His successes and generous distribution of war booty among his Khurasani Arab troops gained him wide popularity with them, but after Yazid died, Salm was not able to maintain their loyalty to the Umayyads for long.

Salm was the third eldest son of Ziyad ibn Abihi, the Umayyad governor of Iraq and virtual viceroy of the eastern part of the caliphate.

[3] According to historian Muhammad Abdulhayy Shaban, his arrest was an effort by Salm to gain the support of the influential chieftain Aslam ibn Zur'a al-Kilabi, who had been imprisoned and extorted by Qays, and to signal a departure of Abd al-Rahman's policy of redirecting the revenues of Khurasan to Damascus instead of among the province's troops for expeditions.

[1][5] Previously, the Arab armies, which had been crossing east of the Oxus from 671, refrained from camping there in the winter because they were unaccustomed to the severe Central Asian cold and the consequent need for heavier, warm clothing.

[1] However, his deputies in Sijistan and Zabulistan, the latter was under the command of his brother Abu Ubayda, were not able to emulate Salm's successes in the region that corresponds with modern-day Afghanistan.

[1] There, the Zunbils of Zabulistan and the shahs of Kabul put up stiff resistance against the Arabs, and Yazid and Abu Ubayda were ultimately slain and captured, respectively, during military expeditions against them.

[1] Unlike Ubayd Allah, Salm decided to join Ibn al-Zubayr's cause, but Zubayrid loyalists nonetheless arrested him in Basra and brought him to Mecca where he was held captive.