Washington: Today, as part of Operation Economic Outcast, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) took action against the networks enabling the Iranian regime to wreak havoc in the Middle East through its terrorist proxies. Today’s action targets entities and individuals that support Kataib Hizballah (KH) and Hizballah.

According to U.S. Department of the Treasury, OFAC announced today an enforcement action against an individual for providing services to companies in Iran and updated its Iran Statement of Licensing Policy to a presumption of denial except in limited circumstances. Operation Economic Outcast is targeting those who continue to stand with the failing Iranian regime, said Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent. Whether they finance terror, launder money, or help Iran evade sanctions, the U.S. will find them, cut them off from the U.S. financial system, and dismantle the networks keeping the regime afloat.

KH and Lebanese Hizballah fuel Iran’s destabilizing
influence in the Middle East, endanger U.S. and partner forces, and facilitate extensive sanctions evasion schemes. Spread across Iraq, Lebanon, the United Arab Emirates, and Turkey, today’s targets underscore the global reach of the Iranian regime’s illicit networks and the serious threat posed by the terrorist proxy organizations that operate on its behalf. Today’s designations strike at the core of Iran’s most dangerous proxies-groups that not only terrorize civilians across the Middle East but also serve as Tehran’s primary instruments for projecting violence, subversion, and global destabilization.

Today’s action is being taken pursuant to Executive Order (E.O.) 13224, as amended, which targets terrorists and their supporters. The U.S. Department of State designated KH as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) pursuant to E.O. 13224 and as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) pursuant to section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act on June 24, 2009, for being responsible for multiple ter
rorist attacks against Iraqi, U.S., and other targets in Iraq. Hizballah was designated as a SDGT pursuant to E.O. 13224 on October 31, 2001, and as an FTO pursuant to section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act on October 8, 1997. Today’s action is also being taken pursuant to E.O. 13902, which targets persons operating in the petroleum, financial, petrochemical, and other sectors of the Iranian economy.

Announced by Secretary Bessent on August 24, 2026, dubbed Economic D-Day, Operation Economic Outcast is severing the remaining economic lifelines that sustain the Iranian regime. Treasury has mapped the networks, facilitators, and financial channels that Iran uses to smuggle oil, evade sanctions, and fund terror. Working with partners across the U.S. government, the European Union, United Kingdom, Gulf partners, and others, Treasury is targeting any source of the regime’s illicit revenue, as well as its sanctions evasion schemes to move funds.

Operation Economic Outcast significantly expanded sancti
ons risk for those who continue to choose to do business with Iran. Treasury warned that any entity facilitating money laundering or sanctions evasion on behalf of Iran risks being cut off from the U.S. financial system. It also expanded secondary sanctions exposure for those who continue doing business with the Iranian regime and will accelerate the pace of U.S. enforcement.

KH is a leading militant faction within Iran’s so-called Axis of Resistance and receives training, weapons, funding, intelligence, and logistical support from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF), itself designated as a terrorist organization by the United States. KH is also the most influential faction within Iraq’s militia-dominated Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF). KH members occupy key leadership positions within the PMF’s governing body, the Popular Mobilization Commission (PMC), including positions that oversee the PMF’s intelligence, missiles, anti-armor, and special forces directorates.

KH seeks to thr
eaten the American people at home and abroad, as most recently evidenced by the May 16, 2026, arrest of a senior KH commander for attempting to arrange the bombing of a New York synagogue and additional Jewish institutions in Los Angeles and Scottsdale. Since February 2026, KH and the other Iranian-aligned militia groups in Iraq have conducted hundreds of attacks against U.S. and Coalition forces in Iraq and across the region.

The PMF and the PMC are heavily dominated and influenced by Iran’s militias, such as KH, that operate at the direction of the IRGC-QF and support the IRGC-QF’s interests and activities in Iraq. Abbas Jawad Kadhim Al-Tameemi is a senior official with the PMC’s Directorate of Technical Equipment, providing strategic guidance and technical advice for the PMC regarding foreign military purchases. Through his position and support services to PMC, Al-Tameemi enables the provision of critical financial and military support to the IRGC-QF.

OFAC’s enforcement campaign to hold accountable U.S.
and foreign persons who violate Iran sanctions will continue as part of Operation Economic Outcast. Additional information about today’s enforcement action can be found in OFAC’s Enforcement Release.