Free Republic

An array of Iran-backed Iraqi militia groups have agreed to suspend rocket attacks on U.S. forces on condition that Iraq's government presents a timetable for a withdrawal of American troops, one of the groups said on Sunday. "The factions have presented a conditional ceasefire," said Mohammed Mohi, spokesman for the Iran-backed Kataib Hezbollah group. "It includes all factions of the (anti-U.S.) resistance, including those who have been targeting U.S. forces," he told Reuters.

Iraqi security forces were on Friday (June 26) interrogating pro-Iran fighters detained for planning a rocket attack in the first such raid in a country caught in the tug-of-war between Teheran and Washington. Since October, nearly three dozen deadly rocket attacks have hit US military and diplomatic installations in Iraq, with the US blaming pro-Teheran faction Kataeb Hezbollah. Infuriated, Washington has demanded Iraq take tougher action to hold the perpetrators accountable and Thursday's unprecedented raid appeared to be a response to this call. Just before midnight Thursday, the elite Counter-Terrorism Service stormed a base in southern Baghdad used by Kataeb...

Iranian Revolutionary Guard Commander Qasem Soleimani wasn't the only major-league terrorist killed in the drone strike ordered by Trump. Also killed was Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, a top Iraqi paramilitary leader whose long, bloody career includes attacks on American and other Western embassies, as well as being a founder of Kata'ib Hezbollah, a group responsible for the deaths of hundreds of American soldiers in Iraq. In 2009, the U.S. sanctioned both al-Muhandis and Kata'ib Hezbollah as terrorist entities. In some ways, killing al-Muhandis was more significant than the death of Soleimani. He's been an active terrorist against the U.S. since the...