Qom

Qom (Persian: قم; [ɢom] ^ⓘ) is the capital of Qom province, Iran. It is also the capital of Qom County and its Central District. It is the seventh largest metropolis and the seventh largest city in Iran. The city is 140 km (87 mi) to the south of Tehran, on the banks of the Qom River.

In antiquity, the Qom region was a stronghold of the cult of Anahita, the Iranian goddess of fertility. André Godard has reported about an Anahita temple along the Qom River (Golshan River). A district called Taraznahid (Nahid is her Persian name), close to Qom, is also connected to the goddess.

Qom is considered holy in Shi'a Islam, as it is the site of the shrine of Fatima bint Musa, sister of Imam Ali ibn Musa Rida (Persian: Imam Reza; 789–816 AD). The city is the largest center for Shi'a scholarship in the world and is a significant destination of pilgrimage, with around twenty million pilgrims visiting the city every year, the majority being Iranians but also other Shi'a Muslims from all around the world.

Qom has developed into a lively industrial center owing, in part, to its proximity to Tehran. It is a regional center for the distribution of petroleum and petroleum products, and a natural gas pipeline from Bandar Anzali and Tehran and a crude oil pipeline from Tehran run through Qom to the Abadan refinery on the Persian Gulf. Qom gained additional prosperity when oil was discovered at Sarajeh (fa:میدان نفتی البرز قم) near the city in 1956 and a large refinery was built between Qom and Tehran. In between the Tehran-Qom highway is the Imam Khomeini International Airport which is the largest airport in Iran.