The U.S. Justice Department announced an eight-count indictment on Thursday against Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood Al-Saadi, an Iraqi-Iranian national accused of directing terrorist attacks, including plots targeting Jewish sites in New York and London.
Federal prosecutors charged Al-Saadi, 32, who was transferred to the United States earlier in May, with terrorism-related offenses linked to Kata’ib Hezbollah and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The department alleges that Al-Saadi helped coordinate nearly 20 attacks and attempted attacks in Europe and the United States, including seeking out operatives to attack a Manhattan synagogue.
“As alleged in this indictment, Al-Saadi has been directly involved in terrorist operations and military decisions to attack U.S. and Israeli interests across the world and conspired with others to plan deadly attacks on American soil,” stated Todd Blanche, acting U.S. attorney general.
“Now that he has been removed from his perch as an alleged commander of Kata’ib Hizballah with close ties to the Iranian regime and its proxies around the world, we look forward to vigorously prosecuting him under American law in an American courtroom,” Blanche said.
Al-Saadi allegedly actively monitored an attack on a London synagogue in April via a video call projected onto a large screen, as another man gave instructions to the attackers, according to the department.
He faces life in prison for two of the charges, and a maximum of 35 years for other charges.
