Qais Khazali (1974-) was the founder of the Iran-backed Special Groups and the Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq Shi'ite militia, fighting against the United States during the Iraq War and against the Islamic State during the Iraqi Civil War.
Biography[]
Qais Khazali was born in 1974 in Sadr City, Baghdad, Iraq to a family of Shi'ite Muslim Arabs. In June 2006, Khazali founded the "Special Groups", an Iran-backed paramilitary organization that fought against the United States during the Iraq War; he was expelled from the Mahdi Army for disobeying orders. Khazali was responsible for arms smuggling, using death squads to kill Sunnis in sectarian violence, kidnapping foreigners, assassinations, and attacking US Marine Corps troops, including a 20 January 2007 attack on American troops in Karbala. In March 2007, he was captured by the US Army, and he was held until January 2010, when he was exchanged for computer consultant Peter Moore. He worked with Abu Mustafa al-Sheibani and Abu Deraa after they were released in December, and he founded the Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq insurgent group, fighting against the USA during the Iraq War and the Islamic State during the Iraqi Civil War. On 3 January 2020, he was captured by the US Marine Corps during a wave of US retaliations against Iran and its proxies in Iraq.