[2][3][4][5][6][7] Charles-André Julien, while reporting that the battle took place on Chelif, notes that this would imply that the Kharejite revolt would have reached central Zenetia, which would confirm the thesis of Émile-Félix Gautier.
The bulk of the Ifriqiyan army, under command of the general Habib ibn Abi Obeida al-Fihri, was at that moment overseas, on an expedition to conquer Sicily.
The governor Obeid Allah ibn el-Habhab immediately dispatched instructions ordering Habib to break off the expedition and ship the army back to Africa.
This column was dispatched immediately to Tangiers and instructed to serve as the vanguard and to keep the Berber rebels in check, until the Sicilian expeditionary force disembarked and caught up with them.
Rather than give pursuit, the Arab cavalry commander Khalid ibn Abi Habib held the line just south of Tangiers, blockading the Berber-held city while awaiting the reinforcements from the Sicilian expedition.
[citation needed] Khalid ibn Hamid al-Zanati opted to immediately attack the Ifriqiyan army mulling around the 'Shalif' (or the outskirts of Tangiers) before the arrival of the reinforcements from Sicily.
Habib ibn Abi Obeida entrenched what remained of the Ifriqiyan army in the vicinity of Tlemcen (perhaps as far back as Tahert), and called upon Kairouan for reinforcements.
[11] In February, 741, the Umayyad Caliph Hisham appointed Kulthum ibn Iyad al-Qasi to replace the disgraced Obeid Allah as governor in Ifriqiya.