Threats of retaliation follow U.S. airstrikes

Iran, Iraq condemn U.S. response to death of American contractor.

BAGHDAD — U.S. airstrikes against bases of an Iranian-backed militia in Iraq drew condemnation across the Iraqi political spectrum Monday, as well as threats of retaliation, raising the risk of an escalating spiral of attacks and questions over the continued viability of the U.S. military presence.

Iraq announced Monday after an emergency meeting of its National Security Council that it will “review” its relationship with the United States as a result of the strikes. A spokesman for the Iraqi government said top officials had pleaded with the U.S. not to go ahead with Sunday night’s airstrikes against the Kataeb Hezbollah militia, in which at least 25 militia members were killed and more than 50 injured.

Iran and its allies warned that the United States would face “consequences” for the strikes, which were carried out in response to a rocket attack blamed on Kataeb

Hezbollah that killed an American contractor and injured four U.S. troops Friday at a base in Kirkuk. “The blood of the martyrs and the wounded will not go in vain, and the response will be harsh for the American forces in Iraq,” said Jamal Jaafar Ibrahimi, deputy head of the Popular Mobilization Forces, of which Kataeb Hezbollah is a part. He is an ally of Iran, better known by his nom de guerre, Abu Mahdi al-Mohandis.

The two attacks sharply raised the stakes in the regional confrontation between Tehran and Washington that escalated this year after the Trump administration launched its “maximum pressure” campaign of economic sanctions against Iran. The sanctions are intended to force Iran to reopen negotiations on a 2015 nuclear deal, but instead Iran has embarked on what it has described as a campaign of “maximum resistance,” affecting international shipping in the Persian Gulf and, increasingly, U.S. troops in Iraq.

The contractor was the first American to die in a series of intensifying rocket attacks against facilities where U.S. troops are based. After an attack earlier in the month narrowly missed hitting Americans, the State Department warned that the U.S. would respond if an American were killed. The retaliatory strikes marked the first time the U.S. has used military force against an Iran-linked target since U.S. combat troops withdrew in 2011. The U.S. military characterized the strikes as defensive in nature and said they were intended to deter further attacks against the 5,000 U.S. troops who returned to Iraq after 2014 to fight the Islamic State.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry said the attacks showed the United States was a source of conflict and tension in Iraq and would have to pull its forces out.

Iraq’s political leaders, who have sought to balance alliances with both Iran and the United States, condemned the strikes. In a half-hour phone call Sunday, acting Iraqi prime minister Adel Abdul Mahdi urged U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper not to go ahead with the strikes, warning that they would “lead to further escalation,” Abdul Mahdi’s spokesman, Maj. Gen. Abdul Karim Khalaf, told the Iraqi News Agency. Esper called the Iraqi leader just before the strikes to inform him of U.S. intentions, Abdul Mahdi’s office said.

“We have previously confirmed our rejection of any unilateral action by the coalition forces or any other forces inside Iraq, and we consider it as a violation of Iraqi sovereignty and a dangerous escalation,” the spokesman quoted Abdul Mahdi as telling Esper. At the same time, Iraqi President Barham Salih expressed his opposition to the strikes in a telephone call with the U.S. Embassy, calling them “harmful to Iraq and... unacceptable,” the news agency said.