“Three explosive-laden drones attacked a military base of the international coalition against the Islamic State [ISIS] in two separate instances,” the Erbil-based Directorate General of Counter Terrorism (CTD), also known as Kurdistan CT, said in a statement on Facebook.
Two drones were shot down in the air, and another drone in a second instance, failed to explode and crashed, the statement added.
US troops in Iraq and Syria have come under target of a series of rocket and drone attacks by pro-Iran militias since mid-October, in response to Washington’s support for Israel in its war against Palestinian Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip in retaliation for their air, ground, and sea incursion into Israel on October 7.
On Monday, Pentagon spokesman Brigadier General Pat Ryder told journalists that there had been a total of 38 attacks on US troops since October 17 - 20 in Iraq and 18 in Syria.
According to the Pentagon spokesman, a total of 45 US personnel were injured in the attacks, all of them prior to the US retaliatory strikes on facilities used by groups affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in Syria on October 26. The attacks on US bases in Iraq and Syria were claimed by Iran-backed militias such as the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a network of shadow Iraqi militia groups affiliated with the IRGC.
Around 2,500 American troops in Iraq and 900 in Syria are leading an international coalition through Operation Inherent Resolve that has assisted Kurdish, Iraqi, and local Syrian forces in the fight against ISIS, which once held swathes of land in Iraq and Syria but was declared devoid of territorial control in 2017 and 2019 respectively.
In late October, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani to pursue the attackers of US bases and troops in Iraq, in the same day that Sudani condemned the repeated strikes on bases housing US troops in Iraq, stressing that Washington is in the country upon an official invitation from the Iraqi government to support and train security forces against ISIS.
In an unannounced Baghdad visit on Sunday evening, Blinken told reporters that during his meeting with Sudani, he emphasized that attacks on US forces were “unacceptable” and that Washington reserves the right to retaliate to protect its interests and personnel.
