The US Treasury Department added Kataib Imam Ali (the “Imam Ali Brigades”) to the list of Specially Designated Global Terrorists on June 12, 2025. Kataib Imam Ali is one of the many Iraqi militias that are part of Iran’s network of proxies in Iraq and the broader Middle East. The Treasury Department has not yet issued a statement expanding on the designation.
Kataib Imam Ali was formed in 2014 in response to Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani’s fatwa to fight against the growing threat of the Islamic State in Iraq. As the Islamic State began to take over large portions of western, northern, and central Iraq and the Iraqi security forces began to falter, militias played a crucial role in stopping and rolling back the group’s advance.
Kataib Imam Ali currently operates as the 40th Brigade in Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), an official military organ of the Iraqi government that is infiltrated with Iran-backed Shiite militias and nominally reports directly to Iraq’s prime minister.
The Treasury Department designated Shibl al Zaydi, the secretary general of Kataib Imam Ali, as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist in 2018. Zaydi was sanctioned for acting on behalf of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF) and in support of Hezbollah. The Qods Force is the expeditionary arm and special operations branch of the IRGC tasked with spreading Iran’s Islamic revolution throughout the world.
According to the Treasury Department’s designation of Zaydi, he “has served as a financial coordinator between the IRGC-QF and sectarian armed groups in Iraq and assisted in facilitating Iraqi investments on behalf of IRGC-QF Commander Qasem Soleimani.” Soleimani, who was crucial to establishing Iraq’s Shiite militias, was killed by a US airstrike in Baghdad in January 2020.
In addition to Soleimani, Zaydi was known to have a relationship with Abu Mahdi al Muhandis, the former PMF chief of staff and close advisor to Soleimani who also died in the same 2020 US airstrike. Soleimani and Muhandis were both Specially Designated Global Terrorists prior to their deaths.
Zaydi and Kataib Imam Ali are well connected in Iran’s regional Axis of Resistance. Treasury noted that Kataib Imam Ali “dispatched fighters to Syria, and its members have trained in Iran and with Hizballah in Lebanon” in addition to their activities in Iraq. The group has not only fought but also operated training camps inside Syria.
Kataib Imam Ali is the latest terrorist designee that is part of the PMF. The PMF was formed in 2014 to institutionalize and legitimize Iraq’s predominantly Shiite militias that fought against the Islamic State in response to Ayatollah Sistani’s fatwa.
According to the 2016 legislation authorizing the PMF, the group answers to Iraq’s prime minister. However, in reality, many of its militias ultimately answer to Iran’s political and religious leadership. The militias’ relationships with Iran predate the founding of the PMF. For example, Muhandis was a key founding figure in the Iraqi military organization after establishing himself as a reliable IRGC partner in Iraq.
Many PMF militias often operate outside the bounds of their official capacity, including launching attacks on American bases and interests in Iraq and the region.
Iraqi militia terror designations
Kataib Imam Ali is the sixth Iran-backed Shia militia in Iraq and Syria that has been listed by the US government as a Foreign Terrorist Organization or a Specially Designated Global Terrorist entity. Asaib Ahl al Haq and Kataib Hezbollah are listed as Foreign Terrorist Organizations, while Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba, Kataib Sayyid al Shuhada, and Harakat Ansar Allah al Awfiya have been listed as Specially Designated Global terrorist entities.
The five Iranian-backed militias that are designated are as follows:
Kataib Hezbollah (Hezbollah, or Army of Allah Brigades): The US government listed Kataib Hezbollah as a Foreign Terrorist Organization in July 2009. Like Asaib Ahl al Haq, Kataib Hezbollah is one of the original Iran-backed Iraqi militias that spawned from the Mahdi Army and attacked US forces during the US occupation and beyond.
Abu Mahdi al Muhandis was the founder and first leader of Kataib Hezbollah. Muhandis, a Specially Designated Global Terrorist, was identified by Treasury as an adviser to IRGC-QF head Soleimani who provided “training in guerilla warfare, handling bombs and explosives, and employing weapons—to include missiles, mortars, and sniper rifles” to various Shiite terror groups.
Asaib Ahl al Haq (League of the Righteous): The US government listed Asaib Ahl al Haq as a Foreign Terrorist Organization in March 2024. In its designation, the State Department said Asaib Ahl al Haq “and its leaders are violent proxies of the Islamic Republic of Iran” and the group “is extensively funded and trained by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Qods Force.”
The group’s two main leaders, Qais al Khazali and his brother, Laith al Khazali, have been listed as Specially Designated Global Terrorists. While the League of the Righteous is responsible for thousands of attacks on US forces and the murder of hundreds of US soldiers during the US occupation in Iraq and after the US exit in 2011, the assault on the Karbala Provincial Joint Communications Center in 2006 was particularly brazen and significant. In that attack, six US soldiers were kidnapped and executed by the terror group.
Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba (Movement of the Party of God’s Nobles): The US government listed Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist entity in March of 2019. Harakat al Nujaba was formed by its leader, Akram al Kaabi, in 2013 as an offshoot of Asaib Ahl al Haq and the Hezbollah Brigades to fight in the Syrian Civil War along with other Iranian-supported Iraqi militias. Kaabi is listed as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist.
In its designation of the group, State noted that Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba “has openly pledged its loyalties to Iran and Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.” In addition, Kaabi “has publicly claimed that he would follow any order, including overthrowing the Iraqi government or fighting alongside the Houthis in Yemen if Ayatollah Khamenei declared it to be a religious duty.”
Kataib Sayyid al Shuhada (The Master of Martyrs Brigade): The US government added Kataib Sayyid al Shuhada (KSS) and its secretary general, Hashim Finyan Rahim al Saraji, to the list of Specially Designated Global Terrorists in November 2023. In its designation, State said that the terror group, “working at times with other U.S.-designated organizations, including KH [Kata’ib Hezbollah] and Harakat al-Nujaba, has planned and supported attacks against U.S. personnel” in Iraq.
Two key leaders of KSS are Abu Mustafa al Sheibani and Abu Ala al Walai, both of whom are closely allied with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and the Badr Corps, another Iranian proxy in Iraq. Sheibani, a dangerous and influential commander amongst the Shiite militias, is one of the key IRGC agents who was responsible for the creation of the Iraqi militias. In January 2008, Sheibani was added to the US Treasury Department’s list of individuals who aided the Iraqi insurgency and attacked US and British forces, as well as Iraqi political and military leaders.
Harakat Ansar Allah al Awfiya (Loyal Supporters of Allah Movement): The US government listed Harakat Ansar Allah al Awfiya and its secretary general, Haydar Muzhir Malak al Saidi, to the list of Specially Designated Global Terrorists in June 2024. State described Ansar Allah al Awfiya as “an Iraq-based, Iran-aligned militia group and part of the ‘Islamic Resistance in Iraq (IRI)’— a front group comprised of multiple Iran-aligned militia groups” that has “claimed responsibility for dozens of recent attacks against U.S. military personnel in Iraq and Syria.”
The IRI gained prominence in 2023 for opening a new front in the war between Israel and Iran-backed proxies following Hamas’s October 7 terrorist attack on Israel. Under the IRI name, Iran-backed Iraqi militias launched hundreds of attacks against the US and Israel. The attacks continued until Iran feared major reprisals against the militias following the killing of US servicemembers in Jordan and Israeli soldiers in the Golan Heights.
