Iran Press/ Middle East: On the morning of January 3, 2020, Lt. Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the commander of the IRGC's Quds Force, and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, a leader of Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF), were assassinated, along with seven others.
US President Donald Trump also explicitly stated that he had ordered the assassination. One year later, on the eve of the first anniversary of the crime, former Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi says, "American fighter jets used the Iraqi airspace with the Iraqi government's permission."
Al-Abbadi's remarks contain several points.
First: Al-Abadi merely announced that the fighters who attacked the two commanders at the airport entered the country with Iraq's permission.
In fact, al-Abadi did not say that the Iraqi government knew about the mission of these fighters. Since he said, "I do not accuse the Iraqis of knowing the mission of the fighters."
Therefore, it is not a case that the Iraqi government being aware of American fighters' mission to assassinate resistance commanders, and it is merely media Naughtiness.
Second: The fighters and every other aircraft must obtain a permit from the Iraqi government before carrying out any operation. In this regard, an Iraqi security source wrote, the planes, in general, must receive the necessary approval from the Joint Operations Command, which is in direct contact with the Iraqi Prime Minister, before carrying out any operation.
However, the point is that former Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi denied Haidar al-Abadi's remarks in a statement, stating that not only did he not grant such permission to US aircraft, but he would take the necessary precautions against any US ground or air movement.
Third: Al-Abadi's remarks are mostly political rhetoric related to Iraq's domestic policies. On the one hand, there are about 20 days left to the first anniversary of the resistance commanders' martyrdom. On the other hand, Iraqi groups have entered the early campaign for next June's parliamentary elections. Meanwhile, the divergence between former Iraqi prime ministers (Nouri al-Maliki, Haidar al-Abadi, and Adel Abdul-Mahdi) is no secret. Accordingly, al-Abbadi's remarks appear to be for domestic use.
Fourth: Abdul-Mahdi implicitly criticizes the Iraqi governments' pattern of behavior toward Americans. In other words, al-Abadi noted that the Iraqi government only permitted American fighter jets but was unable to know the purpose of the flights.
"Al-Abbadi did not say that Abdel-Mahdi's government had agreed to assassinate the commanders, but said that he only allowed the flight and that the mission should have been known earlier," wrote Iraqi analyst Salem Mashkoor. This kind of statement is both a critique of the performance of the government of Abdul Mahdi and a kind of confirmation of the violation of Iraqi sovereignty by the United States.
Finally, Haider al-Abadi's remarks are a kind of political and media Naughtiness aimed at influencing Iran-Iraq relations, something that some Iraqi currents along the Arab-Israeli-American axis have been doing, especially in recent months.
206/110.
Read More:
Iraqi president, PMU chief stress security and stability in country
Iran urges trial of those behind Lt Gen Qasem Soleimani assassination
