group managed to establish branches in the United Kingdom and France. In 1971 Chamran left the US for Lebanon and joined the camps of the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Amal movement. He became a leading and founding member of the Islamic revolutionary movement in the Middle East, organizing and training guerrillas and revolutionary forces in Algeria, Egypt, Syria. During the civil war in Lebanon he actively cooperated with Musa Al Sadr, founder of the Amal movement. Chamran also became an Amal member and "right-hand man of Sadr". Chamran along with Sadegh Ghotbzadeh was part of the faction, called "Syrian mafia", in the court of Khomeini, and there was a feud between his group and the Libya-friendly group, led by Mohammad Montazeri. With the Islamic Revolution taking place in Iran, Chamran returned to Iran. In 1979, he served as deputy prime minister in the cabinet of Mehdi Bazargan. He led the military operations in Kurdistan where Kurds rebelled against the Interim Government of Iran. He served as minister of defense from September 1979 to 1980, being the first civil defense minister of the Islamic Republic. In March 1980, he was elected to the Majlis of Iran (the Iranian Parliament) as a representative of Tehran. In May 1980, he was named the Ayatollah's representative to the Supreme Council of National Defense. Personal life Chamran was married to Tamsen Heiman, an American Muslim, in 1961. They had one daughter Roushan and three sons Ali, Jamal and Rahim. Jamal drowned during childhood and the rest of them live in the US. After migrating to Lebanon, due to the difficulties they were facing, Tamsen left Chamran in 1973 and went back to the US. She died in 2009. Later on Chamran was married to a woman from Lebanon, Ghadeh Jaber. Death Chamran led an infantry unit during the Iran–Iraq War and received two wounds in his left leg by shrapnel from a mortar shell. However, he refused to leave his unit. He was killed in Dehlavieh on 21 June 1981 as the war was raging on. His death was regarded as "suspicious" and the related details have remained unclear. Chamran was buried in the Behesht-e Zahra cemetery in Tehran. Legacy Ayatullah Khomeini publicly proclaimed Chamran as a "proud commander of Islam." Chamran was posthumously given a hero status, and many buildings and streets in Iran and Lebanon were named for him, as well as