US offers $10m reward for info on Iraqi armed group leader

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The United States on Friday announced “a reward of up to $10 million” for information on an influential Iran-aligned Iraqi armed group commander, accusing his faction of carrying out attacks on American interests in Iraq and Syria, amid reports that he was recently wounded in a suspected US airstrike in Baghdad.

The US Department of State’s Rewards for Justice program announced in a statement a “reward of up to $10 million for information” on “Hashim Finyan Rahim al-Saraji, also known as Abu Ala al-Wala’i,” whom it described as the “leader and Secretary General of Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada (KSS), an Iran-aligned terrorist group in Iraq.”

The statement added that members of Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada “have killed Iraqi civilians and attacked U.S. diplomatic facilities in Iraq, as well as U.S. military bases and personnel in Iraq and Syria.”

“If you have any information on al-Saraji, send it to us… You could be eligible for relocation and a reward,” the Rewards for Justice program concluded.

The US and Israel launched a widescale aerial campaign against Iran on February 28, targeting more than 17,000 sites across the country over six weeks.
In response, Tehran carried out drone and missile strikes across the Middle East, targeting alleged US assets - particularly in Gulf Arab states - as well as launching retaliatory attacks against Israel.

The Iranian response also involved Iraqi armed groups aligned with the Tehran-led ‘Axis of Resistance,’ with several factions claiming responsibility for attacks on alleged US targets in the region, including in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region.

Importantly, the Iraqi armed factions operated through shadow groups under the banner of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq (IRI) and are believed to include Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada, in addition to other influential actors such as the Asa’ib Ahl al-Haq, Kata’ib Hezbollah and Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba armed groups.

The IRI had emerged in the immediate aftermath of the outbreak of the Gaza war in October 2023, sparking controversy over its core overlap with Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) - a state-funded institution that was established in 2014 during the Islamic State group (ISIS) blitz, which saw the extremist group seize control of large parts of Iraq’s north and west.

In its capacity as the IRI, the entity in early April claimed it carried out 753 attacks against alleged US targets across the country, over the first 34 days of the Iran war. However, that number has since risen.

Importantly, the US Department of State’s Rewards for Justice program announcement on Friday comes amid weeks of uncertainty over Wala’i’s fate following a suspected US airstrike that targeted a house in central Baghdad’s upscale Jadriya neighborhood - a critical nerve center for Iraqi armed groups aligned with Iran-led 'Axis of Resistance' - near the heavily fortified Green Zone, which houses key government institutions, diplomatic missions and United Nations offices.

The mid-March strike killed four people with initial reports suggesting that "two of those killed are Iranian advisors,” according to a report by Agence France Presse (AFP) at the time.

Amid media speculation that the Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada leader may have been among those killed or injured in the reported strike, Wala’i’s official account on X has continued to publish statements attributed to him. However, he has not made any public appearances since.