Qais al-Khazali

On the night of 20 March 2007 the G squadron of the British SAS and US troops raided a house in Basra containing Khazali and arrested him along with his brother Laith and his advisor Ali Musa Daqduq without casualties and gained valuable intelligence. Khazali was released in January 2010, in exchange for Peter Moore, who had been kidnapped by Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq. In December that year, notorious special groups commanders Abu Deraa and Mustafa al-Sheibani were allowed to return to Iraq and declared they would be working with Khazali after their return. Since his release, al-Khazali has pivoted from attacking U.S.-led Coalition forces in Iraq to recruiting for pro-Assad Shi'ite militias in Syria. ==Sanctions==

On 6 December 2019, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Khazali and placed him on the SDN List for "involvement in serious human rights abuse in Iraq," and addressed his role in the violent repression of Iraqi protests beginning in October 2019. During the protests, AAH militia forces controlled by Khazali, opened fire on and killed peaceful protesters. On 31 December 2019, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo named Khazali, along with Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, Hadi al-Amiri, and Falih Al-Fayyadh, as responsible for the attack on the United States embassy in Baghdad. On 3 January 2020, U.S. Department of State designated Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq as a foreign terrorist organization (FTO), with Qais al-Khazali and his brother Laith al-Khazali as Specially Designated Global Terrorists (SDGT) under Executive Order 13224. ==Notes==