This Day in History (April 19)

Date: 18 April 2021 - 22:57

News ID: ۸۹۳۱۶

Today is Monday; 30th of the Iranian month of Farvardin 1400 solar hijri; corresponding to 6th of the Islamic month of Ramadhan 1442 lunar hijri; and April 19, 2021, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.
Over three-and-a-half lunar millenniums ago, on this day (Ramadhan 6), God revealed the Torah to Prophet Moses (AS) on Mount Sinai for the guidance of the Israelites after they had been delivered from bondage in Pharaonic Egypt. Islam regards Moses as one of the five Great Messengers of God – the other four being Noah, Abraham, Jesus and the last and greatest of them all, Prophet Mohammad (SAWA). He has been mentioned some 500 times in the holy Qur’an, which confirms the Torah revealed to him. Unfortunately, over the centuries the Israelites have tampered with the contents of this holy book to such an extent that except for some scattered passages, nothing remains in the present Torah of the revealed words of God.
1490 solar years ago, on this day in 531 AD at the Battle of Callinicum near what later came to be known as ar-Raqqah in Syria, an Iranian army of 15,000 cavalry and 5000 Lakhmid Arabs led by the Sassanid general, Azarethes, defeated the forces of Byzantine or the Eastern Roman Empire, made up of 25,000 Greeks and Slavs and 3000 Ghassanid Arabs under the command of Belisarius.
1241 lunar years ago, on this day in 201 AH, a grand ceremony was held in the Khorasani city of Merv (currently in Turkmenistan) by the Abbasid caliph, Mamoun, to officially declare Imam Reza (AS), the 8th Infallible Successor of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA), as heir apparent. This was part of an intricate plot to tarnish the unsullied image of the Ahl al-Bayt. Courtiers and the masses, beginning with Mamoun’s own son, Abbas, swore allegiance to Imam Reza (AS), in whose name coins were minted, while the official colour of the Abbasids was changed from the black to the green of the Prophet’s Household. The crafty Mamoun, alarmed at the popularity amongst the masses of the Prophet’s progeny and concerned about the lack of legitimacy of the rule of the Abbasids, who had deceived the ummah some 70 years earlier to hijack the caliphate after obliterating the Omayyad usurpers, forced Imam Reza (AS) to leave Medina and come to his capital Merv in distant Khorasan. Here he offered to abdicate the caliphate in the Imam’s favour, but was frustrated in his devilish design by the curt reply: "If the caliphate is really yours, you ought not give to others what God has given you as a trust; and if it does not belong to you, how can you give to others what is not yours.” After over two months of pressures coupled with threats of covert death, he forced the Imam to at least accept being his heir apparent, despite the glaring age gap of 22 years between the young 31-year-old ruler and the 53-year old heir apparent, who might not be expected to outlive the person he was supposed to succeed. To the horror of Mamoun, his plot backfired as the popularity of Imam Reza (AS) further grew among the people. Two years later in 203 AH, he martyred the Imam through poisoning of food, and shifted the Abbasid capital back to Baghdad.
979 lunar years ago, on this day in 463 AH, the renowned Iranian Imami theologian, Abu Ya’la Hamza Ibn Abdullah Sallar Ibn Abdul-Aziz Daylami, passed away. It is worth noting Abu Ya’la is a common "kunya” (agnomen) of all those persons whose name is Hamza.
570 solar years ago, on this day in 1451 AD, with the abdication of Alam Shah, the last king of the Seyyed Dynasty of North India, the ambitious Pashto warrior, Bahlol Lodi ascended the throne of Delhi as Bahlol Shah Ghazi. The dynasty founded by him lasted 75 years, ending with the defeat and death of his grandson, Ibrahim Lodi in the Battle of Panipat in 1526 against the Mughal conqueror Zaheer od-Din Mohammad Babar.
515 solar years ago, on this day in 1506 AD, the Lisbon Massacre or the Easter Slaughter began in the capital of Portugal, when the Catholics, joined by Christian sailors from other European lands, anchored in the Tagus, persecuted, tortured, killed, and burnt at the stake hundreds of people who were accused of being Jews and, thus, guilty of heresy.
246 solar years ago, on this day in 1775 AD, the armed rebellion of the 13 New England colonies against the British crown – also known as the American Revolutionary War – started with a victory of the colonists at Battle of Concord. This was prelude to the birth of the United States of America, which has since expanded to its present size, large through a policy of expansionism and seizure of Mexican territory.
214 solar years ago, on this day in 1807 AD, the British forces, following their failure to confront the Egyptians, withdrew from Alexandria. The British plot was to seize Egypt in order to pressure the Ottoman Empire, but the Egyptian ruler, Mohammad Ali Pasha, with the assistance of Egyptian people and ulema, who had issued a fatwa for Jihad against the invading troops, defended the country.
182 solar years ago, on this day in 1839 AD, the Treaty of London established the new country Belgium as a kingdom and guaranteed its neutrality. Made up of ethnic Dutch, French and German speakers, its capital Brussels today is the headquarters of the 28-nation European Union (EU).
139 solar years ago, on this day in 1882 AD, English naturalist, Charles Darwin, died. He is the author of the controversial theory of evolution which he presented in "Survival of the Fittest,” and "On the Origin of Species.” His theories have been refuted by both Christian and Muslim scientists and scholars as absurd.
115 solar years ago, on this day in 1906 AD, French physical chemist and co-winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903, Pierre Curie died at the age of 46.
112 solar years ago, on this day in 1909 AD, Howard Baskerville, a 24-year old American Presbyterian preacher in Iran, was shot dead while trying to break the siege of Tabriz as a defender of the new Iranian constitution. Born in North Platte, Nebraska, he came to Iran in 1907, and taught English and geometry in the American Memorial School in Tabriz. In the spring of 1909, during the Constitutional Revolution of Iran, he decided to raise a volunteer force to defend the people. Despite attempts to discourage him by the American consul in Tabriz, William F. Doty, he led about a hundred volunteers to help defend the besieged city against the British-backed Qajar troops of Mohammad Ali Shah. Baskerville’s funeral was attended by thousands, and he was eulogized by Iranian patriots.
83 solar years ago, on this day in 1938 AD, the Jurist, Ayatollah Seyyed Najm ul-Hassan the founder of Jame’ Nazemiyya of Lucknow, the oldest Shi’ite Muslim religious institution of India, passed away at the age of 75.
60 solar years ago, on this day in 1961 AD, Cuba’s air force shot down 9 of the 16 US aircraft used by the American-backed invaders and killed 114 of the insurgents, making the rest of the invasion force to surrender, thereby defeating the sinister plot of Washington to overthrow the government of Fidel Castro.
33 solar years ago, on this day in 1988 AD, the US launched unprovoked attacks on Iranian naval forces in the Persian Gulf in support of Saddam the Ba’th minority dictator of Baghdad, in an operation codenamed ‘Praying Mantis’. This was the largest naval battle since World War II.
28 solar years ago, on this day in 1993 AD, following the attack of FBI on the Headquarters of Davidian Sect in Waco, Texas 80 men, women and children were brutally killed for opposing the Godless policies of the US regime.
26 solar years ago, on this day in 1995 AD, in Oklahoma City, US, a large car bomb exploded at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building killing 168 people and injuring 500 including many children in the building’s day care center. As usual, the American press alleged the blast to be the work of what it called a Muslim terrorist. Within a week a suspect, Timothy McVeigh, was caught and charged, along with Terry Nichols, and since the two were white American Christians, all talks of terrorism quickly disappeared from the American press. The two were later convicted and sentenced to 12 years in prison in 1998. McVeigh was later convicted of federal murder charges and executed.