Illustrative. A US Air Force MQ-1 Predator drone. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

i24 News – Two Iranian drones shot down over Iraq on February 14 by US warplanes were intended to attack Israel, security officials said Monday, lifting a gag order.

The incident came days before a strike attributed to Israel that targeted a drone warehouse at a western Iranian airbase in Kermanshah, prompting the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) to launch a dozen ballistic missiles on what they claimed without evidence to be an Israeli “strategic center” in the city of Erbil in northern Iraq.

On February 14, “several low-flying drones westward from the eastern border region of Iraq” were shot down, a coalition member had told the BBC.

Images of one of the drones posted online showed a design similar to Iran’s Shahed-136 model.

“The drone has been seized and is being analyzed by coalition forces,” the official said, adding that the same model had previously been used by “malicious suspects” against targets in the UAE and in Saudi Arabia.

Israeli officials confirmed on Monday that the devices were heading toward Israel.

Israel has repeatedly warned that Iranian drones pose a real threat to the region, especially as Tehran’s proxies are stationed along the Jewish state’s borders.

The Israel Defense Forces have confirmed intercepting at least four Iranian drones heading toward Israel or the West Bank and Gaza Strip in recent years.