Alqama ibn Mujazziz al-Mudliji al-Kinani was an early Muslim commander under the Islamic prophet

Muhammad Muhammad ( ar, مُحَمَّد; 570 – 8 June 632 Common Era, CE) was an Arab religious, social, and political leader and the founder of Islam. According to Muhammad in Islam, Islamic doctrine, he was a prophet Divine inspiration, di ...

and the caliphs

Abu Bakr Abu Bakr Abdallah ibn Uthman Abi Quhafa (; – 23 August 634) was the senior companion and was, through his daughter Aisha, a father-in-law of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, as well as the first caliph of Islam. He is known with the honor ...

() and

Umar ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb ( ar, عمر بن الخطاب, also spelled Omar, ) was the second Rashidun caliph, ruling from August 634 until his assassination in 644. He succeeded Abu Bakr () as the second caliph of the Rashidun Caliphate o ...

(). He was a leading commander and governor of

Jund Filastin Jund Filasṭīn ( ar, جُنْد فِلَسْطِيْن, "the military district of Palestine") was one of the military districts of the Umayyad and Abbasid province of Bilad al-Sham (Levant), organized soon after the Muslim conquest of the Leva ...

(the military district of

Palestine __NOTOC__ Palestine may refer to: * State of Palestine, a state in Western Asia * Palestine (region), a geographic region in Western Asia * Palestinian territories, territories occupied by Israel since 1967, namely the West Bank (including East ...

) under Abu Bakr, Umar, and possibly for a relatively short period under

Uthman Uthman ibn Affan ( ar, عثمان بن عفان, ʿUthmān ibn ʿAffān; – 17 June 656), also spelled by Colloquial Arabic, Turkish and Persian rendering Osman, was a second cousin, son-in-law and notable companion of the Islamic proph ...

().

Life

Alqama's father was a certain Mujazziz or Muharriz of the Mudlij branch of the

Kinana The Kinana ( ar, كِنَاَنَة, Kināna) were an Arab tribe based around Mecca in the Tihama coastal area and the Hejaz mountains. The Quraysh of Mecca, the tribe of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, was an offshoot of the Kinana. A number of mod ...

tribe. From 630 the Islamic prophet

appointed him a commander of a number of expeditions, and he continued as a commander after Muhammad's death under Caliph

(). Abu Bakr dispatched Alqama to lead the conquest of Palestine with

Amr ibn al-As ( ar, عمرو بن العاص السهمي; 664) was the Arab commander who led the Muslim conquest of Egypt and served as its governor in 640–646 and 658–664. The son of a wealthy Qurayshite, Amr embraced Islam in and was assigned impor ...

. In 636 or 637 Caliph

appointed Alqama as governor of half of the newly created military district of

headquartered in

Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...

. Alqama ibn Hakim al-Kinani was appointed over the other half of Palestine. According to one version of the Islamic tradition Alqama was charged with confronting Byzantine troops concentrated in Gaza. According one version in the Islamic tradition Muhammad had appointed Alqama to command a naval operation against the

Abyssinian Empire The Ethiopian Empire (), also formerly known by the exonym Abyssinia, or just simply known as Ethiopia (; Amharic and Tigrinya: ኢትዮጵያ , , Oromo: Itoophiyaa, Somali: Itoobiya, Afar: ''Itiyoophiyaa''), was an empire that historica ...

in 630 or 631, and the mission was successful. In another version, Alqama was appointed to lead the same operation by Umar in 641, in the course of which Alqama was slain. According to a report of the 8th-century historian

Sayf ibn Umar }) was an 8th-century Islamic historian and compiler of reports who lived in Kufa. He wrote the ('The Great book of Conquests and Apostasy Wars'), which was the later historian al-Tabari's (839–923) main source for the Ridda wars and the early ...

, Alqama had been governor of Palestine at the time of Umar's death in 644, while he also held that during the first two years of Uthman's reign, i.e. 644–646, Alqama's son Abd al-Rahman had been governor. After Abd al-Rahman's death Jund Filastin was attached to the Syrian governorship of

Mu'awiya ibn Abi Sufyan Mu'awiya I ( ar, معاوية بن أبي سفيان, Muʿāwiya ibn Abī Sufyān; –April 680) was the founder and first caliph of the Umayyad Caliphate, ruling from 661 until his death. He became caliph less than thirty years after the deat ...

References

Bibliography

* * * * * *{{The History of al-Tabari , volume=15 , url= 640s deaths 7th-century Arabs Generals of the Rashidun Caliphate Military personnel killed in action Medieval Palestine Kinana