Najaf

More than 250 people were taken to hospital in Najaf province, and at least 322 patients including children were sent to hospitals in Diwaniyah province.

The authorities were forced to shut down airports in the provinces of Najaf and Basra.

He then traveled to a seminary in Najaf, Iraq, for religious studies, but two years later he and other Shiite students and clerics were expelled by Saddam Hussein’s government.

After a short spell in the Iraqi holy city of Najaf to attend a Shia seminary he rejoined Amal in Lebanon before he and others split from the group in 1982, shortly after Israel invaded Lebanon in response to attacks by Palestinian militants.

He was killed in Najaf, Iraq, in 2004, and laid to rest in Section 60.