Iraq’s most senior cleric Grand Ayatollah Sayyed Ali al-Sistani called on the government on Friday to rush to the aid of Sunni tribes battling the ISIL terrorist group

Iraq’s most senior cleric Grand Ayatollah Sayyed Ali al-Sistani called on the government on Friday to rush to the aid of Sunni tribes battling the ISIL terrorist group, after the group executed at least 220 tribesmen west of Baghdad this week.

"What is required from the Iraqi government ... is to offer quick support to the sons of this tribe and other tribes that are fighting ISIL terrorists," Sistani said, in an address read out by an aide in the holy city of Karbala after Friday prayers.

"This will offer the opportunity to the other tribes to join the fighters against ISIL," he said.

At least 220 bodies of men from the Albu Nimr tribe, who had been seized by Islamic State days earlier, were found. They had been shot at close range.