Today is Tuesday; 28th of the Iranian  month of Dey 1395 solar hijri; corresponding to 18th of the Islamic month of Rabi a-Sani 1438 lunar hijri; and January 17, 2017, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.

1622 solar years ago, on this day in 395 AD, on the death of Emperor Theodosius I, after a 16-year reign, the Roman Empire was permanently divided between his two young sons into the Eastern Roman Empire under the 18-year-old Arcadius, and the Western Roman Empire under the 10-year old Honorius, with Flavius Rufinus and Flavius Stilicho respectively acting as their guardians.The Roman Empire was never again re-united. In 380, a year after his accession, Theodosius, through the infamous Edict of Thessalonica, had forced all Roman citizens to convert to the Trinitarian form of Christianity, or else be branded as heretics, subject to punishment. Trinity or the weird concept of ‘godfather’, ‘godson’ and ‘holy ghost’ – an invention of Paul the Hellenized Jew who was a staunch opponent of Prophet Jesus and after him feigned to be his follower – was designed to suit the polytheist beliefs of European pagans, in opposition to the monotheist message of the Virgin-born Messiah. With its capital city at Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul), the Eastern Roman Empire, also known as Byzantine, survived for almost a millennium the fragmentation and fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5^th century AD, reaching its greatest extent after conquering much of the historically Roman western Mediterranean coast, including North Africa, Italy, and Rome itself, which it held for two centuries. During the 26-year long war with the Sassanian Empire of Iran from 602 to 628 for control of Anatolia and Levant, its resources were exhausted and led to major territorial losses to the newly-emerging Muslim Arabs to whom it lost its richest provinces, that is, Egypt and Syria. In 1071, at the Battle of Manzikert, the Eastern Roman Empire lost much of Asia Minor to the Iran-based Seljuqid Empire. Byzantine was finally cast into the dustbin of history in 1453 when the Ottoman Turks captured its capital in 1453. Its language was Greek, in opposition to the Latin of the West, while its Church was “Orthodox”, in opposition to the Catholic Church of Rome.

940 lunar years ago, on this day in 498 AH, Abu'l-Muzaffar Rukn ud-Dn Barkyaruq, the Seljuq sultan of Iran-Iraq-Anatolia and parts of Syria, died in Boroujerd, southwestern Iran. He was a son of Malik Shah I and participated in the succession wars against his three brothers, Mahmud I, Ahmad Sanjar, and Mohammad I. He ascended to the throne young, and his detractors thought him too inexperienced and accused him of being a drunkard. He waged war to regain control of the core Seljuqid lands that included Iran, Iraq, Syria, Turkey, Central Asia and parts of Afghanistan. His rule coincided with the Crusader European invasion of Palestine. It is said his body was brought to Isfahan, the Seljuqid capital for burial. However, a tomb exists in his name 5 km from Boroujerd, at a place called Zawwarian.

836 lunar years ago, on this day in 602 AH, the great scholar Najmoddin Abu’l-Qasem Ja'far Ibn al-Hassan, famous as “Muhaqqiq al-Hilli”, was born in the city of city of Hilla in Iraq. His legal manual titled “Shara'i al-Islam”, is regarded as a masterpiece of theology and more than thirty commentaries have been written by scholars upon it. Among Muhaqqiq's most important students was his nephew, the celebrated “Allamah Hilli”. Another important work of his is “Ma'arij al-Usoul” on jurisprudential methodology. In it, he stresses the centrality of the Mujtahid during the time of Occultation of the 12th Imam, in deriving a proper understanding of the Shari'ah from the holy Qur'an, Hadith and statements of the Twelve Infallible Heirs of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA). Before him, it was the authority of the Hadith and not of the Mujtahid that was obeyed. His books include “an-Naafe’. He passed away in 676 AH at age 74.

730 solar years ago, on this day in 1287 AD, King Alfonso III of Aragon invaded the Muslim island of Minorca (Manurqa in Arabic) in the Mediterranean to end over five centuries of glorious Islamic rule, six decades after the Christians had conquered Majorca Island in the Balearic Archipelago. Alfonso killed, Christianized and enslaved the Muslims of these islands.

211 solar years ago, on this day in 1706 AD, Benjamin Franklin, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States of America that was set up by the 13 rebellious New England colonies, was born in Boston to British parents. He was a printer, publisher, author, inventor, scientist, and diplomat. He became widely known in European scientific circles for his reports of electrical experiments and theories. He invented the lightning rod, and the bifocal eyeglasses were his ideas as well. When the colonies rebelled against the British crown, he became an ardent supporter of independence, served as diplomat both at home and in Europe, and was regarded as second only to President George Washington in power and prestige. Franklin emphasized that the US could survive only if the people were virtuous, followed religious rules in both personal and civic life, and abstained from corruption, oppression, violence, and immoralities – all of which are dragging the US today towards its eventual doom.

176 solar years ago, on this day in 1841 AD, British mountaineer, George Everest, became the first European to discover the highest peak in the world in the Himalayas, which was later named after him as “Everest”, although he never managed to ascend this 8,800-meter high summit, which lies in Nepal, and is called “Sagarmatha”. The Everest was first scaled in 1953 by Indian Nepalese mountaineer, Sherpa Tenzing Norgay, and New Zealand's Edmund Hillary. This massive peak in the formidable Himalayan Mountain Range also covers parts of Tibet where it is called “Chomolungma”. In 2005, a mountaineering team from the Islamic Republic of Iran succeeded in climbing Mount Everest.

157 solar years ago, on this day in 1860 AD, the Russian author, Anton Chekhov, was born in a poor family, and with his hard efforts graduated in medicine from Moscow University. He had a flair for writing, and cooperated with newspapers and magazines. He is famous for his short stories, and died in 1902.

144 solar years ago, on this day in 1873 AD, native warriors of the Amerindian Modoc tribe defeated the US Army in the First Battle of the Stronghold. The Modoc War, also known as the Lava Beds War, was part of the expansionist and genocidal policy of the Anglo-Saxon rulers in Washington to exterminate the native population, in southern Oregon and northern California from 1872 to 1873.

124 solar years ago, on this day in 1893 AD, Hawaii's monarchy was overthrown by a group of US businessmen and sugar planters who forced Queen Liliuokalani to abdicate. She was the last reigning queen of the Hawaiian Islands in the Pacific Ocean, having ascended the throne in 1891 upon the death of her brother, King Kalakaua. In 1895, following her failed attempt to regain the throne, she was forced to renounce her royal status and shipped to the US, where her petition to seek compensation for the loss of her property was rejected by the expansionist US regime. Hawaii became US territory against the wishes of the Hawaiian people, and in 1959 was declared as the 50th state.

84 solar years ago, on this day in 1933 AD, Sadr od-Din Agha Khan, the diplomat and art collector of Iranian origin was born in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France to a French mother. The second son of the self-styled Imam of the Ismaili Nizari sect, Sultan Shah Mohammad Agha Khan, whose own mother was a granddaughter of Fath Ali Shah the Qajarid king of Iran, Sadr od-Din described Iran as the cradle of his family, though he never lived in Iran. He held French, Iranian, and Swiss citizenship, and was fluent in French, English, German and Italian, while also speaking some Persian and Arabic. He travelled widely with his father, and started a long international diplomatic career by joining the UNESCO and retiring as Chief of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). His bid for election to the UN Secretary General’s post was thwarted by the US, because in his trips to Iran and Iraq during the 8-year imposed war, for finding solution to the issue of war refugees, he had become greatly impressed by the dynamic personality of the Father of the Islamic Revolution, Imam Khomeini (RA). He died of cancer in Boston, USA, on 12 May 2003, and his body was conveyed to Switzerland, as per his wish, and buried with full diplomatic honours. Sadr od-Din assembled one of the finest private collections of Islamic art in the world, including a priceless collection of paintings, drawings, manuscripts and miniatures. His collection is vast and diverse, and includes Arabic, Persian, Turkish, and Indian pieces dating from the 10th century onwards. An example is a Qur’anic page of North African origin written with gold lettering in the Kufic script – it is more than 1,000 years old. His full collection is to be housed at a new museum being built by his nephew, Karim Agha Khan, in Toronto, Canada.

83 lunar years ago, on this day in 1355 AH, Grand Ayatollah Mirza Ali Shirazi, passed away in holy Najaf, Iraq at the age of 68. A student of Ayatollah Fesharaki Isfahani and Ayatollah Mirza Mohammad Taqi Shirazi, he attained the status of ijtehad at the young age of 22 years. He was an authority in theology, jurisprudence, philosophy, medicine, history, and literature.

73 solar years ago, on this day in 1944 AD, World War II: Allied forces launch the first of four assaults on Monte Cassino with the intention of breaking through the Winter Line and seizing Rome, an effort that would ultimately take four months and cost 105,000 Allied casualties.

56 solar years ago, on this day in 1961AD, Patrice Lumumba, Congo’s independence leader against Belgian colonial rule and the 1st premier of the Republic of Congo, was murdered after 67 days in office at the age of 36. His assassination was ordered by US President Dwight Eisenhower, who backed the military rebellion in Katanga Province and had him dismissed from his post by the Congo president, Joseph Mobuto. CIA Deputy Director, Sidney Gottlieb personally carried some deadly bacteria to Congo that was used to kill Lamumba, after he was tortured by US and Belgian agents for his independent policies. In 2000 the Belgium Parliament opened an inquiry into possible government involvement in the killing of Lumumba. The inquiry found that King Baudouin of Belgium knew of the plot but did nothing to stop it. Lumumba has left behind several books including “Congo My Country”.

26 solar years ago, on this day in 1991 AD, a so-called multinational force, led by the US, launched operation 'Desert Storm' to dislodge Saddam's army from Kuwait, which the Ba'thists had occupied on August 2, 1990. It was actually the US that had given green light to Saddam to occupy Kuwait, and then assembled a coalition against him to drive his forces by manipulating the UN Security Council. Saddam's forces quickly fled Kuwait, and when the people of Iraq rose against his repressive minority regime, the US stopped the war, and permitted Saddam to mercilessly slaughter hundreds of thousands of Shi'ite Muslims, even desecrating the holy shrines in Karbala, of Imam Husain (AS) and Hazrat Abbas (AS). Saddam was assisted in his crimes against Iraq's Shi'ite Arab majority and the ethnic Kurds of the north, by the MKO terrorist outfit, which with US and West European support has a bloody record of martyring several senior Iranian officials, as well as thousands of ordinary citizens.

19 solar years ago, on this day in 1998 AD, the Iranian Kurdish poet and researcher, Sheikh Ismail Rouhani, who was an expert on Persian and Arabic literature, and wrote under the penname “Shiva”, passed away at the age of 77 in Tehran. Born in Kashtar near Sanandaj, in Kurdistan, western Iran, and known as “Baba Mardoukh”, he graduated in “Divinities” from Tehran University, and was a scholar of repute of the Sunni sect of Islam. He wrote extensively and has works to his credit in jurisprudence, exegesis of the holy Qur’an, mathematics, logics, poetry and history of Kurd notables. He compiled a complete religious course for Sunni Muslim students of middle and high schools, which for years is being taught in the Kurdish, Baluchi and other minority regions.

8 solar years ago, on this day in 2009 AD, the illegal Zionist entity, Israel, was forced to halt its 22-day holocaust on the besieged Palestinian people of the Gaza Strip, thus failing to overthrow the elected Hamas-led government. Over 1,400 Palestinian men, women, and children, were martyred and almost 5,500 others sustained injuries in this holocaust, which inflicted a damage of at least 2 billion dollars on the infrastructure. The despicable crimes of the Zionist army forced the UN to launch an investigation, and its well-documented report, called the Zionist ringleaders war criminals. The report was approved by the UN Human Rights Council and the UN General Assembly, but because of US support, the Zionist entity unabashedly continues its crimes against humanity, including the illegal economic siege of Gaza.

AS/MG