There was growing tension in Iraq over the weekend as the Baghdad government reported arresting over a dozen members of a powerful Iranian-backed Shiite militia. It is the first time that the Shia-led Iraqi government has moved to reduce the growing power of these armed groups, which some say threaten the cohesion of the country's fragile state institutions.
Most Iraqi paramilitary groups are members of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), a collection of about 40 different Shiite militias composed of over 150.000 armed fighters, who helped the Iraqi government defeat the Islamic State in 2017. Militias began forming in the summer of 2014, after Sayyid Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani, the spiritual leader of the Iraqi Shiite community has issued a fatwa (religious invective) to declare the destruction of the Islamic State. The Iranian-backed PMFs proved instrumental in the defeat of ISIS on the ground. However, the group's leadership is ideologically aligned with Iran and many of its members have called for an end to the US military and diplomatic presence in Iraq.
In January of this year, many of these groups declared war on the United States after Washington launched the drone missile attack in which Iranian general Qassem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the leader of the Kita'ib Hezbollah (KH). KH is one of the most powerful Shiite militias in Iraq and controls much of the country's territory. Surprisingly, on Thursday, Iraqi counter-terrorism forces announced that they had arrested 14 KH members, after receiving indications from intelligence. According to the government, KH members were planning to launch large-scale attacks on Baghdad's Green Zone, a heavily fortified area of the Iraqi capital that houses the headquarters of most ministries, as well as several embassies.
Arrests were reportedly ordered by the new Iraqi prime minister, Mustafa al-Kadhimi, former director of the Iraqi National Intelligence Service, who took up his new duties on 7 May. His appointment ended a long political stalemate as the country struggled to replace the government of his predecessor, Adil Abdul-Mahdi, who stepped down in 2019 following a wave of popular protests. Al-Kadhimi is known for having good relations with Washington, despite being in line with Tehran. However, he guaranteed that he would "crush" the paramilitaries, whom he considers enemies of Iraqi democracy.
In response to al-Kadhimi's statements, Shiite militias have launched small-range rocket attacks against the green zone in recent weeks.
