Al-Qassim

After his retreat from Riyadh, Ibn Rashid had one strategic card left: Al-Qassim. The regions north of Riyadh, Al-Washm and Sudair, had turned toward Abdulaziz after he recovered Riyadh and won at Al-Dalam and Al-Silmiyah. The leading families of Al-Qassim’s two main towns, Al Muhanna of Buraidah and Al Selaim of Unaizah, were living in exile in Kuwait.

Ibn Rashid’s garrisons put up resistance at Shaqra and Tharmada. But his family’s rule over the region, from 1309 to 1320 AH, had never really been accepted, at least in people’s hearts. They had been under Al Saud for almost two centuries.

Ottoman battalions

Ibn Rashid went to southern Iraq and pressed the Ottoman ruler of Basra for soldiers and supplies. The Ottomans finally gave him eleven battalions, each of 800 to 1,000 soldiers. They were armed with the German Mauser rifle, known locally as Um Khams.

Unaizah and Buraidah

In 1321 AH Abdulaziz set out as if heading for Kuwait, then turned toward Al-Qassim, with Al Selaim and Al Muhanna at his side. That year he fought Ibn Rashid’s garrison at Faidhat Al-Ser.

He then appeared at the southern walls of Unaizah. Its people, loyal to the Saudi state, opened the gates and joined him in besieging the fort held by Ibn Rashid’s deputy, Fuhaid ibn Sibhan. Abdulaziz granted the garrison safety for their lives and their guns, and they left for Ha’il. He was not vengeful: force was his last resort for as long as there was room for reform, and he sought to win over his enemies.

Majed ibn Hamoud Al-Obaid Al-Rasheed, camped near Buraidah, tried to escape to Ha’il when he heard Unaizah had fallen. Abdulaziz attacked him and he withdrew, avoiding a confrontation while Ibn Rashid was still in Iraq. Al Muhanna sent a delegation inviting Abdulaziz to Buraidah. He besieged Ibn Rashid’s garrison there, under Abdulrahman ibn Dab’an, until it surrendered. By 1322 AH Buraidah and Unaizah were his, though Al-Qassim as a whole was still divided between the two powers.

Al-Bukairiyah

Ibn Rashid returned with his Ottoman battalions and camped at Al-Shaihiyah, north of Al-Bukairiyah, where Abdulaziz was. (Historians of the period sometimes prefer the word “skirmish” to “battle” for fighting between Muslims.)

The Ottoman force alone numbered roughly 8,800 to 11,000 men, with better rifles and a cannon. Abdulaziz may have had about 4,000, although the sources give 4,000, 5,000 or 10,000, and such numbers are unreliable. What is clear is that Ibn Rashid’s army was the larger.

Abdulaziz split his army in two. He led one part against the Ottoman battalions; the men of Unaizah and Buraidah led the other against Ibn Rashid, the men of Ha’il and their allied tribes. The hills of Al-Bukairiyah lay between the two. The Qassim force beat Ibn Rashid’s men, while Abdulaziz’s part broke against the Ottomans and he was shot in the left arm.

Then the Qassim force came over the hill behind the Ottomans who were chasing Abdulaziz’s men. The Ottomans took it for an ambush. Caught between two fronts, they even began firing on one another, and many were killed or captured. A near defeat turned into a sweeping victory that struck about half of Ibn Rashid’s forces.

In battles of that time it was normal for tribes to start on one side and change sides partway through. This later led Abdulaziz to his great social project, the Hijar, in 1330 AH.

Al-Shananah

Ibn Rashid did not go home. He fell back to Al-Shananah, near Al-Rass, and the two sides camped there for two months, with skirmishes. Abdulaziz sent Fahad Al-Rushodi of Al-Qassim to propose a truce, but Ibn Rashid dismissed it. His soldiers were starving and his tribes restless. When he began to move off, Abdulaziz attacked and won the Battle of Al-Shananah. Ibn Rashid’s army fell back to the palace of Ibn Agail nearby.

1323 AH was a year of recovery for both sides. The Ottomans saw that Ibn Rashid had not brought them victory and partly withdrew their support, and Abdulaziz opened contact with the Ottoman state.

Rawdat Muhanna

In 1324 AH the two sides met again, at Rawdat Muhanna, in the middle of a dust storm. In the fighting, Abdulaziz ibn Mutib ibn Rashid was killed, and with him ended any serious resistance to Abdulaziz. After Rawdat Muhanna, Al-Qassim belonged to Abdulaziz; the Ottomans still held Al-Ahsa but had no authority in Al-Qassim. By 1324 AH Riyadh, the lands north and south of it, and Al-Qassim were all his.

In Ha’il, Ibn Rashid’s son Mutib succeeded him and was killed in a family power struggle, and Sultan Al-Hamoud Al-Obaid Al-Rasheed took power. Abdulaziz defeated Ha’il again at the Battle of Al-Tarfiyah in 1325 AH. Sultan too was killed, and the young Saud ibn Abdulaziz ibn Rashid became ruler, with his uncle Zamil ibn Sibhan as regent. A truce followed, with few clashes, from 1326 to 1332 AH.