led him to abandon his studies in Al-Azhar, and return to Karbala. In 1953, he was granted ijaza's from Sayyid Abd al-Husayn Sharaf al-Din, Sheikh Agha Bozorg al-Tehrani and al-Milani. The following year, the Imam Sadiq primary school was established, and al-Qazwini was made headmaster. He then resigned a few years later and went on to get married, go to the Hajj and visit many other countries. Activism Communist and Baathist Iraq During the days of the communist red tide, under the rule of Abd al-Karim Qasim, al-Qazwini supported Ayatollah Sayyid Muhsin al-Hakim's fatwa deeming communism an infidelity and atheist. He took a strong stance against Qasim, by rejecting to join the iftar he had prepared for the religious convoy in Ramadan, 1960, which lead to his imprisonment, making him the first cleric to become a political prisoner in Baghdad. After the Baathist regime took control in 1968, severe persecution began to gradually be administered towards the Shias, specifically the clerical class. As a result, al-Qazwini could not remain in home country for too long, and had to flee Iraq. Exile al-Qazwini fled to Kuwait in October, 1971 and picked up where he left off in Iraq from delivering speeches to teaching jurisprudence classes. In 1980, he travelled to Iran after the Iranian revolution, and carried on his duties and activities, raising awareness of the teachings of the Ahl al-Bayt. In Qom, he spent a few years teaching in its seminaries, and led the Friday prayers at the Jamkaran Mosque. In Tehran, he served as a professor in Shahid Motahari University as well as a judge in the Islamic republic's judiciary system, appointed by Ruhollah Khomeini. He led the Friday prayers at the al-Qodos Mosque. In 1985, he emigrated to the United States, and settled in Los Angeles. He gained representation of the grand maraja' of his time and began to widen the spectrum of his communication of Islam. Return to Iraq After the 2003 Iraqi invasion, al-Qazwini immediately returned to his Iraq and settled in Karbala. al-Qazwini claimed the Shirazi wing (eastern side) of the Husayn shrine and became the Imam of the daily prayers. He also performs a sermon after the congregational prayer. It was evident that the Baathist regime had suppressed the Shias in Iraq, with Karbala in the forefront, having a single poorly maintained hospital in all of Karbala, as well as a very few schools,