Anti-U.S. rioting in Pakistan and Iraq leaves 10 dead

In Karachi and Baghdad, security forces thwarted attempts to storm American diplomatic facilities.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

At least 10 protesters were killed Sunday in clashes with police in Karachi, Pakistan, after some 4,000 pro-Iranian Shiites stormed the American consulate in the port city following the death of Iran’s leader in the joint U.S.-Israel attack on the Islamic Republic early Saturday morning.

Around 25 others were wounded as the authorities battled stone-throwing youths for hours.

Hundreds of police officers and paramilitary personnel were deployed to secure the building.

Witnesses heard gunfire and saw police respond with tear gas as well.

Others said some demonstrators managed to get close enough to the building to smash some of the windows, although senior police official Irfan Baloch denied reports that parts of the consulate had been set on fire.

While Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said that “every citizen of Pakistan shares in the grief of the people of Iran” over the “martyrdom” of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and described it as a “day of mourning,” he urged people to express their anger in a peaceful manner.

Protesters held mostly nonviolent demonstrations near the American consulate in Lahore and in other cities and called for a rally outside the American embassy in the capital of Islamabad.

Police announced the closure of all roads leading to the embassy’s neighborhood, which houses many diplomatic missions.

In Iraq, hundreds of furious protesters denouncing the US and Israel tried to approach the American embassy in Baghdad’s secure diplomatic district, commonly called the Green Zone.

Security forces used tear gas, water cannons, and batons to thwart repeated attempts to reach the heavily guarded area.

Some demonstrators carried the Iranian flag and pictures of Khamenei.

One told AFP, “We are here to respond to Khamenei’s martyrdom, and I want us to fight the U.S. and Israel.”

Local media reported additional protests in southern Iraqi provinces.

Several Iran-backed armed militias operate in Iraq, several of which threatened Saturday to attack local U.S. bases after two missile strikes hit Kataib Hezbollah, one of the largest groups, reportedly killing two fighters and injuring five others.

An umbrella group calling itself the “Islamic Resistance in Iraq” later claimed responsibility for carrying out 16 operations using “dozens of drones” against what it said were “enemy bases in Iraq and the region.”

On Sunday, the Iraqi government condemned the American and Israeli strikes on Iran as a “flagrant aggression” and violation of international law, called for them to end, and declared three days of mourning for Ayatollah Khamenei.