Why did Iraq first claim Kuwait in 1938?

The first Iraqi claim to Kuwait surfaced in 1938, the same year that oil was discovered in the emirate. Although neither Iraq nor the Ottoman Empire had ever actually ruled Kuwait, Iraq asserted a vague historical title to the territory.12

During that year, Iraq also provided rhetorical support to a merchant uprising against the emir known as the Majlis Movement. Following the failure of this uprising, Iraq continued to press its claims, specifically targeting the strategic islands of Būbiyān and Al-Warbah, which had been part of the Ottoman province of Basra but were ceded to Kuwait in an unratified 1913 convention.123