Iran Update, October 22, 2025

Information Cutoff: 2:00 PM ET

The Critical Threats  Project (CTP) at the American Enterprise Institute and the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) publish the Iran Update, which provides insights into Iranian and Iranian-sponsored activities that undermine regional stability and threaten US forces and interests. CTP-ISW publishes the Iran Update daily.

Click here to see CTP and ISW’s interactive map of assessed control of terrain in Syria, and here to see CTP and ISW’s interactive map of Israeli ground operations. The Syria map is updated daily alongside the static Syria maps in this report. CTP-ISW ended daily maps of Israeli ground operations in February 2025.

Click here to see ISW-CTP's interactive map showing the total strikes in Iran during the Israel-Iran War, as well as an interactive timelapse showing the strikes day-by-day.

The Iranian regime passed the Combating the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) convention on October 22 as part of an effort to remove Iran from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) blacklist. The FATF is an international body that sets standards for combating money laundering and terrorist financing.[i] The FATF blacklisted Iran in 2007 and again in 2020 for failing to implement anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing policies.[ii] An FATF blacklist designation requires all FATF members to sanction and restrict international financial exchanges with Iran.[iii] The FATF outlined six conditions in 2020 for Iran to fulfill in order for the FATF to consider removing Iran from its blacklist. These conditions include implementing the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (Palermo Convention) and the CFT convention, criminalizing terrorist financing, and freezing terrorist assets, among others. The Iranian Expediency Discernment Council approved the Palermo Convention in May 2025.[iv] Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian signed Iran’s conditional accession to the CFT convention on October 22.[v] The CFT is a set of international policies and measures that prevent terrorist groups from accessing and using financial resources.[vi] Pezeshkian approved the CFT convention under the condition that the Iranian constitution and domestic legislation will take precedence over the convention if the convention comes into conflict with Iranian law. An Iranian delegation separately participated in a plenary FATF meeting in Paris on October 21 for the first time in six years, which further highlights Iranian efforts to remove Iran from the FATF blacklist.[vii]

Iran is very unlikely to meet the FATF requirements given that it continues to provide financial and material support to members of the Axis of Resistance. The Axis of Resistance is a key component of Iran’s regional strategy because it enables Iran to project power and influence across the Middle East. Iran has provided financial and material support, as well as training, to members of the Axis over the past several decades. Senior Iranian officials have debated Iranian security strategy following the June 2025 Israel-Iran War, but have highlighted that the Axis of Resistance remains an important element of Iran’s security strategy.[viii]

The Syrian transitional government appears to be pursuing a low-level effort to target foreign fighters in Syria who have not integrated into the Ministry of Defense (MoD). The General Security Service (GSS) attempted to raid a compound controlled by the French foreign fighter group “Fiqrat al Ghuraba” and fighters from the Caucasus near the Turkish border in Harem, Idlib Province, on October 21.[ix] The GSS reported that the raid was in response to local claims that Fiqrat al Ghuraba had committed violations against civilians in the surrounding area, including kidnapping a young girl.[x] Fiqrat al Ghuraba denied that its fighters kidnapped the girl.[xi] The GSS said that Fiqrat al Ghuraba leader Omar al Diaby rejected a negotiated surrender to GSS forces and opened fire on GSS forces.[xii] The GSS attempted two separate raids to infiltrate the foreign fighter compound on October 21 and 22, but neither was successful.[xiii] An unspecified group of Uzbek foreign fighters deployed to Fiqrat al Ghuraba’s compound on October 22 to provide reinforcements.[xiv] The GSS previously arrested two prominent Uzbek foreign fighters in August 2025, which has led to increased discontent among Central Asian foreign fighter groups.[xv] The arrested Uzbek foreign fighters had previously trained Hayat Tahrir al Sham (HTS) special forces as private military contractors and fought alongside HTS in the offensive that overthrew Assad in December 2024.[xvi] Fiqrat al Ghuraba cited the arrest of the two Uzbek fighters as evidence that the Syrian transitional government is targeting non-integrated foreign fighters.[xvii]

The foreign fighters whom the Syrian transitional government has recently targeted have historically come into conflict with HTS. The GSS has targeted foreign fighter groups that espouse overtly Salafi-jihadist ideologies and have not integrated into the MoD. Fiqrat al Ghuraba has previously lamented the Syrian transitional government's collaboration with US forces in operations that target Salafi-jihadist groups, such as al Qaeda-aligned Ansar al Islam, and has called for sectarian violence against religious minorities in Syria.[xviii] The Syrian government has integrated most loyal jihadist foreign fighters, such as the al Qaeda-affiliated Uyghur Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP) and Ansar al Tawhid, into the 84th and 82nd divisions under the Syrian MoD since June 2025.[xix] The United States allowed the Syrian transitional government in June 2025 to integrate foreign fighters into the new Syrian army in order to prevent foreign fighters from joining Salafi-jihadi groups in Syria.[xx]

Key Takeaways

• Iranian Efforts to Access Global Markets: The Iranian regime passed the Combating the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) convention on October 22 as part of an effort to remove Iran from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) blacklist. Iran is very unlikely to meet the FATF requirements given that it continues to provide financial and material support to members of the Axis of Resistance.
• Foreign Fighters in Syria: The Syrian transitional government appears to be pursuing a low-level effort to target foreign fighters in Syria who have not integrated into the Ministry of Defense (MoD). The foreign fighters whom the Syrian transitional government has recently targeted have historically come into conflict with HTS.

Iraq

Iran is enhancing border security cooperation with Iraq along the northwestern Iran-Iraq border as part of an effort to defend against real and perceived threats from anti-regime Kurdish groups that operate in Iraqi Kurdistan. Senior Iranian and Iraqi officials held a series of meetings in Tehran between October 12 and 22 to discuss border security and the implementation of the March 2023 Iran-Iraq border security agreement. This agreement requires Iraq to disarm and relocate anti-regime Kurdish groups away from the Iran-Iraq border.[xxi] Iran has historically accused Kurdish opposition groups and Israel of using Iraqi Kurdistan to facilitate operations in Iran.[xxii]  Iran views Iraqi Kurdistan as a rear area from which anti-regime Kurdish groups can foment instability against the regime.[xxiii] These meetings come as Iran has tried to securitize the country following the June 2025 Israel-Iran War, during which Israel’s attacks targeting senior regime officials and sensitive sites revealed the scale of Israeli infiltration and clandestine operations in Iran.[xxiv]

Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Quds Force Commander Brigadier General Esmail Ghaani reportedly met with unspecified Shia Coordination Framework leaders in Baghdad on October 21 to urge them to remain united ahead of the November 2025 parliamentary elections.[xxv] The Shia Coordination Framework is a loose coalition of Shia political parties, some of which Iran backs. Iran has recently urged unity among Shia Coordination Framework leaders ahead of the November elections to improve the likelihood that Iranian-backed parties will maintain control of the Iraqi government.[xxvi] The Shia Coordination Framework is running on multiple lists in the upcoming elections, which will divide votes between Iranian-backed candidates.[xxvii]

Syria

See topline section.

Arabian Peninsula

Nothing significant to report.

Palestinian Territories and Lebanon

Nothing significant to report.