Ibadi

Further expansion

Ibadi missionary activity was met with considerable success in North Africa. In 757, Ibadis seized Tripoli and captured Kairouan the next year. Driven out by the Abbasid army in 761, Ibadi leaders founded a state, which became known as Rustamid dynasty, in Tahart. It was overthrown in 909 by the Fatimid Caliphate. Immediately following this period, the Ibadi faith had a continuing presence in the Sahara, as they fled the end of the Rustamid dynasty and founded the regional trading city, Sedrata, along the Trans-Saharan trade routes. Ibadi communities continue to exist in the Nafusa Mountains in northwestern Libya, the island of Djerba in Tunisia, and in the M'zab in Algeria. In East Africa, they are found in Zanzibar. Ibadi missionary activity also reached Persia, India, Egypt, Sudan, Spain and Sicily, although Ibadis communities in these regions ceased to exist.