Iraq recalled Tuesday its ambassador from Tehran and summoned Iran's charge d'affaires in Baghdad to voice frustrations over Iranian strikes on northern Iraq.
In a rare rebuke of its close ally, Baghdad said the attack was "a blatant violation of the sovereignty of the Republic of Iraq, strongly contradicts the principles of good neighborliness and international law, and threatens the security of the region."
The Foreign Ministry said in a statement posted on its website that the Iraqi government "will take all legal procedures, including lodging a complaint with the UN Security Council" in response to the Iranian strikes.
It added that the council of ministers formed a committee headed by Iraq's national security advisor to investigate the incident and collect relevant information to support the government's position on the international level.
Iran fired missiles late Monday at what it said were Israeli "spy headquarters" in an upscale neighborhood near the sprawling U.S. Consulate compound in Irbil, the seat of Iraq's Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), and at targets linked to the Daesh terrorist group in northern Syria.
Iran's Revolutionary Guard said in a statement Tuesday that it launched four Kheibar missiles at Daesh positions in Idlib in Syria and 11 precision ballistic missiles at the Kurdish region in northern Iraq, where it said it hit a center of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency. Iraqi officials denied that the building was related to Mossad.
"There is no reason for these attacks and there is no excuse," KRG Prime Minister Masrour Barzani said in a news conference in Davos, where he was attending the World Economic Forum on Tuesday. "These attacks should not remain without a response."
The strikes came at a time of heightened tensions in the region and fears of a wider spillover of the ongoing war in Gaza.
They also came after the Daesh terrorist group claimed responsibility earlier this month for two suicide bombings targeting a commemoration for an Iranian general slain in a 2020 U.S. drone strike. The attack in Kerman killed at least 84 people and wounded 284 others at the ceremony honoring Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani.
Last month, Iran accused Israel of killing a high-ranking Iranian general, Seyed Razi Mousavi, in an airstrike on a Damascus neighborhood.
It was unclear whether the strikes in Syria had, in fact, hit any targets associated with Daesh.
The strike in Irbil killed at least four people, among them Peshraw Dizayi, a prominent local businessman with a portfolio that included real estate and security services companies, along with members of his family.
The United States condemned what State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller described as "Iran's reckless missile strikes."
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani said in a statement that the strikes in Iraq and Syria were "in line with the resolute defense of the country's sovereignty and security, countering terrorism, and part of the Islamic Republic's punishment against those who threaten the country's security."
He said that Iran in "a precise and targeted operation, identified the headquarters of the criminals and targeted them with accurate and precision-guided projectiles."
A few hundred demonstrators gathered in Irbil on Tuesday to protest the attacks.
