“This (attack on Iran’s consulate) is also an attempt to create tension and hostility between Iraq and Iran by trying to deceive Iran into thinking that Iraqi citizens are attacking Iran, when in fact these provocateurs are most likely paid mercenary agents from Saudi Arabia and Israel,” Scott Bennett, from San Francisco, told Iranian Tasnim news agency on Saturday morning.

Scott Bennett is a US Army Special Operations Officer (11th Psychological Operations Battalion, Civil Affairs-Psychological Operations Command), and a global psychological warfare-counterterrorism analyst, formerly with defense contractor Booz Allen Hamilton.

Regarding attack on Iranian consulate in Basra said: This appears to be part of a psychological operation designed to distract attention away from Idlib, Syria and movements of US and NATO forces and their terrorist mercenaries, as well as their potential chemical weapons false flag attack which would be used by the United States and NATO to justify an attack upon Syria.

He added : This unrest is also intended to distract attention away from the diplomatic talks between Iran, Russia, and Turkey and the Syrian settlement process. It is also intended to distract attention away from the nonsense and hypocrisy and lies being put forth by US United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley and the United Kingdom UN Ambassador, who are engaged in a joint full-scale propaganda campaign against Russia (using the Skripal poisoning false flag event) and Iran.