Washington and Tehran concluded an agreement to appoint one of General Qassem Soleimani’s assassins, Mustafa al-Kadhimi, to the post of Prime Minister of Iraq.

Despite having dual British and Iraqi nationality, Mr. al-Kadhimi is reportedly close to the CIA. He was part of the Iraqi government in exile set up by Washington around Ahmad Chalabi to overthrow President Saddam Hussein. He is also close to Saudi Arabia, whose crown prince, MBS, was the first foreign figure to congratulate him on his appointment. He worked as a journalist for Al-Monitor, and subsequently served as director of Iraqi Intelligence. He was the Iraqi part of the double operation that in January 2020 took out Qasem Soleimani, major general in the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, and Abu Mahdi al-Mouhandis, deputy head of Al-Hashd Al-Sha’abi (pro-Iranian Iraqi militia).

General Qasem Soleimani was unanimously regarded as the main architect of Daesh’s regional defeat on the ground. His death was experienced as a tragedy, not only by the Iranian people, but by all those in the Middle East who had suffered at the hands of Daesh. The Leader of the Iranian Revolution, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and the secretary general of Lebanon’s Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, truly mourned a brother. Surprisingly, the Iranian government of Sheikh Hassan Rohani also shed tears when it was no secret that he could not tolerate Soleimani and saw him as a serious political rival. The idea of a possible prior agreement on President Rohani’s part to his assassination was even floated.

Be that as it may, the appointment of Mustafa al-Kadhimi as Iraqi Prime Minister certifies that:

 1. The United States and the Iranian government have, since 2003, continuously jointly overseen Iraqi political life despite their disagreement on other matters.

 2. The assassination of General Soleimani not only failed to elicit any significant retaliatory action, but was experienced instead as a justified call to order. The deaths of the principal Shiite military chief preceded a few weeks earlier by that of the top Sunni military chief, the caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, marked the takeover of the Middle East by President Donald Trump.