The deadlock in the war between the United States and Iran has raised fears among Iraqis that their deeply divided nation, which suffers from its own security problems, could become a tinderbox in the conflict between US-allied Sunni Arab countries and Shia Iran.
Shia-dominated Iraq has been caught in the middle of the war that started in February, finding itself dragged into the hostilities as its Iranian-backed militias have joined in attacking US and Gulf targets.
The devastating US and Saudi Arabian strikes on Iraq last week in retaliation for drone attacks against American and Saudi installations by Iran-aligned groups highlighted Iraq’s core dilemma of being caught between rival regional powers combined with a struggle to forge an autonomous path.
Worse still, Iraq is exposed to domestic constraints represented by tensions between Shias, Sunnis, and Kurds that continue to threaten its stability and fragile governance.
The present crisis could be even more perilous because it threatens deeper sectarian polarisation involving other Sunni Muslim nations such as Turkey and Pakistan that have already joined a Saudi-led regional maritime security framework to confront Iran and its Shia allies.
Iraq is already under pressure from the conflict, with its multi-religious, multi-sectarian, and multi-ethnic groups sharply divided and fears rising that the prolonged standoff will reopen old wounds and plunge the country back into a new and tragic chapter of civil strife.
A dispute over an image of slain Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in Iraq’s holy city of Karbala last week served as a reminder that Iraq could become a flashpoint in the regional infighting.
The row started when the police commander in charge of the security of the holy shrines in Karbala ordered his soldiers to take down a huge portrait of Khamenei hanging on the façade of a building in the city centre.
The portrait was posted by fighters of the Popular Mobilisation Force (PMF) as the city marked the Arbaeen rituals, the Shia world’s largest annual public mourning event for the Imam Hussein who was slain in 680 CE.
The controversy was quickly resolved by the guardians of the shrines, but failing to intervene in the dispute could have escalated in this city which often hosts millions of pilgrims for the event that peaked on Tuesday.
It sparked heated discussions across online platforms, ranging from heaping praise on the police commander’s move to outrage by pro-Iran groups that decried what they perceived as the desecration of Khamenei’s memory.
The backlash also served as an urgent alarm call for Iraq, highlighting the risk of the conflict in the region spreading to Iraq where the country’s Shias are watching the escalation with fellow Shias in Iran.
Iraq has been facing tough challenges. Ever since the US and Israel launched their war on Iran on 28 February this year, the Shia-led Iraqi government has largely tried to navigate it in what might seem to be an impossible task.
Since the outbreak of the war, warplanes, missiles, and drones have been crossing the skies of Iraq, disrupting flights and forcing air-defence systems to operate on constant alert.
Multiple explosions by Iranian drones have rocked the Kurdistan Region of northern Iraq, targeting US troops and Iranian opposition groups that Iran fears could be thrust into the war as part of primary ground forces.
Shipping routes have also been disrupted, cutting Iraq’s oil exports to minimum. The country’s monthly oil revenues have dropped sharply to about $1.5 billion, down from $7 to $8 billion previously due to export disruptions from the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
After being attacked by both the United States and Saudi Arabia, Iraq can no longer be considered safe outside the conflict’s reach, and any escalation in hostilities could put Iraq on the perilous path of being directly involved in an unsought war.
When the US and Israel attacked Iran, the Iraqi government declared its neutrality. It has also set a 30 September date for a US troop withdrawal from Iraq as a deadline for all the militias in the country to disarm and put their weapons under state control.
However, as the conflict between the United States and the Islamic Republic widens and a larger anti-Iran alliance is being formed, questions linger regarding how the Iraqi government will push to disarm these powerful militias in what is set to be a key test of its survival.
Iran-aligned Iraqi armed factions have openly rejected demands to surrender their weapons to state control, directly challenging the authorities and highlighting divisions within the Shia political camp.
The predicament facing Iraq now is choosing between cracking down on the militias and bearing the cost of internecine warfare or letting the United States and Iran’s regional adversaries continue the military response with all the risks that this entails.
Facing public embarrassment over the US-Saudi strikes, Iraq’s ruling Shia Alliance Framework blasted the raids as acts of aggression against the country’s sovereignty. The Iraqi National Security Council also condemned the attacks as undermining the Iraqi state.
Both bodies noted that the joint US-Saudi strikes had come while the Iraqi government was saying it remains committed to ensuring the withdrawal of the US forces and placing militia arms under state control.
While pressure by the United States and the Arab Sunni countries to stifle the militias is nothing new, the response this time in the form of air strikes was jarring because it seemed to depict the Iraqi government as a lame duck.
The strikes were embarrassing to Prime Minister Ali Al-Zaidi, who had just concluded a visit to Washington featuring a grandiose welcome at the White House and was scheduled to travel to Saudi Arabia.
Further humiliation came from US President Donald Trump, who claimed that the strikes were coordinated with Al-Zaidi’s government, something that was immediately denied by its spokesman.
Now questions have started being asked about what comes next for Iraq if there are further spikes in the tit-for-tat strikes between the US and Iran or even if the ongoing conflict expands into a regional war.
By all accounts, Iraq is already in the eye of the storm as it faces insurmountable challenges from the repercussions of the US-Saudi strikes and its leadership has little margin for manoeuvre.
Targeting sites belonging to the PMF indicates that what is required from Al-Zaidi is not only confining weapons belonging to the Iran-aligned militias but also disbanding this paramilitary force that is officially part of the security apparatus.
While disarming the powerful militias in Iraq remains an extremely difficult task, there is a consensus among seasoned Iraq experts that disbanding the nearly 250,000-strong PMF or re-integrating it into the national army will be nearly impossible.
The PMF is an umbrella organisation composed largely of brigades that belong to political factions, including those represented in the parliament and government and receiving clerical, societal, or tribal backing.
Disbanding these brigades will be a multifaceted problem carrying hidden and potentially disastrous consequences that could trigger a violent pushback, while integrating them into the army would be a time-bomb due to their deep political affiliations.
For many Iraqis, the US-Saudi strikes, which were coupled with threats reportedly by Kuwait, Jordan, and Syria, suggest a worrying shift in the direction of the US and its Sunni Arab allies towards Iraq.
This policy seems to aim at pulling Iraq out of Iran’s sphere of influence and containing its western neighbour in the way that former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein sought to do after the Islamic Revolution in 1979 with the help of the Gulf nations.
The goal is to change the dynamics of power in the Middle East, which resulted from the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 that empowered the Iraq Shias, accelerated the political rise of Shias across the Middle East, and allowed Iran to expand its regional influence.
This desired new security and political structure will require rapid political re-engineering that will certainly come at a high cost and raise fundamental questions about its possible consequences.
A power struggle that has been sparked by the debate over the US-Saudi strikes, now discretely going on in the corridors of power in Iraq and reported on social media, has shown the capacity of the new formula to stir chaos and civil strife.
With the prospect of ending the war with Iran remaining uncertain and the determination of both sides to make the war as costly as they can, Iraq will likely continue to head towards the abyss.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 6 August, 2026 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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