List of assassinations and assassination attempts attributed to the

Assassins An assassin is a person who commits targeted murder. Assassin may also refer to: Origin of term * Someone belonging to the medieval Persian Ismaili order of Assassins Animals and insects * Assassin bugs, a genus in the family ''Reduviida ...

(the Nizaris of Alamut), active in

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, and

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, in the 11th through 13th centuries.

Background

The Assassins were a group of

Nizari The Nizaris ( ar, النزاريون, al-Nizāriyyūn, fa, نزاریان, Nezāriyān) are the largest segment of the Ismaili Muslims, who are the second-largest branch of Shia Islam after the Twelvers. Nizari teachings emphasize independent ...

Ismaili

Shia Muslims Shīʿa Islam or Shīʿīsm is the second-largest branch of Islam. It holds that the Islamic prophet Muhammad designated ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib as his successor (''khalīfa'') and the Imam (spiritual and political leader) after him, mos ...

that, by capturing or building impregnable forts, established a "state" of their own inside the hostile territories of the

Seljuk Empire The Great Seljuk Empire, or the Seljuk Empire was a high medieval, culturally Turko-Persian, Sunni Muslim empire, founded and ruled by the Qïnïq branch of Oghuz Turks. It spanned a total area of from Anatolia and the Levant in the west to ...

, a Sunni Muslim government, first in Persia and later in Iraq and the Levant. Lacking a conventional army, in order to survive, they started using unconventional tactics such as assassination of prominent enemy figures and

psychological warfare Psychological warfare (PSYWAR), or the basic aspects of modern psychological operations (PsyOp), have been known by many other names or terms, including Military Information Support Operations (MISO), Psy Ops, political warfare, "Hearts and M ...

Assassination

The precise ideology that motivated the assassins are unclear. Most of the assassinations by the Nizaris took place during the first decades of their struggle, which helped them to create a local political power. Their first and boldest assassination was that of Nizam al-Mulk, the vizier and ''de facto'' ruler of the

Gustave Dore Crusades Edward I kills his attempted assassin

Those assassinated were usually the enemies of the Nizari Ismaili sect, but also sometimes people of political importance who are killed in exchange for money paid by some local ruler. This tactic caused resentment against them, and there is a correlation between the assassinations and subsequent massacres of the Nizaris. This tactic gradually declined and the later attributed assassinations are probably of local origination. It should be taken into account that medieval Arabic sources generally tend to attribute most of the assassinations of this period to the Ismailis. The assassins gained access to the victims through betrayal of confidence and carried out the attack in a ritual manner. Some of the assassins were sleeper cells, notably by befriending or being employed by the victim, sometimes remaining unrecognized for years. The names of the assassin and their victims were written in a roll of honor kept in Alamut Castle, recorded by later Muslim authors.

List

References

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Assassinations by the Assassins