US-occupied Ain al-Asad base targeted in fresh drone attack: Report

The base located in the western province of Anbar came under a drone strike on Friday morning, Sabereen News reported.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack, and no casualties or damage have been reported.

The attack comes a day after Iraq’s foreign ministry said Baghdad and Washington have agreed to set up a committee to start talks to set a timetable for a phased withdrawal of American forces from the Arab country.

The two countries agreed to form working groups that would eventually lead to formulating “a specific and clear timeline… and to begin the gradual reduction of its (the coalition’s) advisers on Iraqi soil,” the statement read.

Iraqi officials, including Prime Minister Mohammad Shia al-Sudani, have repeatedly urged for US troops’ withdrawal from their country.

“There is a need to reorganize this [Iraq-US] relationship so that it is not a target or justification for any party, internal or foreign, to tamper with stability in Iraq and the region,” Sudani told Reuters in an interview in Baghdad on January 9.

Sudani said the exit should be negotiated under “a process of understanding and dialogue.”

“Let’s agree on a time frame (for the coalition’s exit) that is, honestly, quick, so that they don’t remain long and the attacks keep happening,” he said.

This is the latest in a series of attacks against US bases in Iraq and Syria that is fueled by its support for Israeli atrocities. Many such attacks against the US forces have been claimed by groups operating under the banner of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq.

Last week, Iraqi resistance groups fired multiple ballistic missiles and rockets at Ain al-Asad, reportedly causing traumatic brain injury to the personnel in the base.

The US Central Command confirmed the attack Saturday evening and said in a statement that “a number” of US personnel are being evaluated for traumatic brain injuries.

The US army has several times attacked Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces over the past weeks, killing several Iraqi forces.

The United States, Israel’s biggest ally, has provided the regime with large quantities of arms and ammunition since the beginning of the Gaza war.

Washington has also vetoed United Nations Security Council resolutions demanding the occupying regime to cease its aggression.

Iraqi resistance groups have vowed to continue retaliatory attacks against US forces in the region while Israel continues to kill Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

Furthermore, the groups also have been pressing for an end to the presence of foreign forces in Iraq more than a decade after a US-led coalition invaded the Arab country in blatant violation of international law based on false claims of Iraq having weapons of mass destruction.