Battle of Al-Dirʿiyyah

Battle of Al-Dirʿiyyah, (1818), major defeat dealt the Wahhābīs, Islamic reformers in the Najd region of central Arabia, by the forces of the Egyptian ruler Muḥammad ʿAlī Pasha. The Wahhābī empire was destroyed, and the Saud dynasty that created it was virtually wiped out. Wahhābī attacks on pilgrim caravans crossing Arabia concerned the Ottoman government, whose sultan was protector of Mecca, Islam’s chief holy city. When the Ottomans attempted to invade al-Ḥasāʾ, eastern Arabia, the...