Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it carried out a missile strike on what it called an Israeli “strategic center” in the northern Iraqi city of Erbil, according to a statement on the group’s official news portal, Sepah News.
The semi-official Tasnim news agency, which is closely aligned to the IRGC, said 10 precision-guided missiles were fired from northwestern Iran, citing an informed source that it didn’t name. The report added that the strike “very likely” resulted in “many casualties” without providing any details.
U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman said no one had been hurt or killed in the attack, denying earlier reports that the U.S. consulate in Erbil was the target. In an interview with Fox News, she said the incident was “of great concern to all of us” and amounted to an assault on Iraq’s sovereignty.
The attack comes days after the IRGC vowed to take revenge after confirming that two of its members had been killed in an Israeli missile attack near the Syrian capital of Damascus on March 7. According to Sunday’s Sepah statement, the Guard warned that there would be a “severe and destructive response” in the event of any future attacks from Israel.
The strike also follows the suspension of indirect negotiations between Iran and the U.S. aimed at restoring the 2015 nuclear deal, amid escalating tensions between the Kremlin and the White House over Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Iran’s state-run Nour News also reported Sunday that Tehran had “unilaterally and temporarily” suspended Iraqi-brokered talks with Saudi Arabia that had sought to mend diplomatic ties between the two rival regional powers.
