Report: Iraqi militias decide to halt attacks on Israel after 14 months

Iran-backed militia groups in Iraq have decided to stop their attacks on Israel, Lebanon’s pro-Hezbollah newspaper Al-Akhbar reports.

Militias have been launching attack drones at Israel since the start of the war in Gaza in October 2023, as part of Iran’s so-called Axis of Resistance. This past October, two soldiers were killed and 24 others wounded when an Iraqi drone hit their Golan Heights base.

But one militia leader tells the paper that the groups have agreed with the Iraqi government to halt the attacks, while also avoiding getting involved in Syria.

“The armed factions adhered to the words of the Iraqi government, especially after what happened in Syria, which says that there may be an intention to drag the country into a scenario worse than the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, which may lead to the return of terrorism to Iraq again,” the member of Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba says.

Another militia official, of the Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada, argues that “the factions’ operations against Israel were linked to the operations of the Lebanese Hezbollah, and when the ceasefire was reached in Lebanon, the operations of the Iraqi factions stopped, and there are also partners in Iraq who have an opinion and reservations about those operations, and they must be listened to.”

There is no outside confirmation to the report.