Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) called the US withdrawal from Iraq a first step towards avenging Iraqis killed by US forces, according to a document seen by IntelliNews.

The statement followed the departure of the last US troops from Erbil on September 30, which ended a 12-year mission against Islamic State under a 2024 agreement between Baghdad and Washington.

Iran-backed Iraqi militias have struck US-linked targets inside and outside Iraq since the US and Israel attacked Iran on February 28. Baghdad set the same September 30 deadline for armed groups to give up their weapons, and the most powerful have refused.

The IRGC said the withdrawal was the result of Iraqi resistance and described it as an expulsion. "America left: not through negotiation, not as a favour, but through the resolve of a nation that stood firm," the statement said.

It named Qassem Soleimani, the former commander of the IRGC's Quds Force, and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the former deputy head of Iraq's Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF), an umbrella of mostly Shia armed groups formally part of the Iraqi armed forces. The IRGC said revenge for Iraqi dead, and Muhandis in particular, would be complete only when the US left the region entirely.

The IRGC claimed the US had lost about 5,000 troops in Iraq by its own count and spent $4tn over two decades. It said the US presence had been a source of insecurity and terrorism in the region and called on Washington to leave security to regional states.

The statement also predicted that Iraqis would move to end what it called US interference in the country's economy and oil sector.

US President Donald Trump described the withdrawal as orderly in a social media post and called the deployment "a very expensive excursion into Hell". Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi had met Trump in Washington on July 14 to discuss the pullout.

A US military official said most of the remaining troops would be redeployed to Jordan and other countries in the region. Soleimani and Muhandis were killed in a US drone strike near Baghdad International Airport on January 3, 2020.