Despite the condemnation of most of the west because of the emperor removing the icons, the emperor first began to surround himself with fellow Iconoclasts, but he did not move to replace some figures. Key among them was the patriarch of Constantinople. The emperor did need to prove his changes were pleasing God, and he just likely found his opporunity. As events in Arabia called for the shah's attention, since the founding of the kingdom in central Arabia, al-Ahwas ruled for 30 years, but from 875 onwards, there was near constant war with the kingdom of Hejaz under Malik V. As the war continued, Utbah ibn Al Walid, who was regent for Malik prior to 878, scored a major victory over the polytheists in the battle of the Turbah valley. But two years later, King al-Ahwas defeated the Nestorians near the city of Tabalah, and then the war continued for two years with raiding, and then a peace formed, and the war ended.
With a 15-year peace, both countries exchanged prisoners taken during the war. The kingdom of Kindha, as it came to be called, also stopped the blockade towards the trade of Hejaz towards eastern Arabia, and Hejaz allowed kindha merchants to access the valuable red sea trade. While the destruction of the many shrines had occurred, the Hejazis allowed Kinda safe passage to surviving pagan sites in the south of Yemen to the sites of Almaqah.
This peace allowed King Malik to address a big problem when his family took over the Taif; they intermarried with the powerful Malik clan, and by now they both had become one. The lesser Ahlaf consisted of the other nobility that already existed or had been formed, but there were tensions with the old Taif rival. Despite the new kingdom elevating Taif to rival Mecca, sooner or later, the kings incorporated the Quraysh, whose tribesmen, who were installed in key government positions, were fine at first, but as the kingdom expanded and it focused on destroying the rebellions of the polytheists, the kings also gave the many estates to the nobles to satisfy them, to serve as a counterbalance, and to stop the constant feuding among its constituents of the kingdom, which was a confederation.
But as they were given so much power, the nobility began to argue not only with the Taif and Quraysh but even among the Quraysh themselves. The Umayyad family had been gaining power for these last decades until the appointment of Utbah ibn Al Walid, a descendant of the arbitor Walid ibn al-Mughira and a warrior Khalid, both of the Makhzūm tribe, but there was a bigger problem: Utbah was also related to the Umayyad family; the tribe itself was distantly related; he was the result of recent marriage to join the tribes, and this was a problem, before during the 7th century and durig the times of that one man preaching monotheism, whose story had become contradicting legends on what his mission or words even were.
The Umayyad and Hashim tribes were the most powerful; this only continued to grow into rivals, despite the Hashim suffering a blow to their prestige as caretakers of the kabba following its destruction. As the kingdom Christianized, they were put in a similar position with the new church, which was the resting site of Saint Abraham, also a member of the Banu Hashim, who by this point had become their patron saint, the man who participated in the writing of Codex Arabicus. He also lived a monastic life, selling his fortune from his powerful family to the poor. Despite his many writings on why paganism was inferior and how he demonized pagans, accusing them of things like child sacrifice and calling for the destruction of their shrines, he was famous for traveling with the army during King Ya'fur's reign to, in his words, lower the bloodshed, famously preventing the massacre of the polytheists after the great victory of 802 by publicly telling the general that no good came from killing surrendered men.
It said this act convinced many of them to be baptized. Malik also spoke about slavery; when the Nestorians arrived, they regulated slavery because it was better to be a Christian slave than a pagan free man. He also called for kinder treatment of slaves but had no regulation of slavery, and while the Arabian climate meant that the slaves did not work in conditions that would kill them, many were still subject to cruelty; some slaves were sent to prostitution or even sex slaves, other abuses still continued, and the saint, while not against the practice, did free some and cried against abuses and even encouraged the emancipation of those polytheists who were baptized. This was not popular, as while the chirstian kingdom was far away, it was connected with the rest of the Christian world, which was growing attitudes toward enslaving chirstians. This was also becoming more prevalent in the kingdom by not converting the polytheists so they could continue the trade and raids, as well as justifying abuses because why should they care about pagans?
The saint still went on till his death in 813, but whether due to his preaching's or a combination of factors, by 826 the first laws of the regulation and treatment of slaves were given, limiting abuses. Abraham was buried in the church of the Kaba, which was already the second-most important church after the church of Taif, where Saint Malik was buried; this in turn gave the Banu Hashim more significance. In the following decades, kings played off the Umayyad and Hashim or other tribes against each other, but the last two kings before Malik father favored the Hashim, but then Utbah ibn Al Walid influence was a shift towards Umayyads. especially under his regency, was another future saint, a man called Yazid, bishop of Taif and of the minor nobility; he wrote about philosophy and poetry, which the Arabs were known for, but later he renounced his post, going to caves to preach and abandoned his possessions and heavily criticized the regent for there many people that were still pagans, but he did use the peace to go preach the kingdom of Kinda, which he was successful in covering some men; he did the same for the tribes of the north; ironically enough, it was when he went to preach to the south in Yemen where he was martyr; it was one of the many reasons cited that the opponents of the Umayaads even when he stepped down as regent he still had much influence.
This influence convinced King Malik to go to war in 890. The war started well for the Christians, but they got bogged down due to internal divisions until, in 900, the polytheists defeated the Christians, and the war ended back to the status quo of the first peace, which was not popular. The Hashim blamed Utbah, who dismissed him, but he still had much influence as he married into the royal family. To offset this, he married one prominent tribe member and family of the saint, one named Muhsin, to his sister.
Malik's rule was then another peaceful one until he died in 912 and was succeeded by Ahmad. While Salama ruled the neo-kigdom of Kindah since 897, he expanded the borders north towards the old kingdom of Kinda, now bordering the areas controlled by the Persian Arab vassals. The Roman emperors saw this as a great new ally against the Persians, but the new kingdom played off both sides well, helping them during Constantine's rule. His death in 928 caused a civil war between the pro-Roman and pro-Sassanid factions, but as the Roman empire really could not do much in this year, it was left to the Taay to support while Hanfinids supported the other faction and then began raiding each other.
The pro-Roman faction won, and the deposed king fled to Ctesiphon, seeking the assistance of the shah, who received the news. The kingdom of Hejaz, now ruled by Ya'fur II, kept attacking them and preparing a campaign to finally conquer them. Kavad moved quickly, and despite his age, he would lead 10,000 men, 4000 Arabs, and the rest from the Shah's army and his elite guard, and like his ancestor Shapur II, he would march towards Arabia; his first minor victory was near Dhiqar, symbolically rectifying the defeat in that area that occurred 300 centuries ago. He kept going south from the coast till he entered central Arabia, where the Hanifids were in their old homeland. In the region of the Oaisies of Al-Yamama, the Persians proceeded to sack the cities, dividing the force to put less pressure on their supplies. The kingdom, already dealing with the Hejazi invasion, was forced to fight the shah, who sacked the capital at Hajar. but he went further, calling back his army into one.
They reunited near Yathrib. The tribes gave them free passage to the south, and their real target was the kingdom of Hejaz. The Persian army met the Hejazi army, which moved towards Badr to intercept the army using favorable terrain. The king himself joined them. There was a legend here that once a wise man who preached monotheism faced the Quarysh and won, and so the valley north of the town would be used as a chokepoint for the great Persian army. When the Persian army arrived, the Hejazi tried to use the common relationship between them and the Hanfinids to try to convince them of the defect; this failed. The battle began with the king of Hejaz against the king of the Hanafids; the king of Hejaz won.
Due to this, his enraged troops were the first to charge, as the Hejazis resisted absorbing the shock as the Iranians sent more forces, despite outnumbering the Hejazis with determination. As the Persians could not force their way through, realizing that there was no place where the Persians retreated, another charge occurred, but it ended the same, so Kavad, by the third charge, moved his own cavalry guard and reserve. The sight of these men, covered from head to toe in armor that was glittering in the sun and armed with their kontos lances, scared the Arabs, and they charged, hitting them. This time the Persians hacked their formation and the wings were breached; all was lost as the men fled and the head of the king was presented to the sha, but Kavad was not done as he marched south; this kingdom was a threat to any future expedition that Kavad wanted in Yemen; weakening them now would do him no harm.
Mecca and Taif panicked; a smaller force was sent to Mecca, which was put under siege as Kavad moved towards Taif. It was not long before Kavad entered and was utterly destroyed; women were raped, most were killed, and a great part of the city was burned, but the Shah had not taken the citadel; the son of the king and one of his generals resisted; Mecca had surprising not fallen during this time; the Shah was fine with waiting until news reached him from the north that Emperor Basil had invaded the empire, wasting no time. The Shah retreated back towards Persia, having, in one campaign, weakened both the kingdoms of Kinda and Hejaz; his only regret was not destroying the latter.