Today is Saturday; 5th of the Iranian  month of Farvardin 1396 solar hijri; corresponding to 26th of the Islamic month of Jamadi as-Sani 1438 lunar hijri; and March 25, 2017, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.

\1430 lunar years ago, on this day in 8^th AH, the Muslims led by the Commander of the Faithful, Imam Ali ibn Abi Taleb (AS) achieved a great victory in the battle of “Zaat as-Salasel” which was fought against the pagan Arab tribes north of Medina on the road to Syria. The event occurred in the aftermath of the Battle of Mu'tah (in what is now Jordan) against a joint force of Christian Arabs and Romans that ended inconclusively, and which encouraged pagan Arab tribes to plan raids on Medina to wipe out Islam. When Prophet Mohammad (SAWA) learned about the plans of the Arab infidels he dispatched a force under the newly converted Amr bin Aas to Wadi al-Qura where the enemies were amassing; in order to invite them to Islam or disperse them. Amr was overawed by the numbers and requested the Prophet for reinforcements that were sent under Abu Bakr, who after a skirmish and loss of men returned to Medina. Another force was dispatched under Omar ibn Khattab and suffered the same fate. The Prophet then decided to entrust the command to his dear cousin and son-in-law, Imam Ali (AS), who duly invited the pagan Arabs to Islam. The infidels refused and prepared for battle. The Imam, despite the mountainous terrain and steep valleys, ably organized the defence. Then after several bouts of individual combat during which he made short work of the arrogant Arabs who challenged him, including their fearsome warlord, Hareth bin Makida, he launched a swift attack to soundly defeat them. The Muslims lost only two persons, while the pagan Arabs suffered huge casualties and completely surrendered to the Muslims along with their women, children and possessions. In Medina, the Prophet informed the people that in honour of Imam Ali's victory, God has revealed “Surah Adiyaat”. On his return to Medina, the Imam was greeted outside the city by the Prophet, who wiped the dust off the face of his dear cousin, kissed his forehead and with tears of joy, said: O Ali, I thank Allah, Who strengthened me through you. O Ali, like Moses, who prayed to Allah, to strengthen his arms by his brother (Aaron) and make him share his Prophethood, I also asked the same from Almighty Allah (for you) and He approved it.

Then the Prophet turned to the companions and said:

I love him by the command of Allah. O Ali, the one who befriends you has befriended me, and the one who loves me, loves Almighty Allah, and the one who loves Almighty Allah is loved by Him and Paradise is his abode. O Ali, the one who is inimical to you, is inimical to me, and the one who is inimical to me, is inimical to the Almighty Allah. And He will not accept any deed of the enemies of Ali (AS).

764 solar years ago, on this day in the year 1253 AD, the prominent Persian poet and chronicler of the Subcontinent, Amir Khosrow Dehlavi, was born in northwestern India. An ethnic Turk who was highly skilled in Iranian and Indian literature and music, he was also familiar with Arabic and Turkish languages. It was, however, in Persian poetry and prose that he excelled. Amir Khosrow was a student of the famous Delhi Gnostic, Nizam od-Din Awliya, and is regarded as the "Father of Qawwali" (a devotional music form of the Sufis in the Subcontinent on chanting praises of God, Prophet Mohammad [SAWA] and Imam Ali [AS]). He is also credited with introducing Persian, Arabic and Turkish elements into Indian classical music and was the originator of the “khayal” and “tarana” styles of music. Amir Khosrow was an expert in many styles of Persian poetry which were developed in medieval Iran, from Khaqani Shirvani’s “qasidas” (panegyrics) to Nizami Ganajavi’s “khamsa” (five long odes). He has written in many verse forms including “ghazal” (lyrics), “mathnavi” (ode), “qata” (fragment), “rubai” (quatrain), “do-baiti” (couplet), and “tarkib-band” (composite-tie). The “Khamsa-e Khosrow” depicts in verse five classical romances: “Hasht-Behesht”, “Matla’ ul-Anwaar”, “Sheerin-Khosrow”, Majnun-Laila and Aaina-Sikandari. Among his prose works is “Tughluq-Namah”, a history of the reign on Tughlaq Dynasty.

612 lunar years ago, on this day in 826 AH, the Islamic scholar, Shaikh Jamal od-Din Meqdad Hilli al-Asadi, passed away in holy Najaf. He was a prominent student of the First Martyr, Mohammad ibn Makki, and was an outstanding jurisprudent himself. Known popularly as Fadhel Meqdad, he groomed many scholars and wrote several books, including “Ayaat al-Ahkam”. The most important book written by him is “Kanz al-Irfan”, in which he has listed all those ayahs of the Holy Qur’an which form the basis of Fiqh, and had deduced from them several rules of Islamic jurisprudence. There are several books written in the same vein by both Shi’ite and Sunni scholars, but “Kanz al-Irfan” stands out prominently as one of the best, if not the best.

476 lunar years ago,on this day in 962 AH, the Peace of Amasya was signed by the Ottoman Turkish and Safavid Persian Empires to end hostilities between the two sides, after three massive but unsuccessful invasions in the course of 22 years by Sultan Suleiman, who was outwitted by the tact and diplomacy of Shah Tahmasb I. The frontier of the two empires was delineated through Anatolia, Iraq, and the Caucasus, with Georgia being divided between the Ottomans and the Safavids. The Ottomans, in return for their control of Baghdad and most of Iraq, allowed Iranian pilgrims to continue visits to Najaf and Karbala, as well as to Mecca and Medina for Hajj.

196 solar years ago, on this day in 1821 AD, following years of sedition by European Christian powers amongst the Greek-speaking subjects of the declining Ottoman Empire the Province of “Yunanistan” declared itself independent and adopted the ancient name of “Greece” that was no longer in use for over a millennium. The Ottomans immediately suppressed the revolt that sporadically raged in different parts, but was crushed in 1825 by Ibrahim Pasha, the son of Mohammad Ali Pasha, the Albanian Ottoman governor of Egypt. At this stage Britain, France and Russia, decided to intervene militarily and the defeat of Ibrahim Pasha by the combined British-French-Russian navies, separated the Peloponnese Peninsula from Ottoman rule, resulting in the establishment of the kingdom of Greece in 1830. The Greek Christians immediately launched a general massacre of Greek Muslims, expelled them, destroyed mosques or converted them into churches, in order to remove all influence of Turkish rule. Over the next decades, as the Ottoman Empire became more weak, other Greek-speaking provinces were detached and added to Greece by the chief European powers. It should be noted that the ancient land of Greece was among the cradles of civilizations. Made up of city-states, it was part of the Iranian Achaemenian Empire 2,500 years ago, until its emergence under Alexander of Macedonia as a powerful empire itself. For almost two centuries Greece controlled parts of Europe, Asia and Africa, until it ceased to exist as an independent political entity on the world map in 146 BC with its conquest by the Roman Empire. Some five centuries later the region became centre of the Eastern Roman Empire and after Christianization was called Byzantine. Since the 13^th century, it gradually came under the rule of the Muslim Turks of Anatolia and was incorporated in the rising power of the Ottoman Muslim Empire, which finally ended the existence of Byzantine in 1453 AD. Today, Greece, which is grappling with an acute financial, economic and political crisis, is among the weakest states of Europe. It covers an area of 132,000 sq km and shares borders with Turkey, Bulgaria, Albania, and Macedonia.

60 solar years ago, on this day in 1957 AD, the treaty for establishment of the European Economic Community (EEC or the Common Market), was signed in the Italian capital, Rome. The goal was to form a customs union among member states to get rid of tariffs to freely facilitate exchange of goods, labour force, investment and services. In 1992, EEC was renamed the European Union (EU) and expanded to include the former socialist states.

46 solar years ago, on this day in 1971 AD, the Bangladesh Liberation War practically began following the launching of a military attack by the armed forces of West Pakistan on the Bengali-speaking civilians of East Pakistan. Tens of thousands of Bengali Muslims were killed by the Punjabi-Pakhtoun army, resulting in war with India in December that led to dismemberment of Pakistan, and the birth of Bangladesh as an independent Muslim country.

42 solar years ago, on this day in 1975 AD, King Faisal Ibn Abdul-Aziz of Saudi Arabia was shot and killed at point blank range by his US-trained nephew, Faisal Ibn Musaid, at the age of 69 after a 11-year reign, less than two years after he led the oil embargo against the West during the Israeli war, thereby crippling the economy of the West. The CIA was behind the assassination, since the king, in addition to taking the decisive step of oil embargo, was a broad-minded person, aware of the criminal nature of his own father, Abdul-Aziz, who with British help had occupied much of the Arabian Peninsula and named it Saudi Arabia. Faisal thus acknowledged the religious and cultural diversity of the land, including the predominantly Shi’ite Muslim oil-rich region of the east, the Asir in the southwest that along with the Shi’ite Ismaili regions of Najran and Jizan was seized from Yemen, and the old Hashemite Kingdom of the Hejaz, with its capital Mecca. He included non-Wahhabi, cosmopolitan Sunni Hejazis from Mecca and Jeddah in his government, and when the great Shi’ite Muslim Marja’, Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Mohsin al-Hakeem, came on Hajj pilgrimage, Faisal allowed him to hold the congregational prayers at the holy Ka’ba in the Masjid al-Haraam. The Wahhabi minority wanted to remove him, and after his assassination, discrimination based on sect, tribe, region and gender became the order of the day and has remained as such until today.

23 solar years ago, on this day in 1994 AD, US troops, which had entered Somalia in December 1992 under the pretext of ending unrests in this African country, were forced to leave. In 1991, Somali opposition groups had toppled Dictator Mohammad Ziad Bareh, but failed to agree on formation of a coalition government and this political deadlock sparked a civil war, thereby providing a pretext for the US to deploy its troops within the framework of UN peacekeeping forces. The Somalis resented foreign intervention and despite suffering hundreds of fatalities, killed over a hundred US occupation forces and finally forced them out.

3 solar years ago, on this day in 2014 AD, Iranian scholar and historian, Dr. Mohammad Ibrahim Bastani Parizi, passed away at the age of 89. Born near Sirjan in Kerman Province, southeastern Iran, he came to Tehran for higher studies and obtained his doctorate in history, after which he joined Tehran University as lecturer. Since youth he took up composing poems and writing essays. An avid researcher, he wrote a great many articles for different Iranian journals, and translated into Persian from Arabic and French. He authored several books such as “History of Kerman”, “Quest for Independence”, and “Zu’l-Qarnain or Cyrus the Great”.

AS/MG