Editing History of Libya (section)

==Islamic Libya==
{{Main|History of Islamic Tripolitania and Cyrenaica}}
[[File:Awjila (Libia) - The Mosque of Atiq.jpg|thumb|upright|The [[Atiq Mosque, Awjila|Atiq Mosque]] in [[Awjila]] is the oldest mosque in the [[Sahara]].]]
Tenuous [[Byzantine]] control over Libya was restricted to a few poorly defended coastal strongholds, and as such, the [[Arab people|Arab]] horsemen who first crossed into the Pentapolis of Cyrenaica in September 643 CE encountered little resistance. Under the command of [['Amr ibn al-'As]], the armies of Islam conquered Cyrenaica, and renamed the [[Cyrenaica#Christianization|Pentapolis]], [[Barqa]]. They took also Tripoli, but after destroying the Roman walls of the city and getting a tribute they withdrew.<ref name="be278">Bertarelli (1929), p. 278.</ref> In 647 an army of 40,000 Arabs, led by [[Abdullah ibn Saad]], the foster-brother of Caliph [[Uthman ibn Affan|Uthman]], penetrated deep into Western Libya and took Tripoli from the Byzantines definitively.<ref name="be278" /> From Barqa, the [[Fezzan]] was conquered by [[Uqba ibn Nafi]] in 663 and Berber resistance was overcome. During the following centuries, Libya came under the rule of several Islamic dynasties, under various levels of autonomy from [[Ummayad]], [[Abbasid]] and [[Fatimid]] caliphates of the time. Arab rule was easily imposed in the coastal farming areas and on the towns, which prospered again under Arab patronage. Townsmen valued the security that permitted them to practice their commerce and trade in peace, while the [[Punic]]ized farmers recognized their affinity with the Semitic Arabs to whom they looked to protect their lands.{{citation needed|date=September 2012}} In Cyrenaica, [[Monophysite]] adherents of the [[Coptic Church]] had welcomed the Muslim Arabs as liberators from Byzantine oppression. The Berber tribes of the hinterland accepted Islam, however they resisted Arab political rule.<ref>{{Cite book|author=Hourani, Albert|year=2002|title=A History of the Arab Peoples|publisher=Faber & Faber|isbn=0-571-21591-2|page=198}}</ref>

For the next several decades, Libya was under the purview of the Umayyad [[Caliph of Damascus]] until the [[Abbasid Caliphate|Abbasids]] overthrew the Umayyads in 750, and Libya came under the rule of Baghdad. When Caliph [[Harun al-Rashid]] appointed [[Ibrahim I ibn al-Aghlab|Ibrahim ibn al-Aghlab]] as his governor of [[Ifriqiya]] in 800, Libya enjoyed considerable local autonomy under the [[Aghlabid]] dynasty. The Aghlabids were among the most attentive Islamic rulers of Libya; they brought about a measure of order to the region, and restored Roman irrigation systems, which brought prosperity to the area from the agricultural surplus. By the end of the 9th century, the Shiite [[Fatimids]] controlled Western Libya from their capital in [[Mahdia]], before they ruled the entire region from their new capital of [[Cairo]] in 972 and appointed [[Bologhine ibn Ziri]] as governor. During Fatimid rule, Tripoli thrived on the trade in slaves and gold brought from the Sudan and on the sale of wool, leather, and salt shipped from its docks to Italy in exchange for wood and iron goods. Ibn Ziri's Berber [[Zirid dynasty]] ultimately broke away from the Shiite Fatimids, and recognised the Sunni Abbasids of Baghdad as rightful Caliphs. In retaliation, the Fatimids brought about the migration of thousands from two troublesome Arab Bedouin tribes, the [[Banu Sulaym]] and [[Banu Hilal]] to North Africa. This act drastically altered the fabric of the Libyan countryside, and cemented the cultural and linguistic Arabisation of the region.<ref name="be202" /> [[Ibn Khaldun]] noted that the lands ravaged by Banu Hilal invaders had become completely arid desert.<ref>"[http://www.galtoninstitute.org.uk/Newsletters/GINL9603/PopCrises3.htm Populations Crises and Population Cycles] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130527170154/http://www.galtoninstitute.org.uk/Newsletters/GINL9603/PopCrises3.htm |date=27 May 2013 }}", Claire Russell and W.M.S. Russell.</ref>

[[File:Roger II Sicily.jpg|thumb|left|[[Roger II of Sicily|King Roger II of Sicily]] was the first Norman King to rule Tripoli when he captured it in 1146.]]
Zirid rule in Tripolitania was short-lived though, and already in 1001 the Berbers of the [[Banu Khazrun]] broke away. Tripolitania remained under their control until 1146, when the region was overtaken by the Normans of Sicily.<ref name="be203">Bertarelli (1929), p. 203.</ref> The latter appointed a governor over it called Rafi Ibn Matruh, who established a kingdom and ruled under Roger I and his son Roger II until he revolted against him in the year 1158. The inhabitants of Tripoli revolted against him one year, and after the Almohads expelled the Normans from Mahdia, he pledged allegiance to the Almohads and remained governor of Tripoli until he asked for an exemption from it and traveled to Alexandria and died there.<ref>{{Cite book |last=المؤلف : الطاهر أحمد الزاوي |url=http://archive.org/details/kaoikaprophe_20180328 |title=ولاة طرابلس من بداية الفتح العربي إلى نهاية العهد التركي |date=2018-03-28}}</ref> For the next 50 years, Tripolitania was the scene of numerous battles between the Almohad rulers and insurgents of the [[Banu Ghaniya]]. Later, a general of the [[Almohad Caliphate|Almohads]], Muhammad ibn Abu Hafs, ruled Libya from 1207 to 1221 before the later establishment of a Tunisian [[Hafsid dynasty]]<ref name="be203" /> independent from the Almohads. in the period of Hafsids the [[Emirate of Banu Talis|emirate of banu talis]] established in the city of [[Bani Walid|bani walid]] and ruled the city until the Ottoman conquest. The Hafsids ruled Tripolitania for nearly 300 years, and established significant trade with the city-states of Europe. Hafsid rulers also encouraged art, literature, architecture and scholarship. [[Ahmad Zarruq]] was one of the most famous Islamic scholars to settle in Libya, and did so during this time. By the 16th century however, the Hafsids became increasingly caught up in the power struggle between Spain and the Ottoman Empire. After a successful invasion of Tripoli by [[Habsburg Spain]] in 1510,<ref name="be203" /> and its handover to the [[Knights of St. John]], the Ottoman admiral [[Sinan Pasha (Ottoman admiral)|Sinan Pasha]] finally took control of Libya in 1551.<ref name="be203" />