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2026-08-13 Iraq
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Baghdad is moving to encircle the positions of factions run by the 'Revolutionary Guard' without clashes
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Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited
[AAWSAT] Iraqi sources revealed on Wednesday the outlines of a government plan after the deadline for restricting weapons on September 30, 2026, which includes "encircling leadership sites" of factions run by the "Revolutionary Guard" in preparation for dismantling them "gradually," while Iranian officials are trying to obstruct or postpone the plan, even though Baghdad "designed a course that does not lead to armed confrontation."
Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi had previously stated that the end of next month would be the deadline for the withdrawal of US forces from the country, and would also mark the end of the deadline for the armed factions to confine their weapons to the state.
"THE ENCIRCLEMENT PLAN"
Sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that the government plan after September 30 calls for the deployment of regular army forces, the Counter-Terrorism Service, and elite units around the operations centers of armed factions, and on roads leading to them, with the aim of restricting the movement of transport and supplies to and from these sites.
The sources explained that government forces will gradually begin setting up checkpoints under the command of officers to monitor the movement of weapons and confiscate them, with a focus on drones and missiles.
According to the sources, these forces will begin imposing a tight security cordon around the armed factions’ centers without any friction, in an operation that ultimately aims to push the factions “either to make a mistake, such as moving drones, or engaging in armed friction, or to abandon their positions in favor of the official institution without firing a single shot.”
A source familiar with sensitive discussions regarding the weapons of the factions run by the Revolutionary Guard said that “government forces will systematically escalate restrictions around those sites, until they reach a stage that allows them to take control of them, which has been difficult to enter for years.”
Military and political leaders reached this formula after discussions about a path that would spare the two sides in the conflict over weapons outside the state a "military confrontation".
Field sources said that “forces from the army and the counter-terrorism service had already begun at the beginning of this week to deploy a number of officers in monitoring detachments in a number of areas and highways, as a trial phase of the plan.”
The sources confirmed that some of these detachments “succeeded during the past few weeks in seizing shipments of drones that were heading to various points in Iraqi regions.”
ROCK CLIFF AND FLINT
Asharq Al-Awsat has learned that the plan focuses primarily on the two locations of Jurf al-Sakhr, a stronghold of Kataib Hezbollah,
| …even though they share a name with Lebanese Hezbollah and have long trained with them under IRGC supervision, nonetheless there is absolutely no connection between Kataib Hezbollah and Lebanese Hezbollah — none whatsoever!!!! (Whew! That’s exhausting! |
and Jurf al-Nadaf, a stronghold of Harakat al-Nujaba, both of which are south of the capital, Baghdad.
The “Jurf al-Sakhr” area has been one of the most important strongholds of the factions since 2014, and it is believed to have turned into a strategic military base for the factions that includes camps, prisons, warehouses, and factories for missiles and drones, but many believe that it is an operations center for the Iranian “Revolutionary Guard”.
As for the Jurf al-Nadaf area, which is located on the southeastern outskirts of Baghdad, near the Baghdad-Madain road, it has emerged in recent years as a site that includes headquarters and facilities belonging to the “Popular Mobilization Forces” and armed factions associated with it.
Security interest in the area has increased due to its connection, according to Iraqi security sources, to facilities for storing weapons and ammunition, and to military activity by pro-Iranian factions.
In July 2026, security sources said that a joint security force raided a headquarters believed to belong to the “Al-Nujaba Movement” in Jurf al-Nadaf, and that the site contained a drone manufacturing facility, which had been used to launch drones targeting various locations.
Iraqi sources said that “the intelligence assessment indicated that the drone shipments that were seized – or those that were launched towards different targets – are connected to a control center at these sites.”
Although the forces that participated in the raid included the Baghdad Operations Command, the Federal Police, and the Popular Mobilization Forces Security Directorate, it ended with their withdrawal without searching the site.
A well-informed political source said that “the failure of the operation to storm the headquarters of Jurf al-Naddaf gave the military leaders sufficient insight to modify the plan from storming the headquarters to surrounding them and restricting access to them.”
WIDER DISTRIBUTION
The spread of armed factions is not limited to Jurf al-Sakhr and Jurf al-Nadaf, located southwest of Baghdad, but they receive special attention due to their strategic importance and their proximity to the capital.
Other faction sites are located in Tuz Khurmatu, in Salah al-Din province north of Baghdad, and Amerli, also in Salah al-Din province, as well as Camp Ashraf in Diyala province northeast of Baghdad, and sites in the city of Kut, the center of Wasit province, southeast of the capital.
Two main tasks stand out for the factions run by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, according to a senior political official. The first is to be stationed in locations very close to the capital, Baghdad, to ensure the ability to intervene quickly if necessary, which justifies their intensive presence in multiple points and locations there.
The second task focuses on tightening the noose around Sunni areas by controlling their most important geographical strongholds, specifically those close to the Syrian border.
The sources confirmed that “imposing the siege and restricting movement around the facilities of the factions run by the (Revolutionary Guard) is part of a broader plan that includes removing all the brigades of the (Popular Mobilization Forces) from all cities and redistributing them according to a plan determined by the military leadership independently of the faction leaders.”
A senior political official told Asharq Al-Awsat that “the government plan is designed to avoid armed clashes with the factions, and at an advanced stage aims to bring the armed factions into serious negotiations within a national framework with the authorities regarding their status and the future of their members.”
"THE TIME IS NOT RIGHT" FOR IRAN
So far, Kataib Hezbollah, Kataib Sayyid al-Shuhada, and Harakat al-Nujaba, all of which are allied with Iran, refuse to hand over weapons to the state. Activists close to these groups say that “the axis of resistance will not hand over its weapons even after the Americans withdraw,” and they have publicly called, in a defiant tone, for “the state’s weapons to be confined to the factions.”
The government plan has raised concerns among Iranian officials about the fate of strategic weapons in the possession of the factions, and command and control centers where Iranian advisors affiliated with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps operate.
According to two political sources, Iranian officials informed leaders in the “Coordination Framework” alliance that the timing of the campaign was very bad, because the regional situation requires allies to hold on to their weapons, especially in Iraq.
A political source close to the leader of an influential Shiite party said that “the latter tried to convince the Iranians not to put more pressure on the Prime Minister, because he is already under pressure from the Americans regarding the issue of weapons, and the failure of this government would mean the end of the (Coordination Framework) alliance and its fledgling government, which is facing a severe financial crisis.”
The source added that “the Iranians are pressuring the (coordination framework) to push the government to postpone the implementation of the plan,” adding that “the factions will ultimately try to buy time until the balance of power changes locally and regionally, and the locations of their military assets are changed."
Funny: Iran offered to help Iraq bring armed groups under state control: President Barzani
[Rudaw] Iran
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate Jews Zionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol...
is ready to help Iraq confine weapons outside state control, Kurdistan Region President Nechirvan Barzani said Wednesday citing Iranian officials as informing him, as a September deadline for gangs - including those aligned with Tehran - to disarm looms.
"'Iranian officials said, ’Convey this message to the [Iraqi] Prime Minister [Ali al-Zaidi]: We are ready to help Mr. Zaidi in this matter,’" the Kurdish President said in an interview with the private-owned Iraqi satellite channel, al-Sharqiya TV, adding that the Iranian figures had reiterated this "official stance" to him on behalf of Tehran on two separate occasions.
"They [Iranian officials] emphasized that I should pass this message on to Mr. al-Zaidi," President Barzani added, further quoting them as stating, "If he [Zaidi] wants help from a neighboring country, we [Iran] are ready to provide it."
In his inaugural address before the Iraqi parliament in mid-May, Prime Minister al-Zaidi vowed security reform, including "confining weapons under state control," and in early June he ordered the formation of a committee to oversee the disengagement of political parties and armed factions from the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF).
The PMF was established in 2014 amid the emergence of the Islamic State
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not really Moslems....
(ISIS) in Iraq, which saw large parts of the country's north and west seized by the group.
Created in response to a religious edict issued by Iraq's highest Shiite authority, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the PMF was initially an umbrella organization of roughly 70 predominantly Shiite gangs, with some 250,000 members.
Though a state-funded institution, the PMF comprises factions aligned with the Iran-led ’Axis of Resistance®,’ with the core overlap including the Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq, Kata'ib Hezbollah, Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba, and Kata'ib Sayyed
 ...Arabic term meaning your/his lordship . Groveling in His Exalted Presence is encouraged...
al-Shuhada gangs.
While some factions have expressed willingness to comply with Zaidi's push, others have cited the continued presence of foreign forces - namely those of the US-led Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS - as justification for refusing to comply.
Moreover, the remarks by Iranian officials come at a time when the same groups included in the disarmament plan - operating under the Islamic Resistance® in Iraq (IRI) umbrella - said in early April that they had carried out more than 750 attacks on alleged US-linked assets in Iraq and the region since the outbreak of the Iran war in late February, as part of Tehran's response.
Zaidi's spokesperson, Sabah al-Numan, told Rudaw in mid-July that a September 30 deadline set by the premier to bring Iraqi gangs' weapons under state control is "fixed and irreversible."
Most recently, the Iraqi premier on Tuesday directed the federal parliament's Security and Defense Committee to draft a law confining weapons to the hands of the state, aiming to consolidate control over armed factions amid heightened regional military tensions and an upcoming US-led coalition withdrawal.
The committee, in turn, vowed support for the al-Zaidi government's measures to strengthen state security and military institutions.
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Posted by badanov 2026-08-13 00:00||
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File under: Govt of Iran Proxies
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