Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi is attempting to consolidate weapon control under the state despite resistance from pro-Iran groups. while the Trump administration supports this move, Iraqi officials have recently clarified that a September 30 deadline applies to coalition withdrawal rather than militia disarmament .
Why September 30 is for coalition departure, not disarmament
The timeline for removing illegal weapons from the streets of Baghdad has become a point of significant confusion. While Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi has publicly stated that all political forces agree on restricting weapons to state control, his own security apparatus is sending a different message. Qasim al-Araji, the security advisor to the prime minister, told Al Iraqiya on August 23 that the September 30 date marks the departure of the international coalition, not a deadline for the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) to surrender their arms.
As Fox News Digital reported, this shift in messaging suggests a disconnect between the Iraqi government's diplomatic promises to the United States and its internal operational reality. The international coalition, a U.S.-led force, is tasked with exiting the region, but the vacuum left behind may be filled by the very militias the Trump administration wants dismantled.
The seven-year sentence of Ali Maarij Al-Bahadly
The struggle to disarm the PMU is not merely a military challenge but a financial one, as Iranian-backed proxies have deeply embedded themselves in Iraq's economic infrastructure. A primary example is Ali Maarij Al-Bahadly, Iraq’s Deputy Minister of Oil, who was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department for diverting oil resources to benefit the Iranian regime and its proxies. According to a report from The National, Iraq's anti-corruption body subsequently sentenced Al-Bahadly to seven years in prison and imposed millions of dollars in fines.
This intersection of state office and militia funding highlights why disarmament is so difficult. When high-ranking officials like Al-Bahadly facilitate the pillaging of national resources, the pro-Iran militias gain a level of financial independence that makes them resistant to state mandates. Former U.S. ambassador Alberto Fernandez noted that profits from Iraqi oil often flow back to pay for the very "death squads" that the Iraqi government is officially tasked with controlling.
Kataeb Hezbollah and the refusal to integrate
The Iraqi government's strategy to bring rogue groups under state control relies on integration, but this approach is meeting fierce resistance from hardliners. While the radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and his Saraya al-Salam group expressed a preference for integration in May, other factions have been explicit in their defiance. Groups such as Kataeb Hezbollah and Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba have declared they will neither disarm nor integrate into the state apparatus.
This resistance is part of a broader trend of "state capture," where militias do not just exist alongside the government but penetrate its most sensitive institutions. elizabeth Tsurkov of the New Lines Institute observed that because these militias are willing to use force against their own citizens and security forces, the government of Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi often finds itself backing down to avoid internal conflict.
The Abbas al-Yaqubi transfer and the PMU's institutional grip
The fragility of the Iraqi state's authority was most clearly demonstrated by the case of Abbas al-Yaqubi. Yaqubi, the head of intelligence for the PMU’s Baghdad Belt Operations Command, was arrested by the Iraqi Counter Terrorism Service—a move initially seen as a sign that the government was finally willing to confront militia figures.. However, just days later, Yaqubi was transferred to the PMU intelligence branch, effectively returning him to the fold of the organization he was accused of using to commit violence against activists.
This incident leaves critical questions unanswered regarding the actual power of the prime minister. It remains unclear why the Iraqi government is wakling back the disarmament deadline and whether Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi possesses the actual political will—or the military capacity—to enforce state authority. If a high-profile arrest by the Counter Terrorism Service can be overturned so quickly, the prospect of a comprehensive disarmament of the PMU remains a distant goal.
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