The State Department released the Country Reports on Terrorism 2018 contending that “Iran remains the world’s worst state sponsor of terrorism”. “The regime”, the report assessed, “has spent nearly one billion dollars per year to support terrorist groups that serve as its proxies and expand its malign influence across the globe”. It went on to state that “Tehran has funded international terrorist groups such as Hizbollah, Hamas, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. It also has engaged in its own terrorist plotting around the world, particularly in Europe… Furthermore, Tehran continued to allow an AQ [al-Qaeda] facilitation network to operate in Iran, which sends fighters and money to conflict zones in Afghanistan and Syria, and it has extended sanctuary to AQ members residing in the country”.