In recent years, the question of Iraq’s place in a US-Israel confrontation with Iran has been treated as speculation, a scenario analysts sketched out in conference papers and op-eds, and many dumping this likelihood based on Iraq’s political or economic instability. Manifestation or unfolding is likely to differ; however, a secondary or indirect Iraqi role in the war cannot be ruled out. Let us work up to that.

Wall Street Journal and the New York Times reported in May 2026 that Israel had built two covert military sites in Iraq’s western desert. Work on the first began in late 2024, and it was used during the June 2025 war and the 2026 conflict. The second, an improvised airstrip on a dry lakebed southwest of Karbala, was built days before the February 2026 strikes. Consequently, Iran-aligned militias in Iraq launched rockets and drones at American bases in Kurdistan and Baghdad, and Washington answered with strikes on militia fighters and Iraqi soldiers, killing a senior Iraqi army commander in Anbar. So, Iraq was never a bystander in this war but was indirectly engaged in the war from day one, whether Baghdad wanted that or not.

Iraq, therefore, can be used to exert pressure on Iran more than being a corridor for amassed American divisions to roll in.

Iraq, therefore, can be used to exert pressure on Iran more than being a corridor for amassed American divisions to roll in.

History bears the animosity between Arabs and Persia for a long time. More recent was the war Iraq and Iran fought for eight years from 1980 to 1988, which........

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