In Iraq, the controversial figure has sparked arguments about his philosophy and the security dangers he could pose.

Iraqi capital Baghdad – A mosque demolished by tractors, irate protestors torching buildings, and police arrests; despite their small size, recent events in Iraq have shocked the country in the last month; and all have been tied to a controversial Muslim scholar – Mahmoud al-Sarkhi.

An otherwise uneventful Friday sermon in early April sparked the latest round of what has become an increasingly tense intra-Shia leaders’ dispute, when Ali Masoudi, a representative of al-Sarkhi and a former student of late prominent Shia scholar Mohammad Sadiq al-Sadr, demanded the demolition of shrines, or the graves of Shia imams, across Iraq.