Iraq

Fears the Chinese coronavirus might spread from corpses to nearby populations has prevented the burial of many people in Iraq who have died from the respiratory illness, reports revealed Monday.

Iraq’s Kata’ib Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Shiite militia group that killed an American civilian contractor in December while launching terrorist rocket attacks against Iraqi military bases, issued a statement on Wednesday accusing the U.S. military of using the coronavirus pandemic as cover to attack its own bases.

Proving that nothing is so awful that the Islamic State cannot make it even worse, ISIS on Sunday published an article in one of its newsletters asking Allah to “increase the torment” of infidels from the coronavirus while sparing faithful Muslims.

A Turkish court on Saturday sentenced three human traffickers to 125 years in prison each for their roles in the death of Alan Kurdi, a two-year-old Syrian migrant child who drowned in September 2015.

BEIRUT — Lebanon went into lockdown and Iraqis prepared for a curfew Monday as part of regional efforts to contain the new coronavirus even as businesses remained open in Iran, which is battling the worst outbreak in the Middle East and where another senior official has died from the virus.

The United States military conducted “defensive” airstrikes against five Kata’ib Hizbollah (KH) weapons storage facilities across Iraq, significantly degrading the Iran-backed Shia militia’s ability to conduct future attacks against coalition forces, the Pentagon said Thursday.

President Donald Trump awarded former Vice Chief of Staff of the Army Gen. (Ret.) Jack Keane the Presidential Medal of Freedom in a White House ceremony on Tuesday.

Former Vice President Joe Biden once again distorted his record on the Iraq War on Monday, claiming he never believed Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), and he only voted in favor of the conflict to pressure U.N. weapons inspectors into the country. 

Obama’s national security leaders came out this week right before Super Tuesday to announce their support for former colleague Joe Biden.

Iran’s state-run PressTV was not terribly impressed by former Vice President Joe Biden’s comeback in the Super Tuesday Democrat primaries.

A 70-year-old cleric died in Iraq on Wednesday, just hours after being confirmed as a carrier of Chinese coronavirus, making him the first Iraqi fatality.

Protesters in Iraq, coming up on half a year of demonstrating against the corruption and incompetence of their government, were not reassured by Baghdad’s handling of the coronavirus. Furious that their disorganized and thoroughly looted government lacks the money and human resources to mount an effective defense, the protesters are setting up their own screening and treatment facilities, distributing information on how to prevent the spread of the disease, and giving out medical masks.

Iraqi Prime Minister-designate Mohammed Allawi withdrew his candidacy on Sunday, roughly a month after he was nominated for the post.

The appearance of the Wuhan coronavirus in Iran is causing a great deal of anxiety in the region and producing some immediate negative effects as trade across Iran’s borders shuts down. The Kurdistan Region experienced a bout of petrol panic on Monday as rumors of an impending fuel shortage spread, even though the authorities said there has been no significant supply disruption to date.

Iraq and Afghanistan confirmed their first cases of the Wuhan coronavirus on Monday. Both cases were detected near the Iranian border and involved patients who recently traveled to Iran, where an outbreak spreading from the city of Qom has officially infected 61 people and killed 12, although a lawmaker from the area claims there have been 50 deaths and 250 people are under quarantine.

A soldier deployed in Iraq helped policemen stop two alleged burglars after he saw them outside his home in Park Ridge, Illinois, on Friday.

Paratroopers with the 82nd Airborne Division who deployed to the Middle East in January amid a crisis with Iran arrived home on Thursday.

A group of Iraqi women joined ongoing anti-government protests in Baghdad’s Tahrir Square on Thursday — a daring exercise given both cultural stigmas against women participating in politics and the proclivity of Iran-backed Shiite militia thugs and Iraqi government security forces for murdering demonstrators.

Hassan Nasrallah, the head of the Iran-backed Shiite terrorist organization Hezbollah, lamented on Iranian television on Thursday that he could not trade his life for that of Major General Qasem Soleimani, eliminated in a U.S. airstrike in January.

The Pentagon on Monday afternoon updated its numbers on how many U.S. service members suffered from mild traumatic brain injury (TBI) after Iran fired ballistic missiles at an Iraqi base where they were stationed.

The Iraqi capital of Baghdad experienced snowfall for the first time in over a decade on Tuesday, in what meteorologists claim is the biggest snowfall in the Middle Eastern country for the past century. 

Pope Francis met with six Catholic patriarchs from Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, and Iraq on Friday to discuss Christian persecution in the region as well as their mass emigration from the Middle East.

Biden said he would not have ordered the strike against Iranian terrorist leader Qasem Soleimani if he were president.

Family members of troops who deployed to the Middle East amid tensions in Iran have been told by leadership their loved ones are redeploying home.

A U.K. woman who as a teenager ran away to join ISIS lost a legal challenge Friday aimed at restoring her citizenship.

Defiant protesters continue to fill the streets of Iraq despite attacks from security forces and Iran-backed militias that may have killed 550 demonstrators, according to the Iraqi Commission for Human Rights (ICHR).

President Donald Trump honored the family of a U.S. soldier killed in Iraq during his State of the Union speech Tuesday, assuring them that the “evil reign of terror” of the man responsible for the murder, Iranian terror chief Qasem Soleimani, was over.

The Pentagon released an updated number of United States service members who have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injury (TBI).

With less than one week before the Iowa caucuses, the establishment media is zeroing in on former Vice President Joe Biden and the culture of corruption that has permeated his immediate family for decades.

A group of French jihadists, who have been sentenced to death, have decried their treatment in an Iraqi prison, claiming that they have been subjected to “torture” and “humiliation”.