To allow FTP with IPTABLES on a RedHat Linux box add "ipconntrackftp" to the IPTABLES_MODULES configuration within /etc/sysconfig/iptables-config and make sure the following two lines are in /etc/sysconfig/iptables:
-A RH-Firewall-1-INPUT -m state –state ESTABLISHED,RELATED -j ACCEPT
-A RH-Firewall-1-INPUT -m state –state NEW -m tcp -p tcp –dport 20:21 -j ACCEPT