Iran's missile strikes in Iraq, Pakistan, and Syria highlight its insecurity amidst regional tensions
The strikes are unlikely to have deterred its adversaries, degraded their ability to mount attacks on the country, nor quelled domestic hardliners' calls for vengeance
Iran’s missile and drone strikes on Iraq, Pakistan, and Syria
In the early hours of Tuesday 16 January 2024, the Islamic Republic of Iran launched missile and unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) strikes in Iraq, Pakistan, and Syria.
Islamic Revolution Guards Corps Aerospace Force (IRGC-ASF) Commander Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh is seen in a video reporting the results of the military operation in a telephone call to IRGC Commander Major General Hossein Salami. According to Hajizadeh the operation focused on three main targets:
Four Kheibar-shekan solid-fuel medium-range ballistic missiles fired from south Khuzestan province and another four of the same type of missile fired from Kermanshah province at a so-called “takfiri” militant group in Idlib, Syria;
Seven ballistic missiles of an unknown type fired from East Azerbaijan province at a so-called “Zionist headquarters” [in Erbil, Iraq];
Nine ballistic missiles of an unknown type fired at a so-called second group of Islamic State “takfiri” which he states in the video will take place within the hour.
Subsequently, it was reported that the Baluchi-Iranian Jaish Al Adl (JAA) militant group had been targeted by the IRGC in the Baluchistan province of Pakistan, likely corresponding to the third target above listed by Hajizadeh.
According to Mohammad Shaltouki, an Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) defense expert and journalist, three types of missiles were used in the operation:
Kheibar-shekan solid-fuel medium-range ballistic missile (Range: 1,450 km);
Fateh-313 solid-fuel short-range ballistic missile (Range: 500 km);
Fateh-110 solid-fuel short-range ballistic missile (Range: 300 km)
Additionally, he claims that in video of the strikes that he analyzed, he also heard what he believed to be the Shahed 136 drone. The use of drones against at least one of the targets was later confirmed by Iranian officials.
Targets and casualties
The missile and drone operation by Iran comes at a time of elevated insecurity within the country and heightened regional tensions in West Asia. Although the Islamic Republic has used such strikes against its state and non-state adversaries with increasing frequency since the late-2010s, this may be the first operation in which it has targeted several different actors in a single attack.
The precise targets and results of the Iranian strike in the Idlib Governorate of Syria, which is under the influence of Türkiye and the control of Sunni Islamist militant groups like Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), remain unclear.
The Jaish Al Adl militant group has been responsible for many attacks on and assassinations of Iranian security personnel (particularly the IRGC) in the country’s Sistan and Baluchistan province. The pace of operations by this militant group appear to have intensified since the Mahsa Amini protests broke out in Iran in September 2022, resulting in a heavy security presence in the region (The Iranian state media clip above purports to show this week’s strike on a JAA camp in Pakistan).
According to Nour News, associated with Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC), the target of the missiles and drones was the “Green Mountain” area of Pakistan’s Baluchistan province. The post on X (formerly Twitter) goes on to claim the Pakistani government lacks full control there, and that JAA has its headquarters and training camps in the area, where it also manufactures and procures weapons.
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, in a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on Wednesday 17 January 2024, asserted that no Pakistani citizens were targeted by the Iranian strike but that they were aimed at the Baluchi-Iranian JAA “terrorist group” based in Pakistan’s Baluchistan province. He claimed that Iran had repeatedly raised the issue of the threat posed by JAA with senior Pakistani security, political, and military officials, including after a recent attack in the Iranian city of Rask leading to the death of Iranian law enforcement personnel, to no avail. He reaffirmed Iran’s respect for the governments and territorial integrity of Iraq and Pakistan, but insisted that the Islamic Republic would not allow its security to be taken for granted, nor would it hold back from establishing the country’s security in the face of “terrorist groups in Pakistan” or “Israeli currents in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI).” According to a press release by Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Iranian strike led to the death of two children and the injury of three girls, themselves possibly Baluchi-Iranians.
Finally, it is believed that the KRI has served as a staging ground for the state of Israel to carry out operations inside of Iran, possibly with the cooperation or at least acquiescence of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) or some of its elements.
According to the Rudaw Media Network, a major media broadcaster in the KRI, the strike led to the deaths of Kurdish-Iraqi businessmen Peshraw Dizayee, his infant daughter Zhina, a housekeeper, and his friend and Chaldean–Syriac–Assyrian businessman Karam Mikhail. Dizayee’s older son Roj (25) lost a hand in the strike and his younger son Rawan was injured. According to the same source, Dizayee headed the Falcon Group conglomerate, which is active in several fields including security, oil and gas, construction, and agriculture.
Shaltouki, the IRNA journalist, rejected the idea that the target struck in Erbil, Iraq, was merely a civilian residence. He instead argued that images of the remains of the targeted site showed that, despite being hit by multiple large penetrating warheads, “the foundations of this building remain standing”. This for him was more evidence that this site was a “fortress”, a “center for designing conspiracies against Iran,” from which operations in the country were “guided, supported, equipped,” and that its “beautiful facade” was to make it appear “normal”. Shaltouki strongly implied that civilian “human shields” may have been placed at the alleged Mossad facility by “someone” to be rolled out as a cover story in case action was ever taken against it.
Context and motivations
These Iranian missile and drone strikes follow on the heels of several recent attacks on Iran or its military personnel abroad by a state actor, a transnational Sunni Islamist militant group, and a domestic Sunni Islamist militant group:
On 02 December 2023, Mohammad Ali Ataei Shourcheh and Panah Taghizadeh, two IRGC officers said by Iranian official sources to be deployed on an advisory mission in Syria, were killed by what is believed to have been an Israeli air strike on the southern Damascus suburb of Sayyida Zeinab;
On 15 December 2023, an Iranian police station in the city of Rask in Sistan and Baluchistan province was struck by the Jaish Al Adl militant group, killing 11 security personnel and injuring several others. This was subsequently followed up by other JAA attacks on IRGC and law enforcement personnel;
On 18 December 2023, Iran experienced a nationwide disruption of gas stations due to a cyberattack by the “Predatory Sparrow” hacker group, linked with Israel;
On 25 December 2023, Brigadier General Seyed Razi Mousavi, a veteran IRGC Ghods Force (IRGC-QF) officer responsible for coordinating between his organization and the Bashar Al Assad regime in Syria, was killed by what is thought to have been an Israeli strike on the Damascus suburb of Sayyida Zeinab;
On 03 January 2024, a twin bombing by the Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP) in the city of Kerman at a ceremony commemorating the death of IRGC-QF Commander Major General Ghassem Soleimani, killed 94 people and injured more. This is the most deadly terrorist attack in Iran since the revolution of 1979.
These attacks have in some instances contributed to a rising atmosphere of insecurity in Iran or, in the case of the assassination of IRGC personnel in Syria, demoralized many of the so-called “hardliners” that form an important constituency for the Islamic Republic. It is noteworthy that these killings took place soon after Iranian FM Amir-Abdollahian said in an interview in the Financial Times that any such act in Syria would be met by a “tough” response. They follow a long line of killings of IRGC personnel like that of Soleimani by the United States in Iraq in January 2020, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh (allegedly the father a covert Iranian nuclear weapons program) by Israel inside Iran in November 2020, and the “Campaign between Wars” by Israel against the IRGC in Syria for the last decade or so. Such losses, while not insurmountable, nonetheless boldly highlight the difficulty the Islamic Republic has faced to protect key military personnel and assets at home and abroad, to deter its adversaries, or to successfully retaliate by imposing a high cost on these adversaries for their actions. This in turn has fueled a growing chorus among some hardliners for vengeance.
Seen In this light, Iran’s missile and drone strikes on three distinct actors in three different states (itself an oddity given it typically targets a single actor in such strikes), appear to be part of a poorly conceived effort to deter adversaries or degrade their operational capacity. The Islamic Republic’s senior leadership also look to be haphazardly thrashing about to find a way to address the domestic climate of insecurity and quench hardliners’ thirst for vengeance. However, this missile and drone spectacle is unlikely to deter its adversaries from carrying out future attacks, nor does it look to have significantly degraded their capabilities, while potentially incurring significant diplomatic and reputational costs for the country.
The aftermath of the strikes
It is unclear what, if any, damage the strike in Idlib, Syria, incurred against the Sunni Islamist militant groups based there. It is also uncertain what blow the strike in Pakistan achieved in terms of diminishing the capacity of JAA to attack Iranian security personnel. In fact, rather than deterring JAA, the strike may have killed Baluchi-Iranian children and been a factor in the assassination of Colonel Hossein Ali Javadanfar, a member of the IRGC Salman Corps of Sistan and Baluchistan province.
The strike also quickly earned the ire of the Pakistani government as a violation of its sovereignty, which noted the existence of multiple channels of communication between the sides, and asked the Iranian ambassador to Islamabad (who was on a trip to Tehran at that time) not to return to his post and recalled its own ambassador.
This led to unprecedented Pakistani retaliatory strikes in Iran on Thursday 18 January 2024 codenamed “Operation Marg Bar Sarmachar” (“Death to the Sarmachar” [guerrillas]), which a statement by Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs characterized as targeting “terrorist hideouts in Sistan and Baluchistan province”, resulting in the deaths of a “number of terrorists” of Pakistani origin. However, the statement ended on a conciliatory note, asserting that “Pakistan fully respects the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Islamic Republic of Iran,” that “Iran is a brotherly country and the people of Pakistan have great respect and affection for the Iranian people,” and leaving an off-ramp for its neighbor by concluding that “We have always emphasized dialogue and cooperation in confronting common challenges including the menace of terrorism and will continue to endevaour to find joint solutions.”
The Deputy governor for security and military affairs of Iran’s Sistan and Baluchestan province told Iranian state media that Pakistan targeted a village close to the border with missiles killing 3 women and 4 children of non-Iranian origin. He said another explosion took place near the city of Saravan but resulted in no casualties.
At the time of writing a statement on the X account of the Iranian Embassy in Islamabad justified Iran’s strike in Pakistan as “a preventive action against a terrorist group preparing to infiltrate the territory of Iran to carry out another terrorist operation similar to the criminal & terrorist attack in Rask.” While condemning Pakistan’s retaliatory strike as “unbalanced and unacceptable,” this statement also ended on a conciliatory note, concluding that “The Islamic Republic of Iran always adheres to its policy of good neighborliness and does not allow its enemies and terrorist allies to strain these relations…”
Iran’s rationale for the strike in Pakistan may have indeed been to prevent an imminent cross-border attack by JAA. But it may have also been intended to spur Pakistan into action against the Baluch-Iranian militant group, or at least probe the sensitivity and responsiveness of its neighbor to Iranian attacks on its territory. Pakistan’s decisive retaliation, and any possible future counter-terrorism cooperation that results from this incident, reduces the likelihood that these events will repeat themselves. But the dire situation in Sistan and Baluchistan province and the persistent insurgency there leaves door open for a repeat of them.
While strikes by Iran against Iranian targets in Pakistan may not be completely unprecedented, such an attack against a nuclear armed state at a time of heightened international and regional tensions is a dangerous escalation, which risks direct armed conflict between the two otherwise friendly states. It could also exacerbate anti-Iranian sentiments and anti-Shia polarization within Pakistani politics and society.
Alternatively, given that these events featured Iranians killing Baluchi-Iranians and Pakistanis killing Baluchi-Pakistanis, and that the air defenses of either side were nowhere to be found, the possibility of prior high-level security coordination between the two neighbors cannot be entirely dismissed.
The missile strike against the alleged Mossad headquarters in Erbil, Iraq, engendered a similarly negative response from the Iraqi government and especially the KRG and Kurdish-Iraqi society. Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani characterized the attack as "clear aggression" against his country and a dangerous development that undermined the strong ties between Tehran and Baghdad. He also said Iraq reserved its right to take all legal and diplomatic measures granted to it by its sovereignty. In protest, Iraq recalled its envoy from Tehran, and summoned Iran's charge d'affaires in Baghdad. Iraqi Kurdish Prime Minister Masrour Barzani cancelled a planned meeting with Iran's foreign minister at the World Economic Forum at Davos in protest over the Iranian missile strikes. Iraqi National Security Adviser Qassim Al Araji denied that the house was an Israeli spy headquarters (see screenshot above). The strike also contributed to anti-Iran sentiments in the KRI, including a protest in the city of Duhok, in which the provincial governor took a shot at Tehran by accusing it of having targeted a toddler named Zhina during its missile attack on Erbil because it was not satisfied with killing Mahsa Zhina Amini. Even Pope Francis chimed in by expressing solidarity with the victims and urging all sides to avoid any steps that would further escalation tensions in the region or beyond (see screenshot above).
This week’s strike by Iran in the KRI follow on the heels of a long period of tension between the two sides largely rooted in Tehran’s belief that Erbil permits Israel and Kurdish-Iranian militant groups (especially following the Mahsa Amini protests) to use its territory as a staging ground for attacks against it. Iran carried out a similar strike in March 2022 when it struck the residence of Baz Karim Barzanji, the founder and CEO of the Kurdish-Iraqi oil company KAR Group, alleging that it was a Mossad facility. That attack appears to not have resulted in any casualties. Last year Tehran gave Baghdad and Erbil an ultimatum to expel Kurdish-Iranian militant groups from their territory by 19 September 2023 or risk further action by Iran.
No concrete evidence has emerged that the target in Erbil was a Mossad headquarters in the region. Nonetheless, Peshraw Dizayee, who was among those killed by the Iran’s strike, may have been targeted for a possible link to Israel, or to send a strong message to the KRG on sensitive security or economic issues. However, this attack will not deter Israel from hitting Iran and the IRGC, nor has its operational capacity to do so likely been impaired. We are thus unlikely to see calls by so-called Iranian hardliners for vengeance for their "martyred” countrymen diminish for very long.
The same can be said of the Islamic State Khorasan Province, which carried out the deadly attacks in Kerman, and two earlier operations against the Shah Cheragh Shrine in the southern Iranian city of Shiraz in October 2022 and August 2023, respectively. According to Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence, the attacks in Kerman were carried out by a team trained at an ISKP camp in Afghanistan’s northeastern Badakhshan province bordering Tajikistan, yet no strikes against the transnational militant group or this camp have been recorded. This may have been a function of the fraught relationship between the Islamic Republic and the Taliban in neighboring Afghanistan (and a desire not to open a new front against a wily adversary) or simply the absence of targeting intelligence. But a future strike is not out of the question.
Conclusion
After the 07 October 2023 attack in Israel, the Islamic Republic of Iran looked to have retaken the initiative in West Asia, and found itself once again in a relatively strong position vis-a-vis its regional and extra-regional adversaries.
However, over the last several weeks, this favorable dynamic has suddenly begun to shift. Iran now finds the Axis of Resistance non-state actor alliance network, which is a key component of its offensive and defensive power, under the hammer across multiple fronts. IRGC personnel are once again being killed abroad. And the Iranian homeland has experienced its deadliest terrorist attack since the revolution of 1979.
This rapid change in circumstances gives the impression of having left the Iranian leadership befuddled and unsure what to do. The Islamic Republic has often responded to attacks by a state or non-state actor in a relatively targeted manner to deter further attacks, reduce the capacity or appetite of its adversary for further conflict, or to at least save face before international, regional, or domestic audiences. This week’s missile and drone strikes have been confounding in their target selection and have likely achieved few of these objectives. This bodes ill for the evolution of the current conflict in West Asia given further major challenges loom on the horizon.