Suicide drone hits residential building in Erbil

08-12-2023
Karwan Faidhi Dri
Karwan Faidhi Dri @KarwanFaidhiDri
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ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A suicide drone hit a residential building in Erbil on Friday, causing no casualties, according to security directorates. This is the third attack in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region on the same day.

“At 6:05 pm, a suicide drone hit a civilian building in Erbil, but luckily it did not cause any casualties,” the Directorate General of Counter Terrorism said in a Facebook post.

The Kurdistan Region Security Council confirmed the attack on "a residential building.”

"We hold the Iraqi federal government responsible to prevent these attempts by outlaw groups,” the council stated.

Earlier in the day, the United States embassy and the headquarters of the Iraqi National Security Service were both targeted with rockets in Baghdad. Neither incident caused any casualties. 

Sabreen News, a Telegram channel linked to pro-Iran Iraqi militia groups, said US troops based near Erbil International Airport were targeted with a number of drones. Rudaw English reached out to local officials, but they were not available for comment. 

The Islamic Resistance in Iraq, which is linked to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), has claimed responsibility for dozens of drone and rocket attacks on US interests in Iraq, including Erbil province, and Syria. The group says its actions are linked to Washington’s support for Israel in its fight against the Palestinian Hamas Movement in the Gaza Strip.

The US Department of Defense on Thursday said that there have been 78 attacks on its forces in Iraq and Syria since mid-October, leaving 66 American personnel injured.

Iraqi authorities have said several times that they would investigate these incidents and bring the perpetrators to justice, but no arrests have been made. 

Attacks by the militias on civilian infrastructure are rare as their main target is US troops.

The US has retaliated several times, most recently on Sunday, killing five militiamen in a drone strike in Kirkuk province.



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