Battle of al-Asnam

In 742 AD, a large two-Berber army marched to attack Qayrawan, one led by Oqasha ibn Ayub al-Fezari and the other by Abd al-Wahid ibn Yazid al-Hawwari. Urgent to meet Oqasha on the battlefield, Handhala dispatched an army of 40,000 cavalry led by a Lakhmite to meet Abd al-Wahid, and fought for a month before they were defeated and lost half of their army. Handhala defeated Oqasha at the battle of al-Qarn and executed him, but withdrew after suffering heavy casualties and prepared for Abd al-Wahid. In Kairouan, Handhala recruited the inhabitants and armed them, and raised around 5,000 infantry and 5,000 archers. Handhala also dug a trench around the city and is said to have wanted to retreat and write to the caliph for reinforcements after seeing the size of Oqasha's army. == Battle ==

Handhala marched to meet the Berbers in a place called al-Asnam, near Qayrawan. The Berbers were 3 miles away from Qayrawan, and they had a large army of around 300,000 men under Abd al-Wahid. When they lined up for battle, the Islamic scholars played a major role in urging the people of Qayrawan to wage jihad and fight the Kharijite Berber rebels, reminding them of what the Kharajites did to women by enslaving them, to children by making them slaves, and to men by killing them — so the men drew their swords from their sheaths. The women came out to encourage the men to stand firm on the battlefield. The Arab left flank was overwhelmed by the Berber right flank and was soon to break, however after a bitter fighting between both sides, the Arabs defeated the Berber left and the center. It was not long before the Arab left flank regained its position, repulsed the Berbers and pursued them to Djeloula, killing many of them in the battle. Abd al-Wahid's army was slaughtered. According to the American historian Khalid Yahya Blankinship, the claim by medieval Muslim sources that the number of Berber dead at al-Asnam were one hundred eighty thousand "is an exaggeration not to be trusted even in a vague way, as it may have been invented by the caliphal tradition to counterbalance the earlier record of utter failure in the Berber war." Handhala reported the victory to Caliph Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik, who was delighted to hear the news. Following the two Umayyad victories, Al-Layth ibn Sa'd is said to have remarked: "No battle has been intense since the Battle of Badr than the Arabs' battle of al-Asnam." ==See also==