In 551 AH al-Muqtafī and Sultan Sulaymān ibn Muḥammad ibn Malikshāh marched to Ḥulwān. Al-Muqtafī then sent the armies out under the Sultan’s command. In the Ramadan of that same year Sanjar, with only his closest attendants, slipped away from the Ghuzz to Tirmidh and fortified himself there.

At the time, Atsiz Khwārazm-shāh and Sanjar’s nephew, the Khāqān Maḥmūd, were fighting the Ghuzz; the struggle between them swayed back and forth. The Ghuzz were humbled when ʿAlī Beg died, and the Faraghliyya Turks entered Sanjar’s service. His fortunes rose, and he returned to his seat of rule in Marw.

That year a great earthquake struck Syria.

In 552 AH a letter from Sultan Sanjar reached King Nūr al-Dīn, full of cordiality. Sanjar wrote that, by stratagem, he had overcome the Ghuzz and pledged to support Nūr al-Dīn against the Franks. Damascus and its Citadel were festively adorned with music. Nūr al-Dīn’s army smashed the Franks; he captured Banias by the sword, engaged the enemy again, and—praise be to Allah—triumphed over them.

During the same year Muḥammad Shāh ibn Maḥmūd and ʿAlī Kujuk descended upon Baghdad with thirty thousand men. Fighting raged for days, the crisis became severe, and many people were killed. Al-Muqtafī poured out money and stores, whereupon the attackers withdrew. He then set out for Awāna and went hunting. Sultan Sanjar died. Nūr al-Dīn routed the Franks near Ṣafad, and Gaza was wrested from their hands.

In 553 AH al-Muqtafī travelled to Wāsiṭ, visited the shrine of al-Ḥusayn, and returned. He then proceeded to al-Madāʾin, where he observed the ʿĪd in magnificent splendour.