Iraqi Resistance group vows to crush US projects in region
An Iraqi Resistance group has warned the United States that it would "crush" Washington's destructive projects in the region.
MEHR: An Iraqi Resistance group has warned the United States that it would "crush" Washington's destructive projects in the region.
Kata'ib Hezbollah, which belongs to Iraq's Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) umbrella counterterrorism forces, who are better known as Hashd al-Sha'abi, issued the warning in a statement on Wednesday.
The US withdrew its troops from Iraq between 2007 and 2011 but redeployed them in 2014 along with other partners to allegedly counter the threat of the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group.
Iraq managed to end the territorial rule of the terror outfit in the country thanks to the sacrifices of the national army as well as the PMU.
However, Washington has kept as many as 2,500 of its forces inside Iraq in defiance of a resolution that has required their withdrawal. The resolution was passed by the Arab country’s parliament in January 2020, following the US's assassination of Iran’s legendary anti-terror commander Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani and his Iraqi trenchmate Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the PMU's deputy head.
The statement by Kata'ib Hezbollah said American military convoys' recent movements across some Iraqi cities served as a "clear testament to the enemy's intransigence and its intention to retain its invasive combat forces in the [Arab] country."
The remaining American forces, though, are "not stronger" in number and the size of their equipment than those that the US used to keep in the country before 2011, the group said. The Resistance has also developed and increased its capabilities compared to that time, it added.
"They (the Americans) should know this that their muscle-flexing is futile, and if the Resistance chooses to fight, it will crush their sinister projects in the region so that Iraq will be their last stronghold in the multi-polar world."
The statement came a day after Asaib Ahl al-Haq, another Iraqi Resistance group, said the eventual withdrawal of the US forces from Iraq was inevitable since the country was capable of defending itself.
The movement also said the main goal of the American military presence in Iraq was to ensure the security of the Israeli regime.
