Busr ibn Abi Artat
He led a large-scale campaign against Ali's supporters in Arabia, gaining the submission of Medina, Mecca and Ta'if to Mu'awiya's caliphate and carrying out punitive measures against the inhabitants of Yemen.
Busr hailed from the Banu Amir ibn Lu'ayy, a clan of the Quraysh tribe's Zawahir subgroup which lived in the mountainous part of Mecca in the Hejaz (present-day Saudi Arabia).
[8] During the First Muslim Civil War (656–661), Busr was a staunch supporter of the governor of Syria, Mu'awiya ibn Abi Sufyan, against Caliph Ali (r. 656–661).
While Amr ibn al-As was sent to wrest control of Egypt, Mu'awiya dispatched his lieutenant commanders on raids against Ali's territory in Iraq and Arabia.
[13] A previous attempt by Mu'awiya to secure oaths of allegiance from the Quraysh of Mecca had failed under the command of Yazid ibn Shajara earlier in 660.
[14] According to the orientalist Henri Lammens, Busr was "perhaps the most striking figure among the lieutenants" of Mu'awiya, "a typical Bedouin of the old school, utterly impervious to pity, if Shi'i [sic] tradition has not exaggerated the details of the portrait of this fiery opponent of Ali".
[2] The historian Wilferd Madelung holds Busr was chosen to lead the campaign because he was not "plagued" by the "scruples" of Yazid ibn Shajara, who had been careful not to spill blood in the Islamic city of Mecca.
[14] Busr did not encounter resistance as he entered the city and issued a condemnatory speech against Medina's traditional elite, the Ansar (early converts and allies of Muhammad).
[16] After a stay of a few days in Medina, Busr proceeded toward Mecca, where Ali's governor Qutham ibn Abbas fled along with a large number of the city's inhabitants.
[16] Busr located a companion of Muhammad and Ali's representative at the arbitration talks, Abu Musa al-Ash'ari, who had gone into hiding in Mecca, and pardoned him.
[23] Upon entering southern Arabia, Busr executed the ascetic Ka'b ibn Abda Dhi'l-Habaka al-Nahdi for his past criticism of Uthman.
[24] Ubayd Allah's deputy in Sana'a, Amr ibn Araka al-Thaqafi, defended the city but was killed by Busr's forces along with numerous other inhabitants.
[24] According to the Zaydi Shia scholar Abu Ishaq Ibrahim al-Thaqafi (d. 896), Busr killed 30,000 men during his campaign in Arabia, an exaggerated figure according to Madelung.
[24] Busr ended his campaign in Hadhramawt and withdrew to Syria upon the approach of a Kufan relief army sent by Ali under the command of Jariya ibn Qudama.
[25] In Madelung's opinion, Busr did not confront the relief army because of "Mu'awiya's instructions rather than his own preference", the purpose of the campaign having been to intimidate the population of Arabia into submission with minimum Syrian casualties, rather than to conquer and permanently occupy any part of the region.
[26] Busr was appointed to the vanguard of Mu'awiya's army, which the caliph led in person, during the campaign to wrest control of Kufa from Ali's son and successor al-Hasan.
[2] The latter abdicated and left Kufa for Medina,[27] after which Busr was appointed governor of Basra,[2] one of the main garrison cities and administrative centers of Iraq, in November 661.
[27] During his governorship, he arrested Abd al-Rahman, Ubayd Allah, and Abbad,[29] three sons of Ziyad ibn Abihi, Ali's governor in Fars (southwestern Iran), who had refused to recognize Mu'awiya's caliphate and held out in the fortress of Istakhr.
[32] According to Agapius and the traditional Islamic sources, Busr led a winter raid which reached Constantinople in 662/63 or 663/64, forcing the Byzantine troops to withdraw into the city.
[31] A seventh-generation descendant of Busr, Abu Abd al-Malik Ahmad ibn Ibrahim al-Busri al-Qurashi (d. 902), was a Damascene transmitter of traditions about the Islamic prophet Muhammad.
