Iraq summoned the ambassador of its ally Iran, Iraj Masjidi, to protest at the strikes that had caused “material losses” and “damage to civilian installations and houses”.

The authorities in northern Iraq said 12 ballistic missiles rained down on Arbil in the predawn cross-border attack that lightly wounded two civilians. The missiles came down in areas near a new US consulate building, according to Kurdish officials.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards confirmed they fired the projectiles, saying the attack targeted sites used by Israel, a top ally of the US.

A “strategic centre for conspiracy and mischiefs of the Zionists was targeted by powerful precision missiles fired by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps”, the Guards said in a statement.

There was no immediate reaction from Israel, while State Department spokesman Ned Price said “no US facilities were damaged or personnel injured, and we have no indications the attack was directed” at the US.

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Iran holds considerable influence over the federal government in Baghdad, and Iraq hosts a dwindling number of US troops who lead a coalition against Islamic State.

Iran also “unilaterally and temporarily” suspended Iraqi-brokered talks with Saudi Arabia on mending diplomatic ties between the two rival powers, Iran’s state-run Nour News reported.

The incidents reflect the fragile web of competing interests that have shaped security in the oil-rich Persian Gulf in recent years as tension over Russia’s war on Ukraine threatens to spill over to the region.

The State Department’s Price condemned the strikes as an “outrageous violation of Iraq’s sovereignty”, adding that the US would “help our partners in the region defend themselves”.

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Sunday’s missile assault comes nearly a week after the Guards – Iran’s ideological army – vowed to avenge the death of two of their officers killed in a rocket attack in Syria they blamed on Israel. Iran backs the government in Syria’s civil war.

Israel, the Guards said at the time, “will pay for this crime”.

The Guards in their statement Sunday said: “Once again, we warn the criminal Zionist regime that the repetition of any mischief will face harsh, decisive and destructive responses.”

Arbil governor Oumid Khouchnaw dismissed as “baseless” any notion of Israeli sites in and around Arbil, adding: “There are no Israeli sites in the region”.

He said the missiles crashed into vacant lots but that buildings and homes were damaged.

The Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) organised a media visit to the residence of a Kurdish oil magnate that was damaged in the attack.

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Kurdistan24 television channel, located near the US consulate, posted images on social networks of its damaged offices, with collapsed sections of false ceiling and broken glass.

A State Department spokesperson emphasised later Sunday that “the US was not the intended target”, adding that “most if not all of the missiles were directed at a private Iraqi Kurdish citizen’s residential compound”.

Iraq saw a surge in rocket and armed-drone attacks at the beginning of the year.

It coincided with the second anniversary of the killing of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani and his Iraqi lieutenant Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis in a US drone strike near Baghdad airport.

In late January, six rockets were fired at Baghdad International Airport, causing no casualties.

Iran had responded to the 2020 killing by firing missiles at military bases in Iraq housing US forces.

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Sunday’s assault also comes amid a pause in negotiations between Iran and world powers to revive its 2015 nuclear agreement, despite a deal having appeared close.

The setback came after Russia said it was demanding guarantees that Western sanctions imposed on its own economy over its invasion of Ukraine would not affect Moscow’s trade with Tehran.

The French foreign ministry condemned the attack in the “strongest terms” and said such actions “endanger the efforts to enable a return” to the nuclear deal.

The European Union said there was “no justification for such an act of violence against the territory of a sovereign country”, while Germany said that “those responsible must be held accountable”.

Iran’s regional rival Saudi Arabia expressed “solidarity” with Iraq and support for measures “to protect its security and stability”.

Additional reporting by Bloomberg