US base in northern Iraq targeted with several rockets

Several rockets have hit a US military base in Iraq’s northern province of Salahuddin.

Three suspected Katyusha rockets slammed the Iraqi airbase of Balad, which is currently home to US forces, in the southern parts of Salahuddin and north of the capital Baghdad on Saturday evening, the al-Mayadeen television news network reported.

One Iraqi contractor sustained injuries in the blasts, Reuters cited unnamed Iraqi security officials as saying.

However, Iraq’s Arabic-language al-Sumaria television network raised the number of “Katyusha rockets” to four, adding that the blasts inflicted almost “no material damage.”

It was the second salvo of rockets to hit a base hosting US forces or contractors in Iraq in less than a week.

Anti-US sentiment has been running high in Iraq following Washington’s assassination of top Iranian anti-terror commander Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani and senior Hashd al-Sha’abi commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis outside the Baghdad airport in January 2020.

Two days after the cowardly act of terror, Iraqi lawmakers unanimously passed a bill mandating the withdrawal of all foreign troops.

Amid the growing resentment, convoys of the US-led coalition purportedly fighting the Daesh Takfiri terrorists in Iraq have been a frequent target of blasts.

Iraqi resistance groups have vowed to avenge the assassinations, but denied any role in such rocket attacks.

A newly-established militant group, however, which calls itself “Saraya Awliya al-Dam” has claimed responsibility for some recent rocket attacks in Iraq.