On April 27, the US State Department’s Rewards for Justice program offered a $10 million reward for information on Haydar Muzhir Malak al Saidi, the leader of Harakat Ansar Allah al Awfiya, an Iraqi militia and US Specially Designated Global Terrorist organization (SDGT). The latest US bounty comes after two other $10 million rewards were offered for Iranian-backed militia leaders in April, and as militia attacks continue on targets in the Kurdistan Region of northern Iraq.
“HAAA members have attacked U.S. diplomatic facilities in Iraq, as well as U.S. military bases and personnel in Iraq, Jordan, and Syria, killing U.S. servicemembers,” the US said in a poster detailing the reward for information on Saidi.
In addition to Saidi, on April 24, the Rewards for Justice program said it was offering $10 million for information on Kataib Sayyid al Shuhada leader Hisham Finyan al Saraji, who is also known as Abu Ala al Walai. On April 14, Rewards for Justice also posted a $10 million reward for information on Ahmad al Hamidawi, the leader of Kataib Hezbollah. Hamidawi is responsible for kidnapping US citizens and killing Iraqis, the State Department’s program noted.
In addition, on April 1, the US offered $3 million for information about attacks on US diplomatic facilities in Iraq. The offer followed numerous attacks on these sites by Iranian-backed Iraqi groups after US and Israeli strikes on Iran began on February 28.
The groups targeted by the US
Kataib Hezbollah (KH) and its leaders have been heavily sanctioned in the past by the US government. The State Department named it a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) in 2009. At the time, the US Treasury Department also designated KH’s former leader, Abu Mahdi al Muhandis, as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist. Muhandis was killed in a US drone strike in Baghdad in 2020, alongside Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Qods Force (IRGC-QF) leader Qasem Soleimani.
Kataib Hezbollah kidnapped US journalist Shelly Kittelson in 2026 and Princeton researcher Elizabeth Tsurkov in 2023. Kittelson was freed on April 8, after a week of being held, and Tsurkov was freed in September 2025. KH is also reportedly behind a January 2024 drone attack that killed three American servicemembers in Jordan.
Prior to last month’s reward offer for information on Hamidawi, the State Department designated the militia leader as an SDGT in February 2020. The US Treasury Department also sanctioned Hamidawi’s brother and other KH members in 2024. Several additional commanders in the group were designated as SDGTs by the US Treasury Department on April 17.
Kataib Sayyid al Shuhada (KSS) was designated by the US State Department as an FTO in September 2025, after State designated both KSS and Saraji, the group’s leader, as SDGTs in November 2023. “KSS terrorist activity has threatened the lives of both U.S. and Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS personnel in Iraq and Syria,” the State Department said during the earlier designations. Photos posted on social media show Saraji attending a meeting of the Shiite Coordination Framework, one of Iraq’s main political blocs, on the same day the US offered a reward for information on him.
Harakat Ansar Allah al Awfiya (HAAA) was designated as an FTO by the State Department in September 2025, along with KSS. HAAA and Saidi, the group’s leader, were previously designated by the US as SDGTs in June 2024. At the time, the State Department accused HAAA of being one of several Iran-backed militias that are part of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq (IRI). State described the IRI as “a front group that includes multiple Iran-aligned terrorist and militia groups, including U.S.-designated terrorist organizations Kata’ib Hizballah, Harakat al-Nujaba, and Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada, that have repeatedly attacked Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS forces in Iraq and Syria.”
On April 27, the US Embassy in Baghdad accused HAAA supporters of launching attacks across the region, including an April 8 attack that targeted US diplomats in the Iraqi capital. “Loyal Supporters of the Ansar Allah Movement [HAAA] terrorists continue to undermine Iraq’s sovereignty, while also threatening the safety and security of Iraqi and American civilians alike. We will not tolerate attacks on American interests, and we expect all measures to be taken to dismantle Iran-aligned terrorist militias in Iraq,” the embassy noted.
Reporting from Israel, Seth J. Frantzman is an adjunct fellow at FDD and a contributor to FDD’s Long War Journal. He is the senior Middle East correspondent and analyst at The Jerusalem Post, and author of The October 7 War: Israel's Battle for Security in Gaza (2024).
Tags: designations, Harakat Ansar Allah al Awfiya, Iraq, Iraqi militias, Kataib Hezbollah, Kataib Sayyid al Shuhada, US-Iraq
