Three rockets were fired at the US embassy in Iraq early on Thursday, the Iraqi army have said, at the end of a day marked by rocket and drone attacks on bases hosting American forces in Iraq and Syria.
The embassy itself was not hit, the army said, but three nearby places in Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone were.
One rocket landed near the headquarters of the National Security Agency, the second in a public square and the third on the outskirts of a residential area damaging a resident's car, the Iraqi military said.
A spate of recent attacks on US military and diplomatic facilities in Iraq has been blamed on pro-Iranian armed groups within a state-sponsored paramilitary force.
US forces, who have 2,500 troops deployed in Iraq as part of an international anti-ISIS group coalition, have been targeted almost 50 times this year in the country, but the past few days have seen an increase in the frequency of attacks.
On Wednesday, 14 rockets were fired at an airbase hosting American troops in the western province of Anbar, causing minor injuries to two personnel, the coalition and Iraqi military said.
A Shiite militant group called Revenge of Al Muhandis Brigade claimed responsibility and vowed to defeat the “brutal occupation”, according to the US-based SITE intelligence group, which monitors extremist groups.
The militant group is named after Abu Mahdi Al Muhandis of Iraq's Hashed Al Shaabi paramilitary alliance, who was killed in a US drone strike early last year along with the revered Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, SITE said.
Late last month, the US carried out air strikes against pro-Iran fighters in both Iraq and Syria.
The rockets on Wednesday “landed on the base and perimeter” of the Ain Al Assad base, coalition spokesman Wayne Marotto tweeted, adding that local homes and a mosque were also damaged.
Iraqi security forces said the rocket launcher had been hidden inside a lorry carrying bags of flour.
Similar attacks happened earlier this week.
On Monday night, US forces shot down an armed drone above the embassy, according to Iraqi security officials.
American defence systems fired rockets into the air in the capital, with Iraqi security sources saying the salvos had taken out an explosive-laden drone.
Just hours earlier, rockets had also been fired towards Ain Al Assad.
Asked about the renewed violence, state department spokesman Ned Price told reporters: “These attacks reflect and are representative of the threat that Iran-backed militias present fundamentally to Iraq's sovereignty and to Iraq's stability.”
Syria 'drone attacks'
Across the border in Syria, where pro-Iran fighters have fought alongside the Damascus regime in the decade-old civil war, Kurdish-led forces also reported attempted attacks near a coalition base.
The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces said they repelled drone attacks near the base in the Omar oilfield in the country's east, in the second such operation in days.
“Our front-line forces against IS and coalition forces in the area of the Omar oilfield dealt with drone attacks,” it said, adding that the drones had caused no damage.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor with sources inside Syria, said pro-Iran militias had probably launched the drones from a rural area outside the town of Al Mayadeen south-west of the oilfield.
It was the second such attack in days, after the SDF reported “two unidentified rocket-propelled grenades landed on the western side of the Al Omar oilfield” late on Sunday, which caused no casualties.
Pro-Iranian militias also fired several shells at Al Omar on Monday last week, causing damage but no casualties, the Observatory said.
The US launched air strikes the previous night against three targets it said were used by pro-Iran groups in eastern Syria and western Iraq.
Sohr said at least five “Iran-backed Iraqi militia fighters” were killed in the strikes on the Syrian side of the border.
MATCH INFO
Uefa Champions League semi-finals, first leg
Liverpool v Roma
When: April 24, 10.45pm kick-off (UAE)
Where: Anfield, Liverpool
Live: BeIN Sports HD
Second leg: May 2, Stadio Olimpico, Rome
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Ten tax points to be aware of in 2026
1. Domestic VAT refund amendments: request your refund within five years
If a business does not apply for the refund on time, they lose their credit.
2. E-invoicing in the UAE
Businesses should continue preparing for the implementation of e-invoicing in the UAE, with 2026 a preparation and transition period ahead of phased mandatory adoption.
3. More tax audits
Tax authorities are increasingly using data already available across multiple filings to identify audit risks.
4. More beneficial VAT and excise tax penalty regime
Tax disputes are expected to become more frequent and more structured, with clearer administrative objection and appeal processes. The UAE has adopted a new penalty regime for VAT and excise disputes, which now mirrors the penalty regime for corporate tax.
5. Greater emphasis on statutory audit
There is a greater need for the accuracy of financial statements. The International Financial Reporting Standards standards need to be strictly adhered to and, as a result, the quality of the audits will need to increase.
6. Further transfer pricing enforcement
Transfer pricing enforcement, which refers to the practice of establishing prices for internal transactions between related entities, is expected to broaden in scope. The UAE will shortly open the possibility to negotiate advance pricing agreements, or essentially rulings for transfer pricing purposes.
7. Limited time periods for audits
Recent amendments also introduce a default five-year limitation period for tax audits and assessments, subject to specific statutory exceptions. While the standard audit and assessment period is five years, this may be extended to up to 15 years in cases involving fraud or tax evasion.
8. Pillar 2 implementation
Many multinational groups will begin to feel the practical effect of the Domestic Minimum Top-Up Tax (DMTT), the UAE's implementation of the OECD’s global minimum tax under Pillar 2. While the rules apply for financial years starting on or after January 1, 2025, it is 2026 that marks the transition to an operational phase.
9. Reduced compliance obligations for imported goods and services
Businesses that apply the reverse-charge mechanism for VAT purposes in the UAE may benefit from reduced compliance obligations.
10. Substance and CbC reporting focus
Tax authorities are expected to continue strengthening the enforcement of economic substance and Country-by-Country (CbC) reporting frameworks. In the UAE, these regimes are increasingly being used as risk-assessment tools, providing tax authorities with a comprehensive view of multinational groups’ global footprints and enabling them to assess whether profits are aligned with real economic activity.
Contributed by Thomas Vanhee and Hend Rashwan, Aurifer
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Attacks on Egypt’s long rooted Copts
Egypt’s Copts belong to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, with Mark the Evangelist credited with founding their church around 300 AD. Orthodox Christians account for the overwhelming majority of Christians in Egypt, with the rest mainly made up of Greek Orthodox, Catholics and Anglicans.
The community accounts for some 10 per cent of Egypt’s 100 million people, with the largest concentrations of Christians found in Cairo, Alexandria and the provinces of Minya and Assiut south of Cairo.
Egypt’s Christians have had a somewhat turbulent history in the Muslim majority Arab nation, with the community occasionally suffering outright persecution but generally living in peace with their Muslim compatriots. But radical Muslims who have first emerged in the 1970s have whipped up anti-Christian sentiments, something that has, in turn, led to an upsurge in attacks against their places of worship, church-linked facilities as well as their businesses and homes.
More recently, ISIS has vowed to go after the Christians, claiming responsibility for a series of attacks against churches packed with worshippers starting December 2016.
The discrimination many Christians complain about and the shift towards religious conservatism by many Egyptian Muslims over the last 50 years have forced hundreds of thousands of Christians to migrate, starting new lives in growing communities in places as far afield as Australia, Canada and the United States.
Here is a look at major attacks against Egypt's Coptic Christians in recent years:
November 2: Masked gunmen riding pickup trucks opened fire on three buses carrying pilgrims to the remote desert monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor south of Cairo, killing 7 and wounding about 20. IS claimed responsibility for the attack.
May 26, 2017: Masked militants riding in three all-terrain cars open fire on a bus carrying pilgrims on their way to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor, killing 29 and wounding 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.
April 2017: Twin attacks by suicide bombers hit churches in the coastal city of Alexandria and the Nile Delta city of Tanta. At least 43 people are killed and scores of worshippers injured in the Palm Sunday attack, which narrowly missed a ceremony presided over by Pope Tawadros II, spiritual leader of Egypt Orthodox Copts, in Alexandria's St. Mark's Cathedral. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks.
February 2017: Hundreds of Egyptian Christians flee their homes in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, fearing attacks by ISIS. The group's North Sinai affiliate had killed at least seven Coptic Christians in the restive peninsula in less than a month.
December 2016: A bombing at a chapel adjacent to Egypt's main Coptic Christian cathedral in Cairo kills 30 people and wounds dozens during Sunday Mass in one of the deadliest attacks carried out against the religious minority in recent memory. ISIS claimed responsibility.
July 2016: Pope Tawadros II says that since 2013 there were 37 sectarian attacks on Christians in Egypt, nearly one incident a month. A Muslim mob stabs to death a 27-year-old Coptic Christian man, Fam Khalaf, in the central city of Minya over a personal feud.
May 2016: A Muslim mob ransacks and torches seven Christian homes in Minya after rumours spread that a Christian man had an affair with a Muslim woman. The elderly mother of the Christian man was stripped naked and dragged through a street by the mob.
New Year's Eve 2011: A bomb explodes in a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria as worshippers leave after a midnight mass, killing more than 20 people.
How to wear a kandura
Dos
- Wear the right fabric for the right season and occasion
- Always ask for the dress code if you don’t know
- Wear a white kandura, white ghutra / shemagh (headwear) and black shoes for work
- Wear 100 per cent cotton under the kandura as most fabrics are polyester
Don’ts
- Wear hamdania for work, always wear a ghutra and agal
- Buy a kandura only based on how it feels; ask questions about the fabric and understand what you are buying
The five pillars of Islam
1. Fasting
2. Prayer
3. Hajj
4. Shahada
5. Zakat
