Iran and Iraq warn US air strikes risk stoking instability

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Iran and Iraq have warned that a wave of US strikes against militants backed by Tehran could trigger greater instability across the region. 

The US military said it hit 85 targets at seven facilities in Iraq and Syria on Friday that were associated with Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards and Iranian-backed militias.

It was the first of what President Joe Biden said would be a series of retaliatory strikes for the drone attack on a base on the Jordan-Syrian border that killed three US servicemen last month.  

The Iraqi government said on Saturday that 16 people, including civilians, were killed in the US attacks, warning that they would “put security in Iraq and the region on the brink of the abyss”. 

Iran’s foreign ministry condemned the strikes as a violation of international law and said the US was engaging in “another adventurous and strategic error”.

The Syrian military said that “many civilian and military martyrs” were killed, but did not provide further details. 

The US attacks underscore the delicate balance Biden is trying to manage. Washington is under pressure to respond to Iranian-aligned militant attacks against American forces while also trying to avoid being drawn deeper into a widening regional conflict.

The air strikes, which hit four sites in Iraq and three in Syria, marked the first time the US has targeted Iran’s powerful Qods Force since the outbreak of the war between Israel and Hamas in October triggered hostilities across the Middle East.  

The Qods Force is the wing of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards that is responsible for overseas operations and trains and arms militants in the region. 

Biden has said repeatedly that he wanted to avoid a wider war, but he signalled on Friday that Washington would continue to hit back if Iranian-aligned militants attacked American targets.

“The United States…