Dawn of a new day
Fall of Baghdad from 1258 to 2003
April 7, 2003
The Iranian
Muslims seem fanatical in their devotion to Muslim ethnic tyrants.
Considering that Indonesians and virtually every other Muslim population
has protested for Saddam they seemingly fail to remember that Saddam
is a part of the 20,000 strong Tirkiti clan, which has co-opted
the rest of Iraq's Muslim population. In Syria the Alawites, forming
2% of the population, are in control whereas in Saudi Arabia the
Al-Saud Dynasty hails from the Nejd enclave and remains fiercely
loyal to the tribal tradition.
Muslims tend to be rail against American troops in these heartlands
of Islam ("Saudi Arabia" is home to Mecca, Syria to Damascus,
the seat of the Umayyad Dynasty and Iraq was the capital of the
Abbasid Caliphate) however the conduct of these tyrants, who often
practise revisionist or heterodox versions of Islam (the Alawites
are marginal Muslims at best) do not earn censure.
Why doesn't Jakarta, Dhaka or Doha protests against these tyrants,
directly responsible for the death of countless Muslims (Hafez Assad
killed at least 20,000 Muslims in his brutal uprising of Hama's
population) and active in their suppression of indigenous Islamic
customs? I wonder why Muslims paradoxically demonstrate against
the liberation of an Islamic population!
Baghdad is indeed the capital to the Islamic world and figures
prominently in the sentiments of Muslims throughout. Nevertheless
rather than mourn its liberation they should cast a glance towards
its sordid recent history where memorials to a tyrant and the screams
of the innocent pervaded the city. The Allies truly are infusing
new life into the Baghdad and will realize that with power will
be responsibility for the immense, and rather unenviable, task of
rebuilding Iraq. We should bow ours heads in collective modesty
to pray for a new inauguration of an era of welfare and freedom
for Iraqis.
The valour with which the soldiers of Allied forces have fought
and achieved this fastest victory in the annals of human history
reminds all the tyrants of the world shape up or ship out. As forces
enter to liberate Baghdad, and I see thousands of civilians welcoming
the UD forces as expected, may we all pray for the fallen soldiers
and join in the grief of the families of military and non-military.
I am confident that the day of Baghdad's fall will be associated
with the great show of magnanimity and greatness continually displayed
by the Allied forces
It would be mindful to recount, as we await the capitulation of
a Baghdad, to recount its history. Baghdad was a Persian village
and lay on the other side of the Tigris River from the Sassanian
capital of Ctesphion. In its construction by the Abbasids the bricks
and mortar were used from the Imperial Palaces of Ctesphion to provide
for the new city, a subtle tribute to the Persian genius in the
life of the new city.
The stories of Scherezade, as recounted in the Arabian Nights,
give an idea of life about 800 AD in the court of one of the most
famous Abbasid rulers, Caliph Harun al-Rashid. Baghdad became a
famous center of learning in the Middle Ages, and by the tenth century
was regarded as the intellectual center of the world. As capital
of the caliphate, Baghdad was also to become the cultural capital
of the Islamic world. Baghdad reached its apogee of cultural elevation
and refinement during the time of Mamun al-Rashid who had founded
Beit al-Hikmah (House of Wisdom) where all kinds of scholars, scientists
and mathematicians were employed for the advancement of rational
sciences.
Baghdad was the city of education and research, grand mosques and
other places of worship, hospitals, the center of Sufis and Saints,
and vibrant discussions and debates. Baghdad?s Golden Age did not
last since autocracy ensured that the society would ossify to the
extent that in February 1258, when the Mongolian hordes under Genghis
Khan's grandson raged from Turan, the city capitulated with the
first signs of a siege.
The Mongolian massacre, according to Diyarbakri (d. 982/1574) in
his Tarikh al-Khamis, continued for thirty-four days during
which 1,800,000 persons were put to the sword. It was said, no doubt
an exaggeration by terrified authors who had never seen such sort
of carnge, that days blood flowed along the streets of Baghdad and
the water of the Tigris was dyed red for miles. To quote Kitab al-Fakhri,
"Then there took place such wholesale slaughter and unrestrained
looting and excessive torture and mutilation as it is hard to be
spoken of even generally." Al-Must'asim bi Allah, the last
nominal Calip, was beaten to death or in a more gruesome version
rolled in carpets and trampled by wild horseman.
Describing the fall of Baghdad, Bernard Lewis (The Middle East,
p.97) states, "Finally, in January 1258, the Mongol armies
converged on the city of Baghdad. The last caliph, al-Musta'sim,
after a brief and futile resistance, pleaded in vain for terms or
for mercy. The city was stormed, looted and burnt, and on 20 February
1258, the Commander of the Faithful, together with as many members
of his family as could be found, was put to death. The House of
Abbas, for almost exactly five centuries the titular heads of Sunni
Islam, had ceased to reign."
According to Philip K. Hitti (Islam - A Way of Life, p.
102), "So offensive were the odors from the corpses strewn
in the streets that even the terrible Mongols had to keep away for
several days."
Baghdad was again sacked by Timur Lang in 1401 who massacred many
of its inhabitants. Later, Iraq was overtaken by the Ottomans who
maintained it as a buffer state. After World War I, the League of
Nations gave Britain a mandate to administer Iraq and in1921 Britain
installed Faisal ibn Husayn as king of Iraq. The mandate ended in
1932 and Iraq became a constitutional monarchy until 1958 when the
monarchy was overthrown by the army in a coup d'etat.
Saddam eventually came to power after a series of coups in 1979-2003.
Today as his regime a tyranny unfolds the whole world will see the
new miracle of a new surrender and fall of Baghdad, no massacres,
no looting and no callous treatment of the civilians, the power
from tyrant finally transferred to the poor people of Iraq. I despair
at the images of citizens of Al-Zubayr and Basra looking for clean
drinking water, when they sit astride the largest oil reserves and
live Mesopotamia, the land of the two rivers.
Shoeless children and eyes full of fright will be the lasting images
of this war.It seems throughout its history Baghdad, and indeed
Iraq, reached an apex of glory only for its fall to be even more
appalling. Let's hope that Allies will restore Baghdad to its old
glory and the world will collectively break the chains through which
Baath regime dragged Baghdad from its glory of greatness to darkness
of medievalism. We can only be thankful that this time the catalyst
for change are not blodd-thirsty Mongols but benevolent Allies,
who place a premium on all life.
The Allies in this instance are pitted against the modern day Mongols,
the Baath party. A horrific new discovery in Basra of mutilated
corpses of Iraqi soldiers, at the hands of their own people, remind
us that the enemy still remains mired in the mould of Hulegu. The
perpetual decline for progress to anarchy has its roots in the denial
of freedom; freedom and welfare are intricately joined, with freedom
will come the fruit of prosperity. It can be hoped that just as
once the seeds of civilization nurtured itself on the rivers of
the Euphrates and Tigris, once will its lands become the bread-basket
for the entire Middle East and be a harbinger of progress in that
region.
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