THE BATTLE of the Confederates [the Battle of al-Ahzaab] was the most serious assault that Madinah suffered. The Quraysh, who had been defeated in the Badr and who had yet to achieve what they were hoping for, this time, launched a common march against Madinah by unifying with the confederates throughout the Arabian Peninsula.
The unified confederates, besides the polytheists of Quraysh, were composed of the greatest polytheist tribes of Arabia, the Jews of Haibar, Abu A’mir the Fâsiq, who resented the city of Yathrib for having been transformed into ‘Madinat al-Nabi’ (the city of the messenger), his adherents, and other tribes. Furthermore, although the Jewish tribe of Bani Quraiza living near Madinah had a standing treaty with the Prophet (peace be upon him), they made plans with the unified confederates to violate this treaty. To complicate matters even more, the hyp-ocrites within Madinah itself fabricated and disseminated malicious notions regarding Allah and his Apostle with the aim to demoralize the believers.
All of these confederates had a single, specific target: to wipe Islam from the scene of history by occupying Madinah and to sweep the Allah’s Prophet (peace be upon him) away.
One of the Prophet’s companions Abbas (RA), being informed of this plan to assault Madinah swiftly and suddenly, immediately relayed this plan to Madinah, prompting Allah’s Prophet (peace be upon him) and his Companions to take action, following the suggestion of Salmān al-Farisī; specifically, to dig a trench around the city. This trench’s depth measured 2.5 meters, its width 4 metres, and its length 4 kilometres. Digging such a trench in such a very short time was an extraordinary feet. In a period of food shortage, Allah’s Prophet (peace be upon him) and his Companions were honoured with a number of miracles. For instance, a piece of date became fertile so as to feed everyone. The Prophet (peace be upon him), upon the invitation of Jābir, responded with all the Companions, and the meal, which would normally only be enough for ten people, fed all the Companions.
The most meaningful of these miracles occurred when they encountered a large rock. The Companions tried many times in vain to split this rock. Had the rock stayed in place, it would have functioned as a passage by which the attackers could enter Madinah. When this was mentioned to the Prophet (peace be upon him), he invoked the Lord of all worlds and struck the rock with a pickaxe three times. With every strike, a flare as of lightning flashed back over the city and toward the south. With every flare, Allah’s Prophet (peace be upon him) informed his companions about the future of Islam: “Did you see them? By the light of the first, I saw the castles of Yemen; by the light of the second, I saw the castles of Syria; by the light of the third, I saw the white palace of Kisrā at Madāin. Through the first Allah has opened unto me Yemen; through the second He has opened unto me Syria and the West; and through the third the East.”
While the believers in Madinah were under siege by the unified confederates of Arabia, the hypocrites dared to mock the miracle that our Master Muhammad was honoured with. Some of them went as far as to say, “Muhammad informs us o the conquests of such and such plac-es, whereas we are afraid of going three steps away even in order to relieve ourselves.”
As the Chapter of Al-Ahzaab (the Confederates) tells us, although these circumstances only increased the doubts the hypocrites had regarding Allah and His Messenger (peace be upon him), they worked the opposite for the believers, increasing their conviction. Because the Lord of all worlds declared to them that in return for their faith, they would not be abandoned, but would be tested with their properties and souls (nafs). Here, they were to experience a serious test that had been promised by Allah.
In the end, the confederates, after a fruitless siege that lasted for twenty-eight days, having been exposed to a terrific storm, desisted from the siege, returning homes empty-handed. This was the last assault that the united confederates conducted against Madinah. Afterwards, they found no further opportunity to attempt an assault on Madinah.
However, when the promise of Allah was realised and Mecca submitted herself to Islam, the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him), in reference to the days of the Battle of the Confed-erates—what we know “War of the Trenches”—was to praise Allah with words such as, “He has made good on His promise that He held to His bondman, helping him to defeat all the confederates.”
Then in the subsequent years, Islam, exactly as had been promised by the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him), spread over through Madāin (Mesopotamia, Anatolia, Iran), Busrā (Egypt, Africa), and Yemen (Indian Subcontinent, The Far East).
Islam has not been able to be removed from these three specific destinations after having tak-en root. Neither Mongols nor the Crusaders, nor the European invasions of the recent centuries have been able to remove Islam from these destinations. Although they may have occupied these specific Muslim territories, they have not forced them into submission.
In pre-modern times, the last great assault in respect to the confederates has been realised by a group of confederates, who although were rivals to each other, were unified against Islam. They launched a campaign against Islam and the Muslims. During this period, even the tiniest of countries like the Netherlands reaped tremendous material benefits from a number of its colonies in Muslim territories. Toward the end of this period, we see the gravest of stages when the Western powers were preparing a “coup de grace” against the Ottomans and their capital of Istanbul in the days of the First World War. Bediuzzaman’s “Antidote for Despair” and “A Speech in Dream,” along with Mehmet Akif’s “To the Martyrs of Dardanelles (Ça-nakkkale)” can only be truly understood by placing one’s mind inside of the circumstances of those days.
In the subsequent period, although Muslims have rid themselves of the actual colonisation of the West, they have continued to suffer under the authority of men and their confederates who carry Muslim names, but who function as outposts for the West. In this era specifically, the believers have tried to save themselves from the “saviours.”
This period has lasted nearly one century. Then, in this country and in the other territories, the believers have caught a real chance for “salvation.” Furthermore, they recognized that one’s salvation depends on all others’ salvation. In this respect, through the hope of Bediuzzaman, within the context of the ‘miracles of brotherhood seen clearly,’ what is happening in Turkey (the author’s home country), Syria, Egypt, and parts of the Islamic world remind me that we are face to face with “global confederates.” Just as the unified confederates of Arabia togeth-er assaulted the Companions of the Prophet, today, all the factions of the globe unified against us as a ‘global confederate’ struggle to maintain domination over the Islamic world from every flank, using every opportunity available to them. Here, we observe the “global confederates” which places the names of those who have been the hope and symbol of the Islamic union, the real salvation of the Ummah (the Muslim community as a whole), and the resistance against global tyranny and oppression onto a target board.
In my humble understanding, this is how I interpret what has been happening in the Islamic world for such a long time, and particularly in this country in recent times. Therefore, defending those figures who have been a hope and symbol of the Ummah, before all kinds of attacks is not a ‘political’ issue.
My reply is thus for those who wonder where I stand, why I stand as such, and why I express my thoughts in such ways.
*Translated by Muhammet Şeviker and edited by Zack Crist.
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