Hizbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has been named the most popular figure in the Middle East in an Egyptian poll.

Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal took second place and Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad third, said Saadeddin Ibrahim of the Ibn Khaldoun Centre for Development Studies.

Researchers asked about 1,200 people from a range of backgrounds in 15 of Egypt's 26 governorates to rank a list of 30 prominent people in the Middle East including writers, politicians, judges, statesmen and religious scholars.