Fatik al-Muʿtaḍidi met al-Khalanji in battle; al-Khalanji’s army broke and fled, while he himself went into hiding. He was later captured along with several of his followers.

In the year 294 AH Zakrawayh the Qarmatian ambushed the Iraqi pilgrimage caravan. Arab women finished off the wounded, and it is said that they killed twenty thousand people and carried off spoils valued at two million dinars. Wailing spread throughout the towns. Al-Muktafi assembled an army against him—do not even ask what that dog did to the advance detachment! When the two sides finally met, most of Zakrawayh’s men were killed; he was taken prisoner with a group of others, died from his wounds, and he and his band were burned.

In the year 295 AH a prisoner exchange took place between the Muslims and the Byzantines, and nearly three thousand captives were ransomed.

Al-Muktafi died young, on the seventh of Dhu’l-Qaʿdah of that same year.

Abu Manṣūr al-Thaʿālibī reports that Ibrāhīm ibn Nūḥ said: “Al-Muktafi left behind one hundred thousand thousand dinars in gold”—so he claimed, though that is highly unlikely. He also stated that the caliph left sixty-three thousand garments, and that the oath of allegiance was then given to his brother al-Muqtadir.

Al-Muktafi’s mother was Jinjak⦗1⦘ the Turk. He (according to another report) died on the thirteenth of Dhu’l-Qaʿdah, having lived thirty-one years and some months. He left the following sons: Muḥammad, Jaʿfar, al-Faḍl, ʿAbd Allāh, ʿAbd al-Malik, ʿAbd al-Ṣamad, Mūsā, and ʿĪsā.

His vizier al-Qāsim ibn ʿUbayd Allāh ibn Sulaymān ibn Wahb died in Dhu’l-Qaʿdah of the year 291 AH, after which al-ʿAbbās ibn al-Ḥasan served as vizier.