Iraqi officials are looking into a blast that hit a base used by a group of Iranian-backed militias. The explosion killed one person and injured eight others.
At first, militia officials said the explosion at the Kalsu military base was caused by an airstrike from US forces, but it was actually an accident at the base. The US Central Command said they did not do any air attacks in Iraq.
The PMF said on Saturday afternoon that there was a blast, but didn’t say who caused it.
The Iraqi Security Media Cell said that they did not find any drones or fighter planes in the airspace of Babylon before or during the explosion. One member of PMF died and eight people were hurt, including an Iraqi army soldier.
The PMF is a group of mainly Shiite, Iran-supported armed groups that are part of the Iraqi armed forces.
Recently, some PMF member groups attacked US forces in Iraq and Syria. They did this because they were upset with the US supporting Israel in its war against Hamas in Gaza. The attacks stopped in January after three American soldiers were killed in a strike on a base in Jordan near Syria. This made the US retaliate with strikes in Iraq.
The explosion at the PMF base happened the day after it was believed that Israel attacked Iran. A group of militias supported by Iran, called the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, said they used a drone to attack the Israeli town of Eilat. They did this because they believe Israel targeted their camps, which they see as a violation of Iraq’s sovereignty.
There haven’t been any reports of an attack on Eilat in Israel, and the Israeli military hasn’t said anything yet.
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Iraq looks into explosion at militia base with ties to Iran
