Azraqites

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The Azraqites ( Arabic أزارقة, DMG Azāriqa ) were an extreme Kharijite sect that emerged in Basra in the 680s and later cracked down on Muslims of different faiths in Iraq and southern Iran with great brutality . It could only be destroyed in 698.

Nāfiʿ ibn Azraq, after whom the sect is named, was one of those Kharijites who first supported Abdallah ibn az-Zubair in 683 and moved to him in Mecca, but then renounced him when they realized that he did not share their political views . When Ibn Zubayr wanted to appoint a governor in Basra that same year , Ibn al-Azraq and other Kharijites resisted.

Ibn al-Azraq was killed in battle quite soon, but his followers refused to give up the fight and withdrew with large numbers to the east, to the province of Chusistan . From there they went pillaging and pillaging through the hinterland of Basra and al-Ahwāz . Muslims who differed in their views or who refused to follow them were killed, including their children and wives. This practice was called Istirāḍ . Only those who actively supported the Azraqites were spared.

The South Arab military leader Al-Muhallab ibn Abī Sufra , whom Musʿab ibn az-Zubair had won for the Meccan caliphate in 686, was able to liberate the surroundings of Baṣra from the Azraqites, but they retreated to Iran and continued their activities there. When they besieged Isfahan in 687 , the local Zubairid governor ʿAttāb ibn Warqāʼ was able to put them to flight by a surprise attack. However, under their new leader al-Qaṭarī ibn al-Fuǧāʿa, the Azraqites soon moved against Iraq again. After the Umayyads took control of Iraq in 691, they again commissioned Muhallab to fight the Azraqites. He was able to crush the sect, which had been weakened by internal divisions in 698.

The Azraqites taught that failure to obey the sect's statutes amounted to apostasy from Islam , which would result in death for the apostate and their entire family. However, the killing of non-Muslims was prohibited.

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