Dawn has broken in Baghdad, where Iraqis are just waking up to the news that Iranians fired ballistic missiles at US positions in their country.

Through the night, US helicopters had hovered overhead. To Iraqis now familiar with the sounds of war, that would have been the first sign that something was afoot.

After the attacks, the motors of an AC-130 Specter Gunship could be heard humming over central Baghdad’s Green Zone, which houses the US embassy. The aircraft is one of the most devastating ground attack aircraft in the US arsenal. 

Across the capital, Iraqis are hoping that their country does not, once again, turn into a proxy battleground for the US and Iran. For decades, Iraqis have suffered from cycles of violence, invasions, sanctions, terror bombings and brutal crackdowns, and in a series of protests last year fiercely called for an end to foreign influence and meddling.