ANKARA (Dispatches) – A military base housing Turkish troops in northern Iraq has been targeted in a rocket attack.
The attack came days after a fatal shelling blamed on Turkey hit a village in the Arab country’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region.
A source told Shafaq News Agency that a rocket landed in the vicinity of Zelikan camp in the district of Bashiqa near Mosul City on Sunday evening.
According to the security source, no casualties were reported in the attack, which was the second of its kind in the past few days.
Other sources said that a resistance group dubbed Saraya Awliya al-Dam (Guardians of Blood Brigade) claimed responsibility for the attack in a video posted online.
The group reportedly said it used 122mm Grad rockets in the attack, noting that it came in response to the latest Turkish shelling. It also warned that it would take the battle to the Turkish territory.
On July 20, Turkey carried out a strike against the Iraqi hill village of Parakh in the Zakho district in Dohuk province, killing at least nine tourists, including children and women, and wounding more than 20 others.
Authorities in Iraq insist that the attack was carried out by Turkish forces and that they are responsible for the deaths and injuries of Iraqi civilians, while Ankara says the country’s forces did not attack civilians.
Iraq’s Defense Minister Juma Inad said in an interview on Sunday that “Turkey exploited the war on Daesh to penetrate into Iraq,” he said.

Several Killed, Wounded in Militant Attacks

Meanwhile, two security members and a civilian were killed and five people were wounded in two attacks by Daesh terrorists in the Iraqi provinces of Salahudin and Diyala, security sources said Monday.
In one attack, the terrorists attacked a Hashd Shaabi popular forces’ outpost near the city of Samarra, some 120 km north of the Iraqi capital Baghdad, leaving two Hashd Shaabi fighters martyred, the popular forces said in a statement.
It said that the martyred fighters are affiliated with armed group Saraya al-Salam, or Peace Companies.
In another attack late on Sunday night, Daesh terrorists attacked a village located in the east of Diyala’s provincial capital Baquba, some 65 km northeast of Baghdad, killing a villager and wounding five others, a provincial security source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.
Iraqi security forces rushed to the scene and launched a search campaign looking for the attackers, the source said.
Meanwhile, in the early morning of Monday, Iraqi security forces repelled another attack by Daesh terrorists on military bases in the Makhoul mountain range in the northern part of Salahudin province, killing a Daesh terrorist, Col. Mohammed al-Bazi from the provincial police told Xinhua.
Over the past months, Iraqi security forces have conducted operations against the terrorists to crack down on their intensified activities.
The security situation in Iraq has been improving since 2017 after defeating the terrorists. However, the terrorists have since melted into urban centers, deserts, and rugged areas, carrying out frequent attacks against security forces and civilians.