Mongol Invasion of the Islamic World

Episode 28: Mongol Invasion of the Islamic

Barbarian Empires of the Steppes (2014)

Dr Kenneth Harl

Film Review

Unlike Genghis Khan, who made no effort to rehabilitate the steppes cities he leveled, his son Ogedei redeveloped the cities he conquered in the eastern Abbasid Caliphate by appointing trusted administrators to run them. Yet Muslims remained in firm control in the region surrounding Baghdad, and the Mamaluks (aka Slave Sultans)* remained in sole control of Egypt.

The Mongol Empire experienced an internal civil war following Ogedei’s death in 1241. Eventually (1251) the position of great khan passed to Genghis Khan’s grandson Mongke.

He appointed Batu ruler of the Mongols and Turks on the western steppes, a post inherited by Berke following Batu’s death. The heirs of Genghis Khan’s second son  Jugatai assumed responsibility for the central steppes. Kublai Khan assumed responsibility for the eastern steppes, and his grandson Hulagu for the eastern Islamic empire.

In addition to the Mamaluks, who continued to receive slave solders from the steppes (via the Byzantine Empire), the other major threat to Mongol rule stemmed from an extremist Shiite group operating out of Alamut (Persia) that carried out orchestrated assassinations of Middle East and Central Asia political leaders.

In his largest military campaign, Hulagu and his troops left the Mongol capitol of Kharakan in 1253. Arriving in Samarkind by 1255, by 1257 they had leveled most of the Shiite assassins’ palaces and confiscated huge libraries of intelligence the Shiites had collected on Mongol opponents.

After securing Persia, in 1258 Hulagu next moved against the Abbasid Caliphate in Baghdad, with support from Christians in Armenia and Antioch. He slaughtered a total of 800,000 civilians in Baghdad, sparing the Nestorian Christians living there because his wife was a Nestorian Christian.

In 1259 he sacked Al Jazeera, the grasslands and cities comprising modern-day Syria, marching as far southwest as Gaza on the Mediterranean. In response, the Mamaluk army (with the help of Crusaders) marched north to Galilee to confront the Mongol army (consisting mainly of Turkish mercenaries). This resulted in the Mongol Army’s very first defeat.

In 1259, Hulagu suspended operations after being notified of the great khan Monke’s death. This would spell the end of Mongol westward military expansion.

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*Historically Turkish military leaders relied heavily on civilians and troops they conquered in battle and trained as slave soldiers. See 9th Century AD: Mass Migration of Uighur Turks to the Steppes fo China Leads to Rise of Seljuk Turks on the Steppes

Film can viewed free with a library card at Kanopy.

https://www.kanopy.com/en/pukeariki/video/5695047

Israel’s Secret 40-year War with Iran

The Secret with Iran: The 30-Year Covert Struggle for Control of a “Rogue” State

by Ronen Bergman

Translated by Ronnie Hope

Oneworld (2009)

Book Review

This is a very depressing book. The “secret war” referred to is the covert war Israeli intelligence has fought with Iran over the last [40] years. Most of The Secret War with Iran is an endless chronology of lawless tit-for-tat revenge killings, car bombings, kidnappings and extrajudicial assassinations Israeli intelligence and Hezbollah* impose on one another.

While most of the narrative seems historically accurate, the author’s clear pro-Zionist bias results in a number of troubling inconsistencies. Examples include persistent claims about Iran’s mythical nuclear weapons arsenal – despite verification by US intelligence (see Iran Doesn’t Have a Nuclear Weapons Program) that their nuclear weapons program ceased in 2003; a clear attempt to minimize the role of Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine in generating and perpetuating Middle East violence; repeated claims that Iran (rather than Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the CIA) was the key player in the birth of Al Qaeda; and an erroneous assertion that Saddam Hussein expelled UN nuclear inspectors in 1998 (Bill Clinton had them recalled so he could bomb Iraq – see Clinton’s Worst Crimes).

Despite these weaknesses, the book provides valuable insight about the Israeli origin of Iran bashing recently taken up by Trump and the Republican Congress. The book also contains important historical background on Ruhollah Khomeini and the 1979 Iranian revolution to overthrow the ruthless CIA-backed Shah. Prior to reading this book, I was unaware of the role Yassar Arafat and the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) played in training Iran’s Revolutionary Guards nor the role of Iran in training, arming and funding Hezbollah, the Shi’ite militia group operating on the Israeli border in southern Lebanon.

After 1948 when the new state of Israel forcibly evicted millions of Palestinians from their lands, a sizeable proportion fled to southern Lebanon where they’re housed in refuge camps to this day. It was these camps that gave rise to the PLO.

After their UN-mandated expulsion from Lebanon in 1987, many PLO fighter returned to Palestine – where they launched the first Intifada.

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*Hezbollah is a Shi’ite Islamist political party and milita group based in Lebanon. They enjoy strong support from Lebanon’s civilian population owing to their programs offering health, education and social services the Lebanese government is too poor to provide.