SOHR: Biden Administration Draws Scorn for Saying Iranian Missiles Were Not Targeting US Consulate in Iraq

 The Biden administration’s assertion that an Iranian ballistic missile attack on Erbil in northern Iraq had not targeted a U.S. Consulate under construction there prompted a scornful response from Senate Republicans, one of whom suggested the administration was “living in an alternative universe.”

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) announced it had fired the missiles, but said they had targeted an Israeli spy facility – a claim little credence by the government of the Kurdish autonomous region.

Several of the barrage of up to 12 missiles landed near the new 51-acre U.S. Consulate compound, which is not yet complete or operational.

“No U.S. facilities were damaged or personnel injured, and we have no indications the attack was directed at the United States,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said in a statement.

“We do not believe that the consulate was actually the target of this missile attack,” Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman told “Fox News Sunday.”

“We are very glad that our facilities are secure, that everybody’s accounted for, that no one has been hurt or killed. But all of that said, this is great concern,” she said, adding that the missile strike was “an attack on Iraq’s sovereignty.’

Host Bret Baier noted that the administration was close to reaching an agreement in Vienna – in talks also involving Russia and others – to bring the U.S. and Iran back into compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

“You can understand the disconnect for the average American watching this happening,” he said. “As we’re sitting at a table not only with the Iranians but the Russians in Vienna, we are getting fired upon by Iran. You’re saying the target wasn’t the U.S. Consulate, but that’s where [the missiles] ended up.”

“It’s hard to understand, I appreciate that,” Sherman said. “But here’s the deal: If Iran has a nuclear weapon, its ability to project power into the Middle East and to deter us, our allies and partners, is enormous.”

Also appearing on the show was Sen. Jim Risch (R-Idaho), ranking member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

“I feel like the administration is living in an alternative universe from where we are,” he said. “I heard Wendy try to excuse the Iranians that, well, they didn’t really intend to shoot at – at our embassy [sic] there in Iraq. What else were they shooting at?”

Recalling Sherman’s remarks about the need to get a nuclear deal finalized quickly, Risch said it sounded as though the missile attack “had exactly the effect that the Iranians wanted.”

He warned the administration that any deal concluded with Iran that was not submitted to Congress as a treaty for ratification would not survive the next Republican presidency – a stance reiterated in recent weeks by more than 75 percent of the Republicans in Congress.

Critics of the Obama-Biden administration’s 2015 JCPOA are concerned that the arrangement being hammered out in Vienna will among other things reverse the Trump administration’s 2019 designation of the IRGC as a foreign terrorist organization.

Asked by Baier whether the accord now being finalized was “as good as the 2015 deal,” Sherman – who as undersecretary of state was chief negotiator in the talks that produced the JCPOA – said that remained to be seen, as the agreement was “not closed.”

Other Republicans also linked the Erbil attack with the nuclear talks, with Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) saying “This should put the Iran deal to bed permanently.”

“Iran is openly targeting Americans with missile strikes,” said Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.)  “Sanctions relief for Iran’s terrorist regime should be completely off the table.”

Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.) tweeted after the missile attack that it was “alarming to see top U.S. government officials downplay & even excuse Iran’s aggression. Long past due for Biden Admin to end talks to revive the Iran nuclear deal.”

“It would be completely insane for Biden to continue trying to make a deal with Iran after it attacked our consulate in Iraq with ballistic missiles,” said Nikki Haley, former South Carolina governor and ambassador to the U.N. “No talks. No concessions. No new Iran deal.”

‘Center for conspiracy and evil’

The IRGC said it had targeted a “strategic center for conspiracy and evil of the Zionists” in Erbil, in retaliation for an Israeli strike in Syria that reportedly killed two IRGC members last week.

(Last Monday’s strike near Damascus airport hit a “weapons and ammunition depot operated by Iran-backed militias,” according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The Assad regime said it was a marble factory.)

The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) reacted skeptically to the IRGCs’ claim of an Israeli target in Erbil.

“The cowardly attack on Erbil on March 13, 2022, allegedly under the pretext of hitting an Israeli base near the U.S. Consulate in Erbil, targeted civilian locations and its justification is only to hide the disgracefulness of such offense,” its council of ministers said. “We reiterate that the propaganda of the perpetrators of this attack is far from true.”

“Iran has repeated these attacks many times, and the silence of the international community in the face of these cowardly attacks will pave the way for their continuation,” it said.

The Kurdish media network Rudaw reported that at least four of the missiles hit a building in Erbil owned by the CEO of an Iraqi-Kurdish oil company.

Iranian proxy militias in Iraq have carried out a number of rocket and drone attacks on Iraqi bases where U.S. troops are stationed, but Sunday’s ballistic missile attack from Iranian territory was the first of its kind since January 2020.

Then, the IRGC fired missiles at Iraqi bases housing U.S. forces, after the U.S. drone strike that killed IRGC Qods Force commander Qassem Soleimani near Baghdad airport. Some 110 American personnel were diagnosed with traumatic brain injury as a result of the missile attack.