The Mukhtar Army is a Shi'a Iraqi militia group formed in February 2013 by Wathiq al-Battat, a former senior official in the Hezbollah Brigades. Al-Battat pledged his loyalty to the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Al-Battat was arrested briefly on 2 January 2014 but was released despite still being a fugitive. He was apparently "accidentally assassinated" at point-blank range on 20 December 2014 at a fake police checkpoint in eastern Iraq by an unknown party.