The Levant Egypt North Africa Anatolia & Constantinople Border conflicts Sicily and Southern Italy Naval warfare Byzantine reconquest The Battle of the Masts (Arabic: مَعْرَكَة ذَات الصَّوَارِي, romanized: Maʿrakat Dhāt al-Ṣawārī) was a naval battle fought in 655 between the Rashidun Caliphate under the command of Abu al-A'war and the Byzantine Empire led by emperor Constans II (r. 641–668).

The battle was part of the earliest campaign by Mu'awiya, the governor of Syria, to reach Constantinople and is considered to be "the first decisive conflict of Islam on the deep".

Uthman permitted Muawiyah to raid the island of Cyprus in 649 and the success of that campaign set the stage for the undertaking of naval activities by the Government of Egypt.

[4] Following their defeat, the respite the Romans were granted is typically ascribed to the Arab fleet retreating after its victory and conflict over the authority of Uthman among the crew, the first stirrings of a civil war among the Muslims.

The siege was unsuccessful, however, due to a fierce storm that sank the ships with war machines aboard, an event the Romans attributed to divine intervention.

Also it provides a strategic explanation for the Arab fleet's retreat following the victory in the Battle of the Masts, since the First Fitna would not break out until a year later, perhaps influenced by setbacks against the Byzantines and in the Caucasus.