BAGHDAD — Israeli special forces established a covert staging camp in Iraq’s western Nukhaib desert during the opening weeks of the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, according to Iraqi and U.S. officials who confirmed the operation to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. The camp, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, functioned as a logistical hub for the Israeli air force and a monitoring post for Iran-linked militia activity, the officials said.
The unauthorized presence places the Iraqi government in an acutely awkward position. Throughout the conflict triggered by the Feb. 28 U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran, Baghdad has publicly insisted that both warring parties leave Iraqi territory out of the fighting. Yet Iran-linked militias operating inside Iraq launched attacks on U.S. bases and on Israel during the war, and U.S. and Israeli forces struck militia positions within Iraq.
A U.S. military official pushed back on descriptions of the facility as a “base,” characterizing it instead as a “temporary staging area or camp to support operations in Iran.” An Iraqi intelligence official told the AP that the Israeli force set up tents and that “its objective was to monitor rocket launches and drone activity conducted by some Iraqi militias.” Iraqi authorities believe the force arrived via an airdrop but do not know precisely when, the official said.
A local shepherd first noticed the force and reported it to authorities, officials said.
Iraqi army forces moved to investigate on March 4, according to Maj. Gen. Tahseen al Khafaji, a spokesperson for the Iraqi defense ministry. “Within 25 kilometers, the force which went there faced an aerial attack, which led to the martyrdom of one of our fighters and injured two other fighters,” al Khafaji told the AP. The Iraqi force pulled back but returned the following day and found no signs of a base and no forces at the location.
“It is believed that the force was there for a very short time and it was a very small force,” al Khafaji said, adding that search operations “did not show anything that indicates that the force was stationed there for a long time in that area.”
On Tuesday, the Iraqi military brought journalists to the site in an effort to demonstrate that no long-term Israeli military presence existed. Gen. Abdul-Amir Yarallah, chief of the general staff of the Iraqi army, told reporters during the visit: “We believe it was a small force that came and stayed for no longer than 48 hours.”
Satellite imagery taken March 8 by Airbus DS and analyzed by the AP appears to show a human-made track dug into a dried-out lake bed at the site, roughly 250 kilometers southwest of Baghdad. The track runs in a straight line for approximately 1.5 kilometers — long enough to accommodate warplane takeoffs and landings. The nearest town, al-Nukhaib, sits about 45 kilometers to the northwest along a road to the Saudi Arabian border, far enough away that the camp likely did not draw immediate notice, though Iraqi airspace was thick with American and Israeli fighter jets throughout the active war weeks.
Representatives of the Israeli military declined to comment. Acting Pentagon press secretary Joel Valdez also declined to comment.
The Nukhaib desert is a remote, sparsely populated expanse southwest of the Shiite holy cities of Karbala and Najaf. The area’s isolation made it a plausible location for a short-duration covert operation — and its proximity to militia activity made it operationally significant for Israeli forces seeking to monitor threats originating from Iraqi territory.
The Iraqi government has maintained that the military presence was brief, small, and left no trace. But the March 4 engagement that killed one Iraqi soldier and wounded two others underscores the risks of operating an undeclared foreign force inside a country whose government position is officially one of neutrality. The episode also illustrates the degree to which Iraq — caught between its Iran-allied militias, its U.S. security partnership, and its stated demand for non-involvement — has become a battlefield that none of the warring parties has agreed to leave out of the fighting.