Many of the victims of attack in Hilla, which has been claimed by Islamic State, were Iranian nationals, security official says

Dozens of people, many of them Iranian Shia pilgrims, have been killed by a suicide bombing claimed by Islamic State near the Iraqi city of Hilla, 60 miles south of Baghdad, in the deadliest single attack on Iranian nationals by the Sunni jihadi group.

A suicide truck bomb packed with 500 litres of ammonium nitrate exploded on Thursday at a petrol station where several buses carrying Iranian pilgrims on their way back from the city of Kerbala had parked. Hilla is situated between Kerbala and Najaf, two cities home to important religious sites for Shias.

Reports of the death toll varied, with officials quoted by Reuters saying as many as 100 people had died and others quoted by Associated Press putting the toll at at least 56 people, including 20 Iranians.

Iran’s semi-official Isna news agency said up to 50 Iranians had been killed in the bombing, which also shattered a nearby restaurant. “The Iranian pilgrims martyred were inside a bus,” a source told Isna.

Isis, which considers all Shias apostates issued a statement claiming responsibility for the attack. According to the SITE Intelligence Group, the statement said the suicide bomber “blew up his vehicle amidst their assembly, inflicting among them more than 200 killed and wounded, including Iranians”.

Falah al-Radhi, a security official for the province affected by the attack, said most of the people killed were Iranian nationals. “A large truck exploded among them. It was a suicide attack,” he told AFP. “There are completely charred corpses at the scene.” Scores of wounded people were transferred to hospitals.

The bombing was seen as a retaliation – albeit on a foreign territory – to Tehran’s anti-Isis campaign. Although Iran is extensively involved in the fight against Isis in both Iraq and Syria, it has remained largely untouched by suicide bombings. Isis attacks such as those in Paris last November or in major cities in the Middle East are unheard of in the Iranian capital.

In Iraq, however, they are a regular occurrence. In July, a bomb claimed by Isis killed about 300 people, one of the worst atrocities to have hit the country since 2003.

About 3 million Iranians are believed to have travelled to Iraq this week for the annual Shia commemoration of arbaeen, an important day in the Shia Muslim calendar..



Iran’s foreign ministry condemned the attack, saying that it would not alter Iran’s backing of the Iraqi government against Isis.

“This heinous and barbarous crime will not change the determination of Iraqi government and people and will not alter the support of the Islamic Republic of Iran for and its solidarity with the oppressed people of Iraq and their fight against terrorism,” said Bahram Ghassemi, Tehran’s foreign ministry spokesman, according to the semi-official Fars news agency.

Morad Veisi, an Iranian expert on the role of its armed forces, said Thursday’s bombing could be seen as the retaliation for Iran providing the security for arbaeen.

“The security in Kerbala during arbaeen this year was a show of force by Iran – there was no attack in the city despite millions attending,” Veisi said. “But the attack is also a response to Iran’s role in fighting Isis in other parts of Iraq. Isis fighters particularly hate Iranian Shias.”

Veisi said Iran’s support had been instrumental in recent years in pushing back Isis on a number of occasions, including stopping fighters from getting closer to Baghdad after Mosul’s fall and more recently in preventing fighters from taking Erbil and helping the army retake Ramadi.

News of the bombing came as fighting continued in the northern city and Isis stronghold of Mosul, where a US-backed ground offensive by the Iraqi army is inching closer to more besieged parts of the city. As they lose ground in Mosul, the jihadis have intensified their attacks in other parts of Iraq.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest Iraqi security forces at the site of the truck bomb attack in Hilla. Photograph: Alaa Al-Marjani/Reuters

Isis has suffered major blows at the hands of the Iraqi army, supported by Iran-backed Shia militias and Kurdish peshmerga, in the five weeks since the Mosul offensive was launched.

“The Iraqi advance on the south and south-east of the city has started to pick up some steam, which we think is a really great development,” John Dorrian, a coalition spokesman was quoted as saying by the AFP, which reported that Iraqi forces were battling against Isis in the neighbourhood ofKhadraa on Thursday.

Iran’s involvement in the campaign against Isis in Iraq and Syria is carried by the Quds force, an external arm of the elite Iranian Revolutionary Guards led by its commander, Qassem Suleimani, who wields huge influence among Shia militias in both countries.

Compared with Iraq, where Iran’s involvement is regarded as helpful by the US secretary of state, John Kerry, its role in Syria is more controversial. Iran has been a staunch ally of Bashar al-Assad’s regime and has been accused of helping him quell opposition.

Battle for Mosul: Iraq asks for UK help to get thermobaric weapons Read more

Iran is hoping that US president-elect, Donald Trump, might change his country’s approach on Syria, shifting away from a focus on removing Assad and instead helping the Syrian army in pushing back Isis from Raqqa, the capital of the Isis “caliphate”. Trump has said he is open to warming relations with Russia, which is allied with Tehran, over Syria.

Iranian leaders insist their forces in both countries act only as military advisers, invited by their central governments, but the rising death toll in Iran points to a greater involvement.

This week, Mohammad-Ali Shahidi Mahallati, head of Iran’s foundation of martyrs, said: “The number of Iran’s martyrs as defenders of shrine has exceeded 1,000”. He was using Iranian terminology for guard forces sent by Iran to Syria.

Iran has also controversially recruited hundreds of Afghan refugees living in Iran to be sent to Syria.

