Rashid bin Matar ruled at a time when maritime violence was prevalent throughout the Persian Gulf, following incursions by the Portuguese and fighting at sea and on land on the Persian Coast between the British and Dutch and the British and French, over 'factories' established on that coast by both maritime powers.
British East India Company interests were habitually protected by the use of firepower and two Arab maritime forces jostling for supremacy on both coasts of the Persian Gulf, the Al Qasimi and the Bani Ma'ain, soon found themselves in conflict with the British ( J. G. Lorimer reports 'the insolence of the local chiefs').
This began a prolonged conflict with the Ma'in, who allied with Mir Mahanna, the Persian governor of Bandar Rig.
[6] The alliance with Mulla Ali Shah paid Rashid dividends when the long and bitter conflict with the Bani Ma'in was concluded with a peace agreement in January 1763 which ceded him a third of the revenues of Qishm island.
[7] Alliances shifted quickly, however, and by 1773 Rashid threw in his lot with the Sultan of Muscat in attacking Karim Khan, the Vakil of Persia, on the Persian coast.