Iraqi Civil War

Six Iraqi security personnel and three civilians were killed in an ambush Nov. 21 carried out by ISIL north of Baghdad, police and a local official said.    

A police source said a roadside bomb hit a car and jihadists opened fire on a rescue team of policemen and state-aligned paramilitary forces when they arrived at the scene, about 200 kilometers (120 miles) from the capital.    

A military base in Iraq with US troops was attacked once again. There were no casualties, world agencies reported, citing a communique by Iraqi armed forces.

Today, Katyusha rockets targeted the Taji military camp, located north of Baghdad.

The incidents come amid heightened tensions between the US and Iran .

At least eight fighters of the pro-Iranian paramilitary Hashd al-Shaabi have been killed in eastern Syria, the Observatory said.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that the planes targeted positions belonging to pro-Iranian militias in the Boukamal area, near the border with Iraq.

Turkey called on all parties to act with common sense and avoid steps that will fuel tension, the presidential spokesman said on Jan. 3 amid the fresh U.S.-Iran row.

The Iraqi military and the U.S.-led coalition fighting ISIL said on Jan. 4 it did not conduct any airstrikes near Camp Taji north of Baghdad.

Earlier on Jan. 4, Iraq's Popular Mobilisation Forces umbrella grouping of paramilitary groups said airstrikes near camp Taji had killed six people and critically wounded three.

Iraqi state television had said they were U.S. airstrikes.

Iran-backed militias withdrew from the compound of the U.S. Embassy in Iraq, the Iraqi army said.

The protesters also dismantled their tents outside the Green Zone in Baghdad on the edge of the Tigris River, the Iraqi Ground Forces Command said in a written statement. 

Paramilitary groups who have been protesting against U.S. air strikes in Iraq told their supporters to withdraw from the perimeter of the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad on Jan. 1.

The crowd did not actually begin withdrawing, according to a Reuters witness.

U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper said on Dec. 31 that he has decided to immediately dispatch a battalion of the 82nd Airborne Division to Iraq following violent protests at the American embassy in Baghdad.

Turkey has conducted a new wave of airstrikes in northern Iraq.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has issued a decree formalizing the inclusion of Shi’ite paramilitary groups in the country’s security forces.