Al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub (Arabic: الناصر صلاح الدين يوسف بن أيوب‎; 1137 – 4 March 1193), better known simply as Salah ad-Din or Saladin, was a Sunni Muslim Kurd and the first sultan of Egypt and Syria and founder of the Ayyubid dynasty. Saladin led the Muslim military campaign against the Crusader states in the Levant. At the height of his power, his sultanate spanned Egypt, Syria, the Jazira (Upper Mesopotamia), the Hejaz (western Arabia), Yemen, parts of western North Africa, and Nubia.