The Washington Post - 14.03.2020

SATURDAy, MARCH 14 , 2020. THE WASHINGTON POST eZ re A

ately. The locations were “clearly

terrorist bases,” McKenzie added,

and if Iraqi military forces were

there, “it’s probably not a good

idea to position yourself with

Kataib Hezbollah in the wake of a

strike that killed Americans and

coalition members.”

The strikes risk compounding

tensions between the U.S.-led co-

alition and an array of political

and armed forces that want West-

ern forces to leave Iraq. Kataib

Hezbollah has threatened Iraqis

working with the U.S.-led coali-

tion and told them to distance

themselves before March 15 or

face attack.

Iran backs a handful of power-

ful militias in Iraq, including

Kataib Hezbollah, a nd r epresenta-

tives of each group hold positions

within the s tate apparatus.

The militias often help e nforce

Te hran’s interests, staging attacks

against a protest movement t hat is

critical of them or against the U.S.

forces t hat Iran wants t o expel. B ut

security experts say Iran’s overall

control of these militias remains

unclear.

In the briefing Friday, McKen-

zie insisted that the Karbala air-

port site had been used to store

weapons.

“It may have been on the air-

field. I can’t tell you what else was

in there, but I know it was being

used for purposes of targeting us.

That’s the reason we struck it,” he

said.

Trump has made it clear that

the death of American personnel

in I raq is a r ed l ine for his adminis-

tration. The death of a U.S. con-

tractor in a rocket attack late last

year set in motion escalating tit-

for-tat strikes that brought Wash-

ington and Tehran to the brink of

war after Trump o rdered the kill-

ing of renowned Iranian military

commander, Maj. Gen. Qasem So-

leimani. Iran hit back with a wave

of ballistic missiles that injured

more than 1 00 U.S. soldiers.

Te nsions have ebbed since Jan-

uary, but U.S. and European offi-

cials say Iran-backed militias have

continued to launch rockets at

Iraqi military bases hosting coali-

tion troops and on t he U.S. Embas-

sy in Baghdad.

On Friday morning, the Penta-

gon released the identities of the

U.S. troops killed in the rocket

attack Wednesday o n Camp Taji.

They were Army Spec. Juan

Miguel Mendez Covarrubias, 27, of

Hanford, Calif., and A ir Force S taff

Sgt. Marshal D. Roberts, 28, of

Owasso, Okla. Mendez Covarrubi-

as was a member of the 1st Cavalry

Division’s 1st Air Cavalry Brigade

at Fort Hood, Tex., and Roberts

was a member of the Oklahoma

Air National Guard’s 219th Engi-

neering Installation Squadron.

The British government identi-

fied its fatality as Lance Cpl. Bro-

die Gillon, 26, a reservist and c om-

bat medical technician deployed

with the Irish Guards.

[email protected]

[email protected]

[email protected]

lamothe reported from Washington;

salim reported from Baghdad.

AlAA Al-MArjAnI/reuters

Members of the Iraqi security forces in the city of Karbala inspect d amage at a civilian airport that was hit in a U.S. airstrike. The strike

was targeting militia forces in retaliation for a rocket attack that killed two American soldiers and a member of the British military.

BY LOUISA LOVELUCK,

DAN LAMOTHE

AND MUSTAFA SALIM

london — T he U nited States a nd
Iraq on Friday wrangled over the
impact of airstrikes carried out to
avenge the deaths of coalition sol-
diers this week, with a top U.S.
general saying the munitions hit
military targets while officials in
Baghdad insisted t hat Iraqi troops
and a civilian were among the
dead.
The U.S. military said it had
launched “defensive precision
strikes” early Friday morning
against targets linked to the Iran-
backed group K ataib Hezbollah,
calling them a proportional re-
sponse to a rocket attack that
killed one British and two Ameri-
can service members Wednesday.
Marine Gen. Kenneth “Frank”
McKenzie Jr., t he chief of U.S. Cen-
tral Command, said the strikes
were carried out by manned air-
craft and hit five weapon storage
facilities believed to be used by
Kataib Hezbollah south and west
of Baghdad.
“We assessed t hat each l ocation
stored w eapons t hat would enable
lethal operations against U.S. and
coalition forces in Iraq,” he said.
“We also a ssessed that the d estruc-
tion of these sites will degrade
Kataib Hezbollah’s ability to con-
duct future strikes.”
McKenzie said the U.S. military
was “very comfortable with the
level of damage that we were able
to achieve” a t those s ites.

But i n Iraq, t he strikes were m et

with condemnation and risked in-

tensifying the p ressure o n U.S.-led

coalition troops to leave the coun-

try. The Iraqi military described

the action as “treacherous,” and

Iraqi President Barham Salih de-

scribed it as a “violation o f nation-

al sovereignty.”

Leading military and political

figures said three s oldiers and two

policemen were killed in the at-

tacks, along with a civilian who

was w orking in an airport that w as

under construction. In a state-

ment early Friday, another Iran-

aligned militia said that further

strikes could prompt retaliation

involving an “eye for an eye.”

It was unclear whether any mi-

litiamen were killed in the air-

strikes, although McKenzie said

he expected f atalities.

Te nsions between the United

States and Iran have soared in the

years s ince P resident Trump with-

drew from a landmark nuclear

deal involving the two nations,

and Iraq has emerged as one of

their most volatile proxy battle-

grounds.

Authorities in charge of Karba-

la International Airport said that

one of their facilities had been hit

and that a civilian working there

had been killed. At his briefing

Friday, McKenzie acknowledged

that one of the s trike sites was at a

civilian airport.

The facility has been under con-

struction since 2017. Iraqi state

television channels showed a di-

lapidated building with windows

blown out. Peeling off above the

door was blue lettering that read

“Karbala International Airport”

and “ Site Offices.”

U.S. officials are still assessing

the target sites, McKenzie said, in

part because bad weather had

made it difficult to do so immedi-

U.S. defends

attacks that Iraq

calls ‘ treacherous’

A merican targeting of

militiamen killed Iraqi

forces, Baghdad says

BY STEVE HENDRIX

jerusalem — Israel’s political
gridlock has been unbreakable
through three brutal elections,
endless grandstanding and
countless back-channel negotia-
tions. Now, the novel coronavirus
could finally give the country its
first government in more than a
year.
As the virus outbreak — and
Israel’s response to it — swelled
frighteningly in recent days, the
warring factions have softened
their rhetoric and embraced, ten-
tatively, the possibility of coming
together in an emergency coali-
tion.
At the end of a televised ad-
dress Thursday in which he an-
nounced the closing of all Israeli
schools, Prime Minister Benja-
min Netanyahu extended an offer
of partnership to his opponent,
Benny Gantz.
“It will be an emergency gov-
ernment for a limited time, and
together we will fight to save the
lives of tens of thousands of citi-
zens,” Netanyahu said.
Gantz, in a statement, respond-
ed in kind. “Given the circum-
stances, we are willing to discuss
the possibility of establishing a
broad national emergency gov-
ernment,” he said.
By the end of the day, the
adversaries had talked by phone
and consulted with Israeli Presi-
dent Reuven Rivlin, according to
a statement from Gantz’s office.
The president is scheduled to

begin consulting with parliamen-

tary parties Sunday, the next step

to naming Gantz or Netanyahu as

the person allowed a first chance

at assembling a governing coali-

tion.

There is no guarantee the coro-

navirus-inspired talk will actually

lead to Israel’s first functioning

government since the Knesset,

the parliament, was dissolved in

late 2018. Observers say the

moves are as much about politics

as public health: Netanyahu,

whose trial on corruption charges

is slated to begin next week, is

eager to remain in power; Gantz

may have little choice but to

acquiesce in a moment of nation-

al emergency.

Already, however, the sides are

bickering about the role Arab

Israeli Knesset members might

play in the arrangement; Gantz

seemed to insist they participate,

while Likud politicians have

called them “terrorists in suits.”

But there is no doubt the roar-

ing emergence of the pandemic,

which has closed Israel’s schools

and all but sealed its borders, has

upended the political dynamic as

nothing else has during months

of stalemate. Covid-19 may not

heal the country’s stark political

divisions, but it might prove to be

the kind of bolt from the blue

needed to break the logjam.

“None of us could have in any

way predicted this coronavirus

thing changing circumstance like

this,” s aid Anshel Pfeffer, a colum-

nist for the English-language dai-

ly Haaretz and author of a recent

biography of Netanyahu. “It’s a

whole flock of black swans.”

Previous attempts to form a

unity government — a power-

sharing agreement in which rival

parties agree to divvy up the

cabinet ministries among them —

faltered after the most recent

election. Rivlin tried to broker

such a deal between Netanyahu’s

Likud party and Gantz’s Blue and

White, but they could not agree

on which leader would get to hold

the top job first.

Netanyahu would like to hold

on to office not only to extend his

already record-breaking 13 years

of rule. He reportedly sees re-

maining in power as a way to fend

off his looming prosecution, ei-

ther by having the trial delayed or

securing formal immunity. The

prime minister faces multiple

counts of bribery, fraud and

breach of trust stemming from

his relationship with wealthy

supporters.

Since the March 2 election

failed again to give either side a

majority, the rancor between the

two politicians has grown even

uglier. Gantz, a former Israeli

army chief of staff, dug in on his

pledge to never serve in a coali-

tion with Netanyahu. Netanyahu

railed that Gantz was trying to

steal the election by pushing for a

law blocking an indicted prime

minister from forming a govern-

ment.

It b riefly looked as if Gantz was

in reach of forming a minority

Coronavirus outbreak prompts

a potential political thaw in Israel

government with outside support

from the group of Arab Israeli

politicians, which won 15 seats

running as the Joint List. That

prospect seemed to collapse

when a member of one of his

partner left-wing parties refused

to participate with Arab support,

leading to speculation that she

had cut a deal for a role in a

Netanyahu government.

But as the familiar carousel of

recrimination, betrayal and false

starts turned and turned, corona-

virus headlines began to domi-

nate. Officials layered on restric-

tions — sending tens of thou-

sands into quarantine, requiring

all international arrivals to self-

quarantine, shuttering schools

for six weeks — and the political

tone grew more sober.

Israel has reported at least 1 50

cases of the infection and no

deaths. But officials fear for an

already overtaxed national health

system. Some Israeli hospitals,

which have the highest occupan-

cy rate of any developed country,

were already known to park pa-

tients in corridors when beds run

short.

“The degrees of freedom that

Israel has to deal with a deadly

infectious disease are extremely

low,” said Dan Ben-David, presi-

dent of the Shoresh Institution

for Socioeconomic Research at

Te l Aviv University.

Politically, the change of sub-

ject may have helped Netanyahu,

who has smoothly shifted from

brawling politician to soothing

crisis manager.

“This is moment he’s been

waiting for all his life, to be

Israel’s Churchill,” Pfeffer said.

Whatever the motivations in

finally forming a government,

plenty of Israelis, dreading the

prospect of yet a fourth election,

may celebrate if a natural disaster

helps to end the political one.

[email protected]

oDeD BAlIltY/AssoCIAteD Press

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Petah Tikva last weekend. After another inconclusive

election, he and rival Benny Gantz are weighing an emergency coalition to address the coronavirus.

S0137-6x

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