The secretary-general of prominent Iraqi Shi’ite militia Asa’ib Ahl al-Haq said on Sunday that if U.S. forces do not leave Iraq immediately, they will be treated as an occupying army.
In a statement aired on Iraq’s Al-Ahd TV, Qais Khazali said: “We expect nothing less than the expulsion of all the forces of U.S. aggression from the pure land of Iraq.”
He added that his militia would fulfill the “hopes and wishes” to which former Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani dedicated his life by “cleansing of the land of Palestine in its entirety” by “erasing the plundering Israeli entity from existence.”
Khazali then turned to the people and Congress of the United States, saying that the decision of U.S. President Donald Trump, whom he called “the idiot,” would cause the deaths of more American soldiers. The Iraqi parliament had decided to expel U.S. forces from the country, he said, and if they do not leave immediately, they will be considered occupation forces and treated accordingly.
Speaking to the Congress, Khazali said that if it remained silent and allowed “that idiot” to make his own decisions, they would bear the consequences. He went on to say the killing of Soleimani was Trump’s stupidest act, that would ultimately bring to an end the U.S. role as a global superpower.
