Alex found himself standing in the hot sun of the middle east. Which might be a worse fate than hell to most people, but Alex had grown up in a similar environment, and because of this, he was actually immune to the heat and it's horrifying effects on an otherwise normal human being's body.
In all honesty, Alex had very little to go on regarding the whereabouts of the Iranian backed militias in Iraq. All he had was a map of territory currently held by them. The relationship between Iraq and these Iranian backed militias was a complicated one.
While these groups had fought alongside the Iraqi Government Forces, and the Peshmerga against ISIS during their hayday, they had stayed around longer than they were welcome for. And had even begun to seize their own territory, where they were effectively the law of the land within.