The Iran war seems to be cooling, as a two week ceasefire holds, but people are still dying from spillover effects and sporadic conflict in neighboring Iraq.
“Drone and rocket strikes in Iraq’s northern Kurdistan region on Friday killed three Iranian Kurds, including two women fighters, an exiled opposition group said, blaming the attack on Iran,” AFP reports. It’s unclear if the projectiles were sent across the border, or whether pro-Iran groups inside Iraq carried out the killings.
This comes several weeks after US officials first floated the possibility of arming Iranian Kurdish dissident groups. Kurdish organizations in Iraq and along the border insisted at the time that there was no plan to receive arms and training from the US.
The fear was that the US statements and avalanche of international press reports claiming a potential impending plan to use Kurds as a proxy ground force served to put a bright red target on the Kurdish community of Iran (and by extension Iraq).
Indeed throughout the conflict there had been sporadic Iranian attacks on Kurdish areas, particularly in northern Iraqi Kurdistan. That appears to still be happening, with the Friday report:
“The Islamic Republic of Iran launched a new wave of missile and drone strikes today targeting… civilian camps of the PDKI,” killing one person and wounding his father, the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PDKI) said on X.
In a separate attack, two women fighters were killed and other fighters wounded, the party added.
A PDKI official told AFP the fighters were killed in an attack on their positions in the Soran area, nestled in the Zagros mountains near the Iranian border.
In other Iraq-related news connected to the Iran war, the US Treasury on Friday has slapped new sanctions on a series of Shia pro-Iran militia leaders.
The United States Treasury Department Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has targeted seven pro-Iran Iraqi militia commanders, accused of organizing and carrying out attacks against US soldiers and facilities.
They are “some of Iraq’s most violent Iran-aligned militia organizations,” such as Asa’ib Ahl Al-Haqq, Kata’ib Hezbollah, Kata’ib Sayyid Al-Shuhada, and Harakat Al-Nujaba – according to the Trump administration.
“We will not allow Iraq’s terrorist militias, backed by Iran, to threaten American lives or interests … Those who enable these militias’ violence will be held accountable,” US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated.