The Qarmatians of the Levant and the equation of confrontation with the Abbasid Caliphate through the history of Al-Tabari

Abstract

The Qarmatians are an esoteric movement that rebelled against its leadership, as it seems that the political dimensions overshadowed the religious aspects, although its leaders were extremists in their religious views related to Islamic law. Given the expansion of the Qarmatian movement in many regions, each group was classified according to the region in which it had strong influence, such as the Qarmatians of Yemen, the Qarmatians of Bahrain and Iraq, and the Qarmatians of the Levant (the subject of the research). Zakruiyeh was the founder of the Qarmatian movement in the Levant, where he and his sons established a military force that played a pivotal role in spreading chaos, wars, and destruction in one of the most prominent regions of the Islamic world. They were distinguished by sectarian extremism, not religious extremism, as they were innocent of their actions, and their behavior and ideas were based on fighting, cunning, deception, and political malice in order to seize power, as they relied on looting, destruction, and killing innocents as soon as they disagreed with them or opposed their deviant ideology. Even the Hajj caravans were not spared from their attacks, however, their movement quickly collapsed in the face of the combined efforts of the forces hostile to them and then they were eliminated, specifically during the rule of the Abbasids and specifically during the rule of the Caliph (Al-Muktafi Billah)(289- 296AH) who used all the possibilities to eliminate them after repeated and violent military confrontations in which he was able to kill Zakruyah, the leader of the Qarmatians of the Levant. Thus, this black page was turned and ended.