At least two rockets hit near US embassy in Baghdad

BAGHDAD-Agence France-Presse

(Photo: Reuters) Iraqi Security Forces vehicles line up in the street outside the U.S. embassy compound in Baghdad, Iraq January 1, 2020.

Two rockets hit near the U.S. embassy in Iraq's capital on Jan. 5, witnesses told AFP, hours after the ambassador was summoned over a U.S. strike that killed top Iraqi and Iranian commanders.     

Jan. 5's attack was the second night in a row that the Green Zone was hit and the 14th time over the last two months that U.S. installations have been targeted.  

 A third rocket simultaneously hit a family home outside the Green Zone, wounding four, medical sources told AFP.    

Ties between Iraq and the U.S. have deteriorated after an American drone attack on Jan. 3 on the Baghdad international airport that killed Iran's Major General Qasem Soleimani and top Iraqi military figure Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis.    

The precision strike came just days after a pro-Iran mob attacked the U.S. embassy in Baghdad.    

In response, on Jan. 5 Iraq's parliament called on the government to oust U.S. and other foreign troops from the country.    

Some 5,200 U.S. soldiers are stationed across Iraqi bases to support local troops preventing a resurgence of the Islamic State jihadist group.    

They are deployed as part of the broader international coalition, invited by the Iraqi government in 2014 to help fight IS.    

Jan. 5's rocket attack came hours after a deadline by a hardline group in Iraq's Hashed al-Shaabi military force, which has close ties to Iran, for Iraqi security forces to "get away" from U.S. troops at joint bases across Iraq.