Iraqi officials suspect Israel in depot strikes

Five people were injured in an explosion at a Popular Mobilization Forces base in Baghdad on October 17, an event that Iraqi authorities now suspect was caused by Israeli strikes on militia weapons caches. The incident occurred in the East Canal area of the capital, where the PMF initially characterized the event as an accident. A government investigation has been promised, though no official update has emerged more than a week after the blast.

A report published by the London-based newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat cites unnamed sources claiming the strikes targeted two locations holding shoulder-fired air defense systems of Chinese origin. The report states that Tehran supplied these weapons to Iranian-backed militias. One source noted that the armed group involved believed the storage sites were difficult to detect, and that the attacks occurred shortly after the shipments arrived.

The report does not identify the specific Chinese systems involved or provide concrete evidence for the claim that Israel was responsible. It acknowledges that parts of the account remain unconfirmed. A security official told the newspaper that while the nature of the strikes has not been fully determined, authorities have seen enough to point to Israel.

These events follow an incident on October 1 involving warehouses linked to Iran-backed groups in and around Baghdad. Those sites reportedly held drones used for reconnaissance and suicide attacks. The pattern of recent explosions aligns with a broader shift in the conflict since the United States and Israel began airstrikes in February. Iran has since moved to utilize Iraq as a frontline, executing over 1,000 drone and missile strikes on the Kurdistan Region and 600 attacks across the country.

The connection between China and the weapons remains a point of contention. The newspaper linked earlier reports of Chinese arms transfers to Iran with the movement of those systems to Iraq, though it described this link as unconfirmed. China's Foreign Ministry denied those supply reports on July 28. The US withdrew its military forces from Iraq on September 30, a move that had been negotiated over several years.

Political figures in the Shi'ite Coordination Framework have spent weeks predicting that a renewed war between Washington and Tehran would involve the destruction of militia capabilities. Most major PMF groups, with the exception of the Badr Organization, are sanctioned by the US as terrorist organizations. The Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a coalition of militias, recently issued a statement claiming that Iraqi airspace was being violated.