Abdul Reza Yusuf Shahlaei, also known as “Abdul Reza Shahlai,” is the Iranian figure who led the Houthi proxy operation against the ship hijacked near the Bab al-Mandab Strait. This was revealed to the “Intelli Times” blog by official intelligence sources.
How significant is Shahlaei?
On the day the United States eliminated Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad, it also attempted to assassinate Shahlaei in Yemen, according to U.S. officials cited by *The Washington Post*. He survived the assassination attempt. The U.S. government’s “Rewards for Justice” (RFJ) program offers a reward of up to $15 million for information leading to Shahlaei, born in 1957, also known as “Yusuf Abu al-Qarq” and “Hajji Yusuf.”
Shahlaei is effectively the commander of the Yemen and Arabian Peninsula theater for the Quds Force (IRGC-QF), based in Sana’a, Yemen. He has a long history of operations against Americans and U.S. allies worldwide. Shahlaei orchestrated numerous assassinations of coalition forces in Iraq, supplied weapons and explosives to extremist Shia groups, and planned the January 20, 2007, attack in Karbala, Iraq, which killed five U.S. soldiers and injured three others.
As a wealthy senior official in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), in 2011, Shahlaei funded and directed a plot to assassinate Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to the United States in Washington, D.C. He also planned subsequent attacks within the United States and elsewhere. Had this plot succeeded, up to 200 innocent people in the U.S. could have been killed.
On October 11, 2011, the U.S. Treasury Department designated Shahlaei as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist under Executive Order 13224, as amended. Prior to that, in 2008, the U.S. Treasury designated him under Executive Order 13438 for threatening the peace and stability of Iraq and its government. As a result of these actions, among other consequences, all of Shahlaei’s assets and property under U.S. jurisdiction were blocked, and U.S. entities are generally prohibited from engaging in transactions with him. Additionally, it is a crime to knowingly provide, attempt to provide, or conspire to provide material support or resources to the IRGC, which the U.S. has designated as a foreign terrorist organization. Shahlaei was also designated by Bahrain, the European Union, Saudi Arabia, and the United Kingdom in 2018.
**The Maritime Arena:**
Iran continues to operate in the maritime domain to undermine regional and international stability. It routinely violates international freedom of navigation by attacking merchant vessels in the Bab al-Mandab Strait through its Houthi proxy. These attacks should concern the entire international community. Iran’s involvement in maritime attacks is a deliberate and calculated policy. As part of its ambition to control international trade routes, Iran deploys the intelligence ship *Behsad*, which is permanently stationed in the Red Sea, and the Iranian Navy’s *Jamaran* vessel. This is not the first time Iran has acted aggressively in the maritime domain—Iran is responsible for attacking tankers, provoking ships, and disrupting maritime trade and freedom of navigation in the region in recent years. Iran operates at sea like a pirate gang. The Iranian threat could lead to navigational hazards and force vessels to deviate from their original routes to avoid danger. Through these actions, Iran is driving the world toward economic chaos—its maritime terrorism harms the global economy through maritime trade, all while presenting a “smiling face” to regional countries, attempting to draw closer to them but continuing terrorist actions that harm them and their interests.