About six months later one Ka’b, another Jewish versifier who, like most satirists of his time, signalized his craft by anointing his hair on one side, allowing his clothes to become disordered, and wearing but one shoe, decided to amuse himself by making public a series of poems that were intimately concerned with the amatory charms of some of the most generous Moslem women. Of a beauty named Um al-Fadl he wrote:
“Of saffron color is she; so full of charms that if thou wert to clasp her, there would be pressed forth Wine, Henna, and Katam;
So slim that her figure, from ankle to shoulder, bends as she desires to stand upright, and cannot.
When we met she caused me to forget my own wife Um Halim, although the cord that bindeth me to her is not to be broken.
I never saw the sun appear by night, except on one dark evening when she came forth unto me in all her splendor.”
Ka’b was also believed to be engaged in double dealings with the Koreish, and so the Prophet offered this public prayer: “O Lord, deliver me from the son of Al-Ashraf, in whatever way it seemeth good unto Thee, because of his open sedition and his verses.” And lest there might be doubt as to how he wished his supplication to be fulfilled, he asked his servants this pointed question: “Who will ease me of the son of Al-Ashraf? for he troubleth me.” Maslama’s son Mohammed, a well-known Moslem libertine, responded, “Here am I—I will slay him.” “Go!” exclaimed the happy Prophet, “the blessing of God be with you, and assistance from on High!” Aided by four conspirators, this Mohammed succeeded in luring Ka’b away from his bride on a moonlight night. Suddenly seizing his long hair, they pulled him to the ground with the shout: “Slay him! Slay the enemy of God!” and immediately stabbed him to death. “Welcome!” said Mohammed on their return, “for your countenances beam of victory.” “And thine also, O Prophet!” they replied, as the victim’s head was tossed down before his feet.
On the following day Mohammed, having decided that the only good Jews were dead or exiled ones, gave the Moslems free leave to kill them upon sight. Muheisa, a converted Khazrajite, at once availed himself of this long-desired privilege by slaughtering the first Hebrew he chanced to meet; and when his brother Huweisa chided him for his excessive zealotry, he growled: “By the Lord! if he that commanded me to kill him had commanded to kill thee also, I would have done it.” “What!” screamed Huweisa, “wouldst thou have slain thine own brother at Mohammed’s bidding?” “Even so,” was the cool answer. “Strange indeed!” said the aghast Huweisa, “hath the new religion reached to this? Verily, it is a wonderful faith!” And he immediately proclaimed his own conversion to Islam.
Many of the Jews would doubtless have liked to follow his example, but their day of grace was past; no longer could they qualify as “Witnesses” for Mohammed. For indeed his heart was set upon their extermination, or—what was even better—the robbery of their goods; and to that end, like a good general, he proceeded first against those who dwelt in Medina. About a month after Bedr, he went to the wealthy tribe of Beni Kainuka, who practised the goldsmiths’ trade in Medina, and peremptorily announced his errand thus: “By the Lord! ye know full well that I am the Apostle of God. Believe, therefore, before that happen to you which has befallen Koreish!” But they hurled defiance at him, so he decided to wait until he could find a convenient excuse to attack them. He soon found it. As a Moslem girl was trading in a goldsmith’s shop one day, a frivolous-minded Jew sought entertainment by creeping up behind her and pinning the bottom of her skirt to her shoulder; howls of merriment followed and the poor maiden almost died of shame. A Moslem who soon avenged the insult by slaying the sprightly Jew was killed in turn by other Jews; and thus the Prophet was conscientiously able to proceed against the Beni Kainuka—for had they not broken the solemn treaty hitherto contracted between the Moslems and the Hebrews? A fortnight’s siege ended in their abject surrender; their hands were then tied and they were led out to be executed. At this moment Abdallah ibn Obei, who still retained some remnants of power in Medina, approached the Prophet with a plea for mercy. But the only reply was an averted face, so Abdallah seized Mohammed’s arm and repeated his request. “Let me go!” the Prophet angrily screamed; then, since Abdallah still clung to him, he again shouted, “Wretch, let me go!” But Abdallah continued to hang on, begging that pity be shown; and Mohammed, who still feared Abdallah’s might, grudgingly commanded, “Let them go!” though he could not refrain from adding, “The Lord curse them, and him too!” So their lives were spared, but their rich possessions were confiscated and they were at once sent into banishment; and Mohammed solaced himself for his Pyrrhic victory by selecting the choicest of their weapons for himself. When Abdallah bitterly reproved one of the Prophet’s leading confederates, he was met by the curt response: “Hearts have changed. Islam hath blotted all treaties out.”
Such, indeed, was the fact. Within a year the murderer of Ka’b was dispatched to the Jewish tribe of Beni an-Nadir—which was suspected of being in secret league with the Koreish—with this commission: “Thus saith the Prophet of the Lord. Ye shall go forth from out of my land within the space of ten days; whosoever after that remaineth behind shall be put to death.” When they protested on the ground that such treatment would be rather severe on a people who had never injured Islam, Mohammed’s envoy merely remarked, “Hearts are changed now,” and abruptly left them. After prolonged and anxious consultation, they decided to hold fast to their fortress—a proceeding so unusual for their race that, when the Prophet heard of it, he shouted in delight: “Allah Akbar! The Jews are going to fight! Great is the Lord!” His enthusiasm was somewhat dampened, however, when he discovered that a lengthy siege failed to dislodge them; accordingly, he determined to hasten matters by destroying the pick of their palm-trees with fire and axe. They protested that this act was both barbarous and contrary to Mosaic law; and, while Mohammed was no longer much interested in Moses, he well knew that his deed was opposed to the unwritten laws of Arabian warfare. The Koran, therefore, was soon adorned with this exculpatory passage: “That which thou didst cut down of the Date-trees, or left of them standing upon their roots, it was by the command of God, that He might abase the evil-doers.” The Beni an-Nadir, in fact, were so completely abased by the relentless siege that they were glad to surrender their lands and go into exile on the generous condition that their lives should be spared.
These episodes relating to the Beni Kainuka and the Beni an-Nadir are only two of many like illustrations, that might be discussed at wearisome length, which demonstrated two significant facts: Mohammed had succeeded in ridding Medina of its indwelling foes, and he had decided to destroy the Jewish settlements throughout all Arabia. The massacre of the Beni Koreiza followed as a matter of course; and in 628 the last Hebraic stronghold of much account was also dismantled. In the summer of that year Mohammed, heading sixteen hundred men, pounced upon the opulent city of Kheibar, which lay about one hundred miles to the north of Medina—a distance that shows how wide the sweep of the Prophet’s victorious arm had reached. The motive which inspired him to assault this people appears to have sprung from the consideration that they had failed to avenge the murder of one of their own tribesmen by a Moslem; for the Prophet may well have believed that such an aggressively peace-loving clan merited the severest punishment. In any case, they were not true believers; and, at this stage of Islam, that fact in itself constituted a more than ample pretext for the opening of hostilities. Kheibar’s forts fell in rapid succession before the impetuous rush of the now veteran Moslem army. As Mohammed gaily charged from one conquered stronghold to another, he continually raised the rapturous shout: “Allah Akbar! Great is the Lord! Truly when I light upon the coasts of any People, woe unto them in that day!” After the conquest was complete, Kinana, chieftain of Kheibar, was tortured in the hope that he would reveal his hidden treasure. Fires were burnt upon his breast until he was so nearly dead that he could not have confessed even had he so desired; and Mohammed, who realized that he had carried the thing too far, ordered his head to be chopped off.