Today is Wednesday; 9th of the Iranian month of Farvardin 1396 solar hijri; corresponding to 30th of the Islamic month of Jamadi as-Sani 1438 lunar hijri; and March 29, 2017, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.

1367 lunar years ago, on this day in 71 AH, the brave warrior, Ibrahim al-Ashtar, who played a prominent part in avenging the blood of Imam Husain (AS), was martyred in battle at the age of 55 against the Omayyad forces of Abdul-Malik ibn Marwan, near Mosul in northern Iraq. Son of the famous military general of Yemeni origin, Malek al-Ashtar an-Nakha’i – the governor of Egypt of the Commander of the Faithful, Imam Ali ibn Abi Taleb (AS) – he had fought in his youth in the War of Siffeen that was imposed on the Muslims by the Omayyad rebel Mu’awiyyah ibn Abu Sufyan. During the next twenty years he retired from public life, but joined the uprising of Mukhtar as-Saqafi in Kufa in the aftermath of the tragic martyrdom in Karbala of the grandson of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA). He played a vital role in liberating Iraq and surrounding lands by enlisting in his army Iranians freed from the bondage of the Omayyads. In 66 AH, in the Battle of Zab near Mosul, he defeated the Omayyad army sent from Syria, and killed the chief perpetrator of the tragedy of Karbala, the tyrannical former governor of Iraq, Obaidollah ibn Ziyad. He then dispatched a force to liberate the cities of Nasibayn, Harran, ar-Raha, Sinjar, and Sumaysat, in the upper Mesopotamian Syrian region – currently under the occupation of the modern day state of Turkey. Ibrahim was in Mosul when the treacherous Abdullah ibn Zubayr sent his brother Mus’ab to atack Kufa and martyr through deceit the valiant Mukhtar in 67 AH. Under pressure from both the Omayyads and the Zubayrids, Ibrahim couldn’t fight on two fronts at the same time, and reluctantly sided with Mus’ab, who entrusted him with the governorship of Mosul, Jazira, Armenia and Azarbaijan. Apparently, he remained in this position until Abdul-Malik ibn Marwan attacked Iraq. Ibrahim’s advice to Mus’ab to purge the conspirators and traitors from the army and the administration fell on deaf ears. As a result, a day before the major battle, despite his courage and swordsmanship, Ibrahim was defeated and killed, because of the betrayal by hypocrites. The next day, Abdul-Malik’s army easily defeated and killed Mus’ab bin Zubayr and went on to occupy all of Iraq and Iran. The tomb of Ibrahim al-Ashtar is located south of Dujayl, on the old Baghdad-to-Samarrah route. In 2005, Takfiri terrorists, backed by the US and Saudi Arabia, desecrated and destroyed the mausoleum housing it.

935 lunar years ago, on this day in 501 AH, the scholar, patron of men of letters, and philanthropist, Sadaqah bin Mansour Mazyadi al-Assadi, passed away. He was titled Saif od-Dowlah and was chief of an Arab emirate in southern Iraq under the Buwaiyhid Iranian Shi’ite dynasty of Iran-Iraq. His house in Baghdad was the refuge of the needy, the travelers, and the followers of the Ahl al-Bayt of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA). In 498 AH, three years before his death, he founded the city of Hillah, which developed into a centre of promotion of Islamic sciences of the School of Ahl al-Bayt, and produced such outstanding scholars as Muhaqqiq Hilli, Allamah Hilli, and the Seyyed Ibn Tawous family. An interesting narration by Sabagh bin Nabata says that in 37 AH while marching for the Battle of Siffeen in Syria, the Commander of the Faithful, Imam Ali (AS), stopped at a hillock and pointing to a vast uninhabited tract of swampy land besides the River Euphrates, stretching from the hillock in the direction of the Babylon, exclaimed: A city! What a city! The narrator seeing no sign of habitation asked whether a city existed in the past on this tract. The Imam replied:

"No! In the future a city will be built here, and will be called Hillah as-Saifiyyah. Its founder will be a man of the Bani Assad, and in this land, virtuous men will flourish."

587 solar years ago, on this day in 1430 AD, the Ottoman Empire under Murad II captured the Byzantine city of Thessalonica, and made it the commercial hub of the Turkish Empire. For almost five centuries the city called Selanik in Turkish was under Ottoman rule, until its occupation by Greece in 1912 during the First Balkan War. The mostly Muslim population of this city was deported to Turkey in 1922 and resettled with Greeks to change its Islamic atmosphere.

444 solar years ago, on this day in 1573 AD, the French King Charles IX issued an edict in favour of Protestants, according to which the French Protestants who had beaten Catholics in the 4th War of Religion, gained freedom in observance of their rituals. This 4th War of Religion between Catholics and Protestants, which started as of July 16, 1572, is known as La Rochelle Battle.

341 solar years ago, on this day in 1676 AD, the Ottoman Turks defeated Poland and gained control of parts of Ukraine. This battle started as of the year 1671 with the unrest of Poland’s Cossacks and the Ottoman Empire’s support for them.

246 solar years ago, on this day in 1772 AD, Swedish thinker and mystic, Emanuel Swedenborg, passed away at the age of 104. He based his philosophy on separation from the materialistic world and observance of the spiritual universe. He believed that whatever exists in the materialistic world is a symbol of the superior spiritual universe. He believed that the more pure and chaste the human being, the better he would be able to understand God. He wrote 50 books on his thoughts.

168 solar years ago, on this day in 1849 AD, the British colonialists formally annexed the Punjab region of the subcontinent after defeating the Sikhs. Punjab is today divided between Pakistan and India.

147 solar years ago, on this day in 1870 AD, Italian-French explorer, Paul-Emile Botta, died at the age of 68. He was assigned as French consul to Mosul in Iraq, where his interest in archaeology led to the discovery in 1843 of the palace of the Assyrian king Sargon II (721 to 705 BC) at Dur Sharrukin or modern Khorsabad.

137 solar years ago, on this day in 1885 AD, the famous Iranian historian, writer, and poet, Mirza Mohammad Taqi Sepehr Kashani, titled “Lisan ol-Mulk”, passed away at the age of 86. After his initial education in his hometown Kashan, he moved to Tehran and on the encouragement of the poet laureate Saba he started writing books. On Saba's death, he returned to Kashan and was appointed deputy to Prince Mahmoud son of Fath Ali Shah and was given the pen name "Sepehr" by the Prince. He was called to Tehran by Fath Ali Shah and entered government service. During Mohammad Shah’s reign, he was the royal eulogist and the secretary to the Finance Department. He was commissioned by Mohammad Shah's royal decree in 1843 to write a comprehensive history from the creation of Adam. He compiled it in several volumes titled “Nasekh at-Tawarikh” which covers the world history up 1272 AH (1855 AD) when he was given the title “Lisan ol-Mulk” by Nasser od-Din Shah. He also wrote the books “Aina-e Jahan-Nama” and “Merits of the Infallible Imams”.

115 solar years ago, on this day in 1902 AD, Marcel Ayme, the French novelist, children's writer, humour writer, screenwriter and theatre playwright, was born. After the great success of his novel “La Jument Verte” in 1933, translated into English as "The Green Mare", he concentrated mostly on writing and published children's stories, novels, and collections of stories. He died in 1967.

114 solar years ago, on this day in 1903 AD, regular wireless news service began between New York and London on Marconi’s wireless. On 30 March 1903, The Times in London became the first newspaper to establish an ongoing arrangement with the Marconi Telegraph Company for regular transmission of news between the US and the UK. Shortly thereafter, the New York Times requested that it be part of the arrangement. Despite extensive teething problems the importance of wireless as a cheap form of communication quickly became obvious.

70 solar years ago, on this day in 1947 AD, the Malagasy uprising against French colonial rule in Madagascar started through coordinated attacks by the local people, armed mainly with spears, against military bases and French-owned plantations in the eastern part of the island around Moramanga and Manakara. The nationalist cause was rapidly adopted in the south and spread to the central highlands and the capital of Antananarivo by the following month, with the number of Malagasy fighters estimated at over one million. The French savagely attacked the independence-seekers and engaged in a variety of terror tactics designed to demoralize the population. The French military force carried out mass execution, torture, rape, torching of entire villages, collective punishment and other atrocities such as throwing live Malagasy prisoners out of airplane – called death flights. As many as 100,000 Malagasies were killed, while only 550 French soldiers lost their life. By August 1948, the majority of the nationalist leaders were killed or captured, and the Uprising was effectively put down by December 1948. The violent repression of the nationalist uprising left deep scars in Malagasy society. A generation of the managerial class was wiped out, creating challenges for the country upon achieving independence in 1960. The Malagasy trace their origin to Borneo in Southeast Asia. Muslims form over 10 percent of the population. The first Muslims to arrive were Arabs and Somalis in the 9th century. The written history of Madagascar began with the Arabs, who established trading posts along the northwest coast by the 10th century and introduced Islam and the Arabic script that was formally used to transcribe the Malagasy language in a form of writing known as “Sorabe”. Today the language is written in the Latin script imposed by the French and the majority of people are Christians – a legacy of European colonial rule. Over 90% of Madagascar’s wildlife is not found anywhere.

44 solar years ago, on this day in 1973 AD, following the humiliating American failure to suppress the aspirations of the Vietnamese people for national unity and reconciliation, despite intense bombing and use of chemical weapons, the last US combat soldiers left the artificial entity called South Vietnam, whose capital Saigon fell on 30 April 1975, thereby ending the war that had started in 1955 with unwarranted American intervention.

23 solar years ago, on this day in 1994 AD, the Gnostic, Ayatollah Ali Akbar Marandi, passed away at the age of 97 in his hometown Marand. Born in an impoverished family, he first studied at the Tabriz seminary, and on visiting Iraq for pilgrimage on behalf of philanthropist, he decided to enroll at the famous Islamic seminary of holy Najaf, where he stayed for sixteen years and attained the status of Ijtehad. For ten years, he was the roommate and close friend of the famous exegete of the holy Qur’an, Allamah Seyyed Mohammad Hussain Tabatabaie. He attended the classes of Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Abu’l-Hassan Isfahani, Grand Ayatollah Mirza Mohammad Hussain Na’ini, Ayatollah Aqa Zia od-Din Iraqi, Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Qazi Tabatabaie, and Ayatollah Badkubaei. On his return to Iran, he took up teaching at the seminary of Tabriz, but his gnostic spirit shunned the limelight he was acquiring, and he retired to his hometown Marand, to continue his activities amongst the deprived people of the region. Ayatollah Ali Akbar Marandi fully supported the grassroots movement of the Iranian people against the British-installed and US-backed Pahlavi regime. When the regime exiled to Turkey, the Father of the Islamic Revolution, Imam Khomeini (God bless him), he issued statements in support of the Imam, and played a vital role in awakening the people of Marand and its surroundings, right till the victory of the Islamic Revolution. He left the transient world, with the fundamental testimony of monotheism on his lips, that is, “la ilaha il-Allah” (there is no god but Allah).  

7 solar years ago, on this day in 2010 AD, Iran’s intelligence personnel carried out an “intricate” cross-border mission and freed Iranian diplomat, Heshmatollah Attarzadeh, who was kidnapped in 2008 by terrorists in northwestern Pakistan on November 13, 2008, along with his Pakistani bodyguard, while driving over a narrow bridge in Peshawar, when two gunmen blocked their way with a car and opened fire.

AS/ME