollah commander, was killed by an Israeli strike on Beirut, and Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political leader, was assassinated in Tehran.
US secretary of state Antony Blinken said Washington was “engaged in intense diplomacy pretty much around the clock with a very simple message: all parties must refrain from escalation, all parties must take steps to ease tensions”.
He said to “break this cycle” there needed to be a ceasefire to end the 10-month war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, urging the sides to accept a deal.
The US, along with Qatar and Egypt, have for months been seeking to broker a deal to secure the release of hostages in Gaza and halt the war in the besieged strip, which is considered vital to ending the regional hostilities that erupted in the wake of Hamas’s October 7 attack.
But they have struggled to get the parties to agree a deal, and mediators have warned that the killing of Haniyeh, Hamas’s main negotiator, has further set back the talks.
The fear is that a robust retaliation to the assassinations by Iran and Hizbollah will trigger an Israeli counter-response and push the region closer to a full-blown war.
There are also concerns that Iran could mobilise the militant groups in its so-called axis of resistance, which includes Houthi rebels in Yemen and militias in Iraq and Syria, as well as Hizbollah and Hamas.
The US has moved additional military assets, including warships and fighter jets, to the region to help defend Israel and in a show of deterrence. But there is a risk that its forces are sucked into combat.
There are about 2,500 American troops in Iraq and about 900 in Syria where they have been part of an international coalition fighting Isis, the jihadi group.
Iran-backed militias have launched multiple rocket and drone strikes against US forces since the October 7 attack and Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza triggered a wave of regional hostilities.
Those attacks had diminished in intensity after the US launched a barrage of air strikes against Iran-affiliated targets in Syria following an attack on a US base on the border between Jordan and Syria that killed three American soldiers in January.
Ain al-Assad base has been targeted at least twice in the past month.
The Houthis have also launched attacks against US navy vessels that have been patrolling the Red Sea in a bid to prevent the Yemeni rebels’ assaults on merchant shipping in the key maritime trade route.
Iranian leaders stepped up their threats against Israel on Monday as the region braced for the Islamic republic’s response, with President Masoud Pezeshkian warning that Tehran would “definitely” respond to Haniyeh’s killing.
He said Iran was not seeking to “expand the scope of war” in the region but Israel “will definitely receive a response for its crimes and insolence”.
Israel has neither denied nor confirmed responsibility for Haniyeh’s killing.
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