Pro-Iranian militias in Iraq may move away from the Syrian border after years of using the area to move into Syria and smuggle weapons to pro-Iran groups there, according to a recent report.
This is a significant development and follows reports that the Iraqi militias have decided to temporarily stop targeting Israel. In addition, the militias are facing pressure at home as a result of the fall of the pro-Iran Assad regime.
The militias in Iraq are part of the Popular Mobilization Units, a group of pro-Iran militias that were mostly formed after 2014 to fight ISIS. However, these groups also have deeper roots in Iraq and the region and form part of the Iranian “axis of resistance” alongside Hezbollah and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
The groups include Kataib Hezbollah, Asaib Ahl al-Haq, and Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba. Some of them have fought the US, and some of their leaders have been involved in pro-Iranian terror activities since the 1980s. In 2018, many of these groups became an official paramilitary arm of Iraq under the umbrella of the PMU.
After the Hamas attack on Israel in October 2023, some of these groups also became part of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, which used drones to attack Israel.
Now, things are changing, according to a report in The New Arab, also known as Al-Araby Al-Jadeed. A source has said the Iraqi government is asking these groups to move away from the Syrian border.
Most of these groups have used an area near Al-Qaim in Iraq to move into Syria near Albukamal. They would then drive up the road along the western bank of the Euphrates toward areas such as Al-Mayadeen and Deir Ezzor. This was essentially a highway for pro-Iran militias that stretched toward Lebanon. However, the fall of the Assad regime has closed this highway.
Fall of Syrian regime
A source told Al-Araby Al-Jadeed on Sunday that 11 armed factions are currently in the border area. Apparently, some of these are groups that were in Syria and fled the fall of the regime. They may now move “sufficient distances” away from the border with Syria starting this week.
“This is the first move by these factions since they entered Iraq and were stationed on the border from the Iraqi side in the towns of Al-Qaim and Hasiba Al-Gharbiya and the Iraqi Al-Rummanah area,” the report said.
The groups withdrew to Iraq along with thousands of other people from Syria, including Syrian regime troops, who likely changed into civilian clothes. Some of those men then returned to Syria.
“Iranians and Afghans who support the Assad regime entered Iraq,” the report added. The Afghans were part of the Fatimiyun, a group of Shi’ites recruited from Afghanistan to fight in Syria.
AN IRAQI military official in the Anbar Province told Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, “The armed factions that entered from Syria…will move a sufficient distance away from the Syrian border, with the presence of sufficient numbers of army forces and border guards in the Iraqi-Syrian strip capable of dealing with any emergency.”
Iraq has deployed border forces to Anbar to prevent chaos from flowing into Iraq from Syria, something that has been a historical theme.
After 2003, many jihadists moved down the Euphrates River Valley from Syria into Iraq. In 2014, ISIS also sought to threaten Iraq from this area. After 2018, many pro-Iranian militias moved the opposite way into Syria.
The report highlights the Iraqis’ desire to show that the militias who played a role in Syria will now not only move back to Iraq but will be moved away from the border. This is likely being done to reassure the Syrians.
“Iraqi army units and the border guards affiliated with the Interior Ministry will continue the task of securing the border strip,” the report said. The Interior Ministry is generally close to the PMU, and therefore, the replacement of the militias with the Interior Ministry may mean that the militias are being substituted in name only but will remain in some way near the border under new uniforms.
The report added that the militias “are the factions that the government in Baghdad is facing pressure to remove from the borderlands with Syria, as it is one of the decisions to support the current transitional phase in Syria, according to the same source.”
The report also mentioned Al-Tanf, which is interesting because it is in Syria and is the location of a US garrison. Apparently, the militias had operated just outside the garrison’s area of control.
The report added that 11 militias were located near the border, but only several names were provided. They had operated in “Deir Ezzor, Albukamal, [near] Al-Tanf, the outskirts of Al-Busayrah, Al-Mayadeen, and the Homs desert.”
Iraqi security officials recently met with the new Syrian leadership. It is assumed that the movement of the militias, or the lip service, is related to “Iraqi messages confirming the government’s good intentions towards the new Syria.”