DAHUK, Iraq — Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein said the United States needs to put more pressure on Israel to end the conflict in Gaza, just as Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani urges Shiite militias to stop targeting US military installations in the country amid a surge in such attacks.
In an exclusive interview on the sidelines of the annual Middle East Peace and Security Forum organized by the American University of Kurdistan in Dahuk, Hussein said, “I am not talking about the United States not doing enough to end the conflict. I am talking about it being time for the United States to put pressure on the Israelis for the war to stop because the United States is the only country that has an impact on the Israeli government.”
Hussein said that in his discussions with US officials, their primary focus was on delivering humanitarian aid to Gaza and opening humanitarian corridors.
Without a sustainable cease-fire, “none of this means a lot,” he said, stressing that a two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the only viable one that can avert the endless cycle of violence.
Since Hamas' attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7 that killed around 1,200 people, the death toll in Gaza has passed 13,300, according to the latest figures from the Hamas-run Ministry of Health. While Washington has pushed for increased humanitarian aid to Gaza and "pauses" in fighting, it does not support a cease-fire.
'Fire in Gaza will burn us all'
Hussein aired worry that the conflict in Gaza would drag on and expand beyond Israel’s borders. “I am afraid this fire that exists in Gaza will burn all of us should the United States fail to put an end to the conflict or manage the situation well,” he said.
Worries of a conflagration have grown as Iran-backed Shiite militias continue to attack US bases in Iraq and neighboring Syria, part of a sustained effort thought to be backed by Iran to drive out US and coalition forces from the region. In a keynote address at the forum, Hussein stressed that Sudani had told the militia groups to refrain from violence against them.
The United States has been cautioning Tehran repeatedly to rein in the groups known as the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), saying Washington has the “right” to respond “at a time and place of our choosing,” most recently when Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Sudani earlier this month in Baghdad.
The calls are apparently having little effect. Since Oct. 17, US troops in Iraq and Syria have faced near-daily attacks from rocket fire and one-way drones, with more than 61 such attacks registered during that period — 29 in Iraq and 32 in Syria. The US military has retaliated three times. On Oct. 27, US fighter jets hit two weapons and ammunition depots in eastern Syria that were allegedly used by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its local allies. On Nov. 8, another such depot was struck in Syria’s Deir Ezzor province, and four days later the United States carried out airstrikes on an alleged IRGC training facility and safe house in Mayadin also in eastern Syria.
The limited US response reflects Washington’s fears of a wider escalation, which Hussein said were shared by Baghdad. The reason that it is targeting Syria is because it does not want to stoke further tensions with Baghdad, especially if Iraqis are killed in those attacks. As Hussein noted, US and coalition troops based in Iraq and Syria to combat the Islamic State (ISIS) are there by invitation of the Iraqi government. “When the Iraqi government, the parliament decides to end the mandate of the US presence inside Iraq, we can negotiate and talk about that. In fact, we were in the process of talking to the Americans about restructuring, reforming the way they work inside Iraq; there were serious talks about that,” Hussein said.
'Talks and negotiations' are the only solution
“The only way to solve this issue is through talks and negotiations, not through attacks,” Fuad added in an oblique swipe at the PMU. He declined to elaborate further on the substance of the talks with the United States about redefining the US role in Iraq. The American footprint is already modest, he said, compromised largely of military trainers. “We also exchange intelligence so that we can continue our fight against [ISIS] terrorists,” Hussein said.
Most of the attacks since Oct. 17 were intercepted by US forces or failed to reach their targets, causing no casualties or damage to infrastructure, according to the Pentagon. More than 60 US service members have sustained injuries, including shrapnel wounds and perforated eardrums. All have returned to duty.
If US forces were to withdraw from Iraq, this would spell an end to their presence in northeast Syria where they are partnered with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in the ongoing campaign to degrade and destroy ISIS.
Hussein believes that Iran is opposed to a widening of the Gaza conflict. “Neither Iran nor Iraq wants to have an escalation; they don’t want the fire reaching their own countries. But escalation does not only have to do with a conflagration. If the war continues, that is also a kind of escalation. It will have an effect on other people in the area, people in Lebanon, in the West Bank, and in Jordan and Egypt,” he said.
If so, then why have Shiite militias multiplied their attacks against US forces? Hussein deflects the question, saying he hopes that problems between the United States and Iran will be resolved “through dialogue, not conflict.” Hussein said he had been personally involved in shuttle diplomacy between the United States and Iran as detailed in a previous interview with Al-Monitor. “Whenever there is tension between Washington and Tehran, it affects Iraq directly and Iraqi internal politics directly. So it is in the interest of these two countries [to] sit down and solve their problems peacefully,” Hussein said.
Iraq fears becoming battleground
Iraq’s big worry is that it will end up becoming the battleground for any direct confrontation between Iran and the United States. The Kurdistan Region of Iraq feels particularly vulnerable because of Israel’s sympathy for the Kurds largely borne from a common antagonism for the Arabs. Iran accuses Iraqi Kurdistan of allowing Israeli operatives on its soil to spy on Iran and has launched armed Iranian Kurdish groups hosted by the Kurdish region who are seen as pawns in their plots. Iraqi Kurdish officials deny the claims.
It probably didn’t help that a large share of Kurdish crude shipped via a purpose-built pipeline running to export terminals on the Turkish coast was purchased by Israel. Turkey halted the flow of an estimated 450,000 barrels per day of crude as of March 25 after an International Chamber of Commerce arbitration ruling said the sales were unauthorized by Baghdad and Ankara had to pay $1.5 billion in damages. Turkey is believed to have pressed Baghdad to waive the fine and drop another case pending for sales that took place from 2018 onward.
Hussein said that Turkey was ready to resume the flow and he would be traveling to Ankara next month, although a final agreement had not yet been reached between Erbil and Baghdad. Hussein explained that the remaining differences were linked to “some problems that have to do with the contracts that were signed with Kurdistan and those signed with the other parts of Iraq.” He added, “There are various sorts of contracts: those that are producing oil and also contracts with companies that are transferring the oil through pipelines — and there are contracts with companies that are buying or already bought oil.”
“All of this is very complicated. The Iraqi government and the Kurdistan Regional Government need to reach an agreement about how to deal with all these companies and how to deal with these contracts and perhaps reshape them. I read documents from both sides. I am positive,” Hussein said.
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