A “bombing” hit, on the night of Friday April 19 to Saturday April 20, a military base located in central Iraq housing army troops and former pro-Iran paramilitaries of Hachd Al-Chaabi, integrated in the regular forces, two security sources said.
Questioned by Agence France-Presse (AFP), the Iraqi authorities were not able to identify those responsible for this aerial bombardment which targeted the Calso base, in the province of Babylon, nor to say if they were It was a drone strike.
Initially, an official at the Iraqi Interior Ministry reported the death toll was “one dead and eight injured”. The Hachd Al-Chaabi militia, for its part, confirmed in a press release “wounded” and “material losses”; she reported in her text an “explosion” having hit its premises on the base, specifying that a “preliminary investigation” had been opened and investigators dispatched to the site.
Explosive regional context
For his part, an Iraqi military official reported three wounded among the army personnel. “There are explosions in the warehouses housing the equipment due to the bombing,” he said, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the subject. A fire is still ravaging certain sectors of the base and the search for the injured continues. »
This bombing, which was not immediately claimed, comes in an explosive regional context, fueled by the war in Gaza which pits Israel against the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, each supported by regional or international allies.
Strikes, attributed to Israel, targeted an area located near a military base in the Isfahan region early Friday in Iran. And on April 13, Tehran carried out an unprecedented drone and missile attack against Israel, responding to the destruction of its consulate in Damascus which had cost the lives of seven of its soldiers, including two senior officers, on April 1.
Hachd Al-Chaabi is an integral part of the official Iraqi security apparatus placed under the authority of the Prime Minister. But this institution brings together several pro-Iran armed factions, some of which have also carried out attacks, in Iraq and Syria, against American soldiers deployed as part of an international anti-jihadist coalition.
