Alleged Al-Qaeda ties

Al-Qaeda leaders regard Shia Muslims as heretics and have attacked their mosques and gatherings. In Iraq it considers Shi'i civilians to be legitimate targets for acts of violence. The group has been designated as a terrorist organization by Iran and many other countries, and Iran has a hostile relationship with the group. However, allegedly Al-Qaeda and Iran formed an alliance during the 1990s in which Hezbollah trained al Qaeda operatives. Iran detained hundreds of al Qaeda operatives that entered the country following the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan; even though "the Iranian government has held most of them under house arrest, limited their freedom of movement, and closely monitored their activities," U.S. officials have expressed concerns that Iran has not fully accounted for their whereabouts, culminating in accusations of Iranian complicity in the 2003 Riyadh compound bombings.

September 11

The U.S. indictment of bin Laden filed in 1998 stated that al-Qaeda "forged alliances ... with the government of Iran and its associated terrorist group Hezbollah for the purpose of working together against their perceived common enemies." On May 31, 2001, Steven Emerson and Daniel Pipes wrote in The Wall Street Journal that "Officials of the Iranian government helped arrange advanced weapons and explosives training for Al-Qaeda personnel in Lebanon where they learned, for example, how to destroy large buildings."The 9/11 Commission Report stated that 8 to 10 of the hijackers on 9/11 previously passed through Iran and their travel was facilitated by Iranian border guards. The report also found "circumstantial evidence that senior Hezbollah operatives were closely tracking the travel of some of these future muscle hijackers into Iran in November 2000." After the commission called for "further investigation" into a possible Iranian role in the attacks, President George W. Bush demanded that Iran sever its ties with al-Qaeda, while saying that in his view, "There was no direct connection between Iran and the attacks of September 11."
Two defectors from Iran's intelligence service testified that Iranian officials had "foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks." By contrast, the 9/11 Commission "found no evidence that Iran or Hezbollah was aware of the planning for what later became the 9/11 attack. At the time of their travel through Iran, the al Qaeda operatives themselves were probably not aware of the specific details of their future operation." In addition, both bin al-Shibh and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed denied "any relationship between the hijackers and Hezbollah" and "any other reason for the hijackers' travel to Iran" besides "taking advantage of the Iranian practice of not stamping Saudi passports."

Riyadh compound bombings

According to Seth G. Jones and Peter Bergen, the 2003 Riyadh compound bombings were planned by al Qaeda operatives in Iran, with apparent Iranian complicity. In May 2003, then-State Department official Ryan Crocker provided information on the upcoming attack to Iranian officials, who apparently took no action.

Opposing view

A West Point study based on documents uncovered in Osama bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad found that the Iran-al Qaeda "relationship is not one of alliance, but of indirect and unpleasant negotiations over the release of detained jihadis and their families, including members of bin Laden's family." According to longtime Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) analyst Bruce Riedel: "Rather than being secretly in bed with each other as some have argued, al Qaeda had a fairly hostile relationship with the Iranian regime. To get members of his family out of Iran, for example, bin Laden had an Iranian diplomat kidnapped and then traded. The Iranians released some of his family members in the deal but then double-crossed al Qaeda by not letting one of his daughters, Fatima, free."

Taliban insurgency

U.S. and British officials have accused Iran of giving weapons and support to the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan.

US Court Judgements

According to The Washington Free Beacon, On multiple occasions, US courts have awarded damages to the victims of terrorism; deemed payable by Iran on the basis that although the attacks were not directly controlled by Iran, evidence shows Iranian payments supporting these terrorist groups. There has been controversy over how to enforce these decisions in order to make Iran pay reparations.

Pragmatism

Like other revolutionary states, practical considerations have sometimes led the Islamic Republic to inconsistency and subordination of such ideological concerns as pan-Islamic solidarity. One observer, Graham Fuller, has called the Islamic Republic "stunningly silent" about [Muslim] Chechens in [nonMuslim] Russia, or Uyghurs in China, simply because the Iranian state has important strategic ties with both China and Russia that need to be preserved in the state interest. Iran has astonishingly even supported Christian Armenia against Shi'ite Azerbaijan and has been careful not to lend too much support to Islamic Tajiks in Tajikistan, where the language is basically a dialect of Persian.