Part 41

The caliph hastened to notify the Seljuk sultan of what had happened, and asked him to pay attention to the matter and hasten to respond to the calls of the Muslims. The Seljuk sultan issued immediate orders to his governor in Mosul, the emir Mawdood, telling him to form a new Islamic alliance with his son, King Mas'ood, as commander in chief of the Muslims.235 All the rulers of the Seljuk region — Suqman al-Qubuti, ruler of Khalat236, Tabriz237 and part of Diyarbakir; Ilghazi al-Artuqi who sent his son Ayaz as his deputy; the two Kurdish emirs, Ahmadeel ruler of Maraghah238 and AbulHayja' ruler of Irbil; in addition to some Persian emirs led by Ilkani and Zangi the two sons of Bursuq the emir of Hamadhan239 — gathered under the leadership of Mawdood, the ruler of Mosul. The allied forces began their military operation in Muharram 505 AH/August 1111 CE by conquering a number of Crusader sites east of the Euphrates, then they went and besieged Edessa, where the campaign spread panic among the inhabitants, but in fact it did not change a thing. Edessa wore the Muslims down because of its fortifications and the resilience of its inhabitants, at which point Mawdood decided to cross the Euphrates and attack Turbessel.240 The Muslim forces hoped to tempt their enemy to cross the Euphrates, thus to get the better of them, but this was a mistake on the Muslims' part, because when they crossed the Euphrates, the Crusaders were able to transfer a large amount of food, weapons and reinforcements to Edessa, which grew strong after it had been weak. It would have fallen into the Muslims' hands if they had continued their siege of the city.241 It was not long before Joscelin, the ruler of Turbessel, who was under pressure from the Muslim forces, was able to bribe the Kurdish commander Ahmadeel, who with his troops formed a large part of the Muslim forces, to withdraw despite the objections of all the other leaders.242 Soon after that, Radwan asked Mawdood for help and summoned his troops to Aleppo so that they could work together from there against the Crusaders. Mawdood left Turbessel and headed for Aleppo at the head of his forces, but he did not get far from Turbessel before Joscelin came out, leading his knights, and was able to attack the Muslim rearguard, killing nearly one thousand men and returning home laden with booty. Radwan's call to Mawdood was not genuine; hardly had the Muslim forces drawn close to Aleppo than he shut the city gates in their faces and took precautions to prevent any demonstrations by ordering the arrest of many prominent figures in the city, whom he took as hostages. Mawdood had no option but to lead his army south to Shaizar, after raiding a number of Crusader sites in the north. In Shaizar he met with Tughtigin, who was heading towards Baghdad to seek help in taking back Tripoli, but he was afraid that Damascus would be taken from him, so he had started to negotiate with the Crusaders in secret. As for Tancred, who had camped in front of Shaizar, he retreated to Afamiyah, and sent word to King Baldwin asking him for help; the latter responded and sent for all the knights in the Crusader East to join him, and he was joined by a large number of them. Tancred also asked his followers from all parts of Antioch for help. Mawdood fortified himself behind the walls of Shaizar before the gathering of Crusaders — which grew to sixteen thousand fighters led by the King of Jerusalem and the rulers of Edessa, Antioch and Tripoli — was complete. Mawdood refused to be dragged by his enemies into a decisive battle, but things did not go well with regard to his army. Tughtigin did not want to offer him help until after Mawdood promised to go ahead with his campaign to the south to fight the Crusaders in Palestine, in spite of the riskiness of this attempt from a military viewpoint. The Kurdish commander Bursuq fell ill and wanted to return to his country, and Suqman died suddenly, so his troops withdrew northward, carrying his corpse with them. Ahmadeel hastened to withdraw his troops in an attempt to capture some of Suqman's possessions. Mawdood was no longer able to launch an attack as the numbers of his troops were diminishing daily, and he did not want to spend the winter far from Mosul so he returned there.243 This poor conduct on the part of some of the commanders had a direct impact on the possibility of achieving a decisive victory against the Crusaders like that achieved by Jekermish and Suqman in the Battle of al-Balikh. These events demonstrated the extent of the Muslim division and lack of unity, at a time when Crusader forces had gathered in the north and south of Syria, and Baldwin King of Jerusalem had achieved a kind of leadership over all the other Crusader rulers.244 The policies of Radwan in the emirate of Aleppo were all dreadful. He made a deal with the Ismailis and Crusaders, forming an alliance with them against their Muslim opponents.