Saleh
An imagining of Saleh inviting his people to see the She-Camel, from an illuminated manuscript version of Stories of the Prophets.
Prophet, Seer, Apostle to Thamud
Born	Thamud
Honored in	Islam Bahá'í Faith[1]
Major shrine	Nabi Salih
Influenced	Many Muslim saints

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Saleh or Șāliḥ (Arabic: صالح‎; meaning Pious) was an Arabic prophet of ancient Arabia mentioned in the Qur'an, who prophesied to the tribe of Thamud.^[2][3] He is mentioned nine times throughout the Qur'an and his people are frequently referenced as a wicked community who, because of their sins, were ultimately destroyed.^[4] Saleh is sometimes equated with the Shelah of the Hebrew Bible, however there is almost nothing in common between the Qur'anic narrative of Saleh and the Biblical narrative of Shelah. The preaching and prophecy of Saleh is linked to the famous Islamic story of the She-Camel, which was the gift given by God to the people of Thamud when they desired a miracle to confirm the truth of the message Saleh was preaching. Chronologically, scholars believe Saleh's prophesying to have been post-Antediluvian^{[clarification needed]} but pre-Abrahamic.

Historical context[link]

Thamud people are believed to have been the successors to the ancient tribe of ʿĀd. Their ancestral descendant may have been Eber, the great-grandson of Noah^[5] and their location is likely to have been in the Northwest corner of Arabia, between Madinah and Syria. In later Islamic history, when Muhammad led his expedition to Tabuk against the Romans, on a reported Roman invasion from Syria, the prophet - and his companions - came across the remains of Thamud. With the advance of material civilization, the people of Thamud became materialistic and arrogant as well as godless. Thus, God sent the prophet and seer Saleh, to warn them about the impending doom they would face if they did not mend their sinful ways.

Thamud cannot be equated with the Edomites at Petra. Salih was born before Abraham and the Edomites were a Semitic race. Historic Petra had several places of worship, and the main mountain at the site - Jebel al-Madhbah - is topped by two stone obelisks, suggesting the worship of deities via stone phallic symbols. The narrow gorge leading to the site - known as the Siq - can sometimes channel the wind to produce a loud trumpet-like sound, and it is known by local Bedouin as the trumpet of God. The Edomite occupants of Petra were, however, not obliterated, but instead just migrated to the Negev; neither were the subsequent Nabataean occupants of Petra destroyed by divine command, but instead were weakened by the Roman Emperor, Trajan, and reduced to mere peasants. The name of Saleh may originate in the name of the city, as it was historically known as Sela, a word deriving from the Hebrew term Se'lah, meaning rock; the Greek name Petra has the same meaning.

The prophet Saleh is not mentioned in any other Abrahamic scripture or contemporary historical text, and his account is only found in the Qur'an. However, the account of Thamud's destruction was well-known in Pre-Islamic Arabia and among the Arabic tribes and their poets that they mentioned them (and the people of ʿĀd) in some of their poetry, as a moral lesson and a bad end. Arab Jews knew about the stories of Thamūd and ʿĀd from the tribes of the Arabian Peninsula, but mostly as an Arabian tradition, and not as a matter of belief and faith, because they were not mentioned in the Jewish sources, nor in the contemporary Roman or Christian ones. Prophet Saleh has remained as one of the lesser-known prophets and the story about Thamud is not as well known as the stories about Sodom and Gomorrah and other cities that have faced the wrath of God.

Narrative[link]

Saleh's life in his community had been so righteous that the people of Thamud virtually relied upon him for support.^[6] In fact, he might have been chosen as their leader or king if he had too followed their idolatrous ways. But Saleh was chosen by God as a prophet and he was born for a higher mission - to preach against the selfishness of the wealthy and to condemn the practice of idolatry. Although Saleh preached the message for a sustained period of time, the people for Thamud refused to hear his warning and instead began to ask Saleh to obtain a miracle for them.

Saleh kept telling his people to look around them and remember the numerous miracles God had bestowed upon them. In monologues of preaching, Saleh reminded his people of the countless castles and palaces they built,^[7] and of their technological superiority over neighboring communities. Furthermore, he told them about their ancestors - the ʿĀd tribe - and how they too were destroyed for their sins. As usually happened in such events, the poor and needy were the steadfast believers from the community^[8] and the suppressive were the rich and arrogant townsfolk. As Saleh took the side of the underprivileged, the chieftains of the tribe reviled the prophet and mocked his words.

Although Saleh had told his people about God's mercy, they argued and demanded that he obtain a miracle. This showed a weakness on the part of Thamud people, and represents in them a childish reliance on visual miracles rather than spiritual faith. Thus, God gave Thamud tribe a she-camel, to provide them with sustenance, as both a blessing and a test. Pasture was considered a free gift of God, and this camel would be a trial to see if the arrogant and greedy would let the camel graze peacefully or whether they would slay her.^[9] The rich and wealthy, instead of accepting the test of God, hamstrung the innocent she-camel and gruesomely slew her.

The people of Thamud had three more days for further repentance to God.^[10] But in the next three days, the people of Saleh asked for no repentance. Thus, a terrible earthquake came by night^[11] on the third day, preceded by a mighty blast in the sky. The explosion stuck their community and, in a matter of minutes, the people were buried in the ruins of their own homes.^[12] While the majority of the people perished, Saleh and the believers were saved, being just and righteous people. Saleh left them lamenting over the destruction of his people for their sinning against God.^[13]

See also[link]

• Thamud
• She-Camel of God
• Biblical narratives and the Qur'an
• Legends and the Qur'an
• Prophets of Islam
• Stories of The Prophets

References[link]

External links[link]

• prophets (a.s.) - when & where : While this page presents some non-accurate information, including the dates and revealed books, the majority of information regarding the prophets is correct.

Amrullah Saleh امرالله صالح
Amrullah Saleh speaking at an international conference in Berlin
Director of National Directorate of Security
In office February 2004 – June 2010
Preceded by	Muhammad Arif Sarwari
Succeeded by	Ibrahim Spinzada (temporarily) followed by Rahmatullah Nabil
Personal details
Born	1971 Panjshir, Afghanistan
Religion	Sunni Islam
Military service
Awards	Cleary University (honorary Doctorate Degree in Political Science)

Amrullah Saleh (Persian: امرالله صالح; born 1971) is an Afghan politician who last served as head of the Afghan National Directorate of Security. In 1997, at the age of 24, he was appointed by anti-Taliban leader Ahmad Shah Massoud to lead the United Front's (Northern Alliance) liaison office inside the Afghan Embassy in Dushanbe handling contacts to international non-governmental (humanitarian) organizations and intelligence agencies. After the fall of the Taliban regime, Saleh was appointed by President Hamid Karzai in early 2004 to lead the National Directorate of Security. Due to political differences with Karzai, Saleh resigned his position in 2010. He is currently leading one of the strongest Afghan pro-democracy and anti-Taliban movements, the Basej-i Milli (National Movement) or Afghanistan Green Trend, with about 10,000 of his supporters rallying against the Taliban in Kabul in 2011.

Biography[link]

Amrullah Saleh hails from Panjshir.

Amrullah Saleh was born in the Panjshir Province of Afghanistan in 1971.^[1]

In the late 1990s, in his early 20s, Saleh worked for the anti-Taliban resistance, the United Front (Northern Alliance), under Ahmad Shah Massoud.^[2][3] In 1997, Saleh was appointed to lead Massoud's international liaison office in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, where he served as a coordinator for non-governmental (humanitarian) organizations and as a liaision partner for foreign intelligence agencies.^[2][4]

After the September 11, 2001 attacks against the United States, Amrullah Saleh participated in leading intelligence operations of the United Front on the ground during the War in Afghanistan (2001–present) toppling the Taliban regime.^[5]

After the creation of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, Saleh was appointed to head Department One of Afghanistan's main intelligence agency, the National Directorate of Security (NDS).^[1] The duties of Department One included liaison with foreign military, diplomatic, and intelligence organizations. In 2004, Amrullah Saleh was appointed as the head of the NDS by President Hamid Karzai.^[3] According to the historian William Dalrymple, the ISI and the Taliban "regarded Saleh as their fiercest opponent."^[6]

In June 2010 Saleh resigned from his position. He subsequently founded the Basej-i Milli (National Movement) or Afghanistan Green Trend as a pro-democracy and anti-Taliban movement.^[7]

National Directorate of Security[link]

Saleh initiated structural reforms and helped rebuild the Afghan intelligence service.^[8] Saleh and former interior minister Hanif Atmar were viewed by the international community as two of the most competent cabinet members in the Afghan government.^[8] A western security expert told The Guardian that both men had a reputation for "clearing corruption within" their organs.^[9]

In 2005, Amrullah Saleh engaged several NDS agents infiltrating the Pakistani tribal areas to search for Bin Laden and other Al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders. Several Al-Qaeda members could be identified, but it was determined that Bin Laden was not in the area. In 2006, Amrullah Saleh was presented with evidence that Bin Laden was living in a major settled area of Pakistan just 20 miles from the town of Abbottabad, Pakistan. He shared the intelligence with former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf who angrily brushed off the claim taking no action.^[10]

After the Afghan presidential election, 2009, Afghan President Karzai's views about the security issues confronting Afghanistan and how best to deal with them reportedly changed. This impacted the working relationship between the President of Afghanistan and some of his cabinet ministers including his intelligence chief.^[11] Saleh says, "He [Karzai] thought democracy had hurt him as a person. His family had been attacked by the media unfairly, and the West was criticizing him unfairly. So after a presidential election, he was a changed man, and we could not have the same relationship as before the presidential election."^[11] Political analyst Ahmed Rashid in 2010 observed the same, "Karzai’s new outlook is the most dramatic political shift he has undergone in the twenty-six years that I have known him."^[12] Both Amrullah Saleh and interior minister Hanif Atmar subsequently had strong disagreements with Hamid Karzai on how to proceed against the Taliban, who Karzai was now referring to as "brothers". At that point Saleh and Atmar were increasingly isolated in the Karzai administration.^[11]

In early 2010, an Afghan man approached the NDS claiming to represent senior Taliban commander Mullah Akhtar Muhammad Mansour. Offering a letter allegedly written by Mansour, he said Mansour was interested to open a channel for negotiations.^[11] Saleh's people started testing the credentials of the supposed messenger, and judged them to be false closing the case.^[11] The man then approached other Afghan government institutions. Saleh recounts, "When I learned ... that he was going through a different avenue, I warned the government that if it is this Aminullah, if he claims this, and if it is this guy, trust me, he is not representing anybody; it's a scam. ... Be careful. This is not Mansour. But there was a perception that Amrullah is against talks, so let's sideline him."^[11] The Afghan man, who lived in Pakistan where the Taliban's leadership council is based, subsequently held three meetings with NATO and Afghan officials.^[13] Having been flown from Pakistan to Kabul on a NATO airplane, the man met with President Hamid Karzai in the presidential palace.^[13] In late 2010, it turned out, that the supposed representative for Mansour was an impostor as Amrullah Saleh had previously warned. The New York Times writes: "In an episode that could have been lifted from a spy novel, United States and Afghan officials now say the Afghan man was an impostor."^[13]

On June 6, 2010, Amrullah Saleh resigned from the NDS while Hanif Atmar resigned from his position as interior minister after a militant attack against the national peace jirga, although nobody had been killed or wounded and the attackers had been arrested.^[8] A few days after the jirga, Karzai had summoned Hanif Atmar and Amrullah Saleh to discuss the attack against the jirga. After the meeting both men officially resigned because of the failure to stop the attack on the jirga.^[8][14] CNSNews writes: "Saleh told reporters he had submitted his resignation as general director of National Security because he had lost Karzai’s trust as a result of the attack. He said he and Atmar had briefed the president on the security preparations for the jirga, and the subsequent "success in ... capturing the facilitators," but Karzai had not been satisfied. He had therefore felt unable to continue in his post. He also said there were “tens” of reasons for leaving his position, but would not elaborate on others."^[9][15]

Amrullah Saleh at an international conference in late 2011.

The two men's resignation led to widespread concerns among Afghanistan experts.^[8] Concerns were voiced over the direction the country was moving in.^[9]

The former United Nation's Special Representative to Afghanistan Kai Eide writes:

"In June 2010 Atmar and Saleh were also gone. All ... had been highly respected among Afghans and among international partners. Since late 2008 I had been enthusiastic about the number of new reform-oriented politicians in key government positions. That trend now seemed to have been reversed."^[16]

—Kai Eide

President Karzai’s national security adviser, Rangin Dadfar Spanta, was quoted as saying:

"With Amrullah Saleh, the Afghan people have lost a huge treasure of commitment, awareness and experience in this struggle against terrorism, Al Qaeda and the ISI. I can’t think of anyone who will be able to even slightly fill the vacuum that he leaves behind. Besides being a highly efficient chief at the N.D.S., he is a man of knowledge and research with an incredible memory and intellect. When he analyzed issues at international meetings, he exhibited tremendous ability at logical reasoning. He was head and shoulder above others. ... I had many differences in arguments with him, but I always saw his presence at the N.D.S. as a huge advantage to this country and this government. Despite my high respects for the president’s decisions, I am extremely mournful about Saleh’s departure. Extremely mournful."^[17]

—Rangin Dadfar Spanta, June 2010

The resignation of Saleh and Atmar came amidst heavy disagreement between Hamid Karzai and Amrullah Saleh on how to proceed against the Taliban.^[18] Daoud Sultanzoi, a member of the Afghan parliament, said, he had observed that disagreement between Karzai on the one side and cabinet members such as Saleh and Atmar on the other side had been going on for a while.^[19] Saleh publicly blamed Pakistan for its support to the Taliban and other extremist groups and said talks with the Taliban should take place but not at the cost of democratic structures.^[19] Meanwhile Karzai had increasingly been placing his hopes on his attempts to reach a secret deal with the Taliban and Pakistan. Pakistan had repeatedly urged Karzai to oust Saleh from his position.^[19][20]

The Afghan media extensively covered the resignations with the daily liberal newspaper Hasht-e Subh headlining an article: "Resignation of Atmar and Saleh: Accountability to the People or Tribute to Pakistan?"^[17]

Amrullah Saleh said he considered Hamid Karzai a patriot, but that the president was making a mistake if he planned to rely on Pakistani support as Pakistan was trying to reimpose the Taliban.^[19]

"They are weakening him under the disguise of respecting him. They will embrace a weak Afghan leader, but they will never respect him."^[21]

—Amrullah Saleh, June 2010

Saleh on the BBC's Hard Talk explained and reiterated that Karzai in hoping to reach a deal with the Taliban and Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence through appeasement policy had alienated his internal allies as well as Afghanistan's external allies and had undermined the morale of Afghan security forces.^[22]

Bin Laden–Musharraf controversy[link]

Information about Bin Laden's possible hideout inside Pakistan were shared by Amrullah Saleh with former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf as early as 2006, but Musharraf brushed them off. Recent documents have alleged that Bin Laden was hidden in Abbottabad "with the full knowledge" of Musharraf.

Amrullah Saleh has repeatedly stated that Afghan intelligence believed and had shared information about Osama Bin Laden hiding in an area close to Abbottabad, Pakistan, four years before he (Bin Laden) was killed there. Saleh had shared the information with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf who had angrily brushed off the claim taking no action.^[10]

As early as 2004, agents working for Afghan intelligence determined that Bin Laden was living in a major settled area in Pakistan proper, rather than the semi-autonomous tribal areas on the Afghan-Pakistan border, Amrullah Saleh told The Guardian. Leading Saleh and Afghan intelligence to that conclusion were "thousands of interrogation reports" and the assumption that Bin Laden "a millionaire with multiple wives and no background of toughness would not be living in a tent".^[10] "I was pretty sure he was in the settled areas of Pakistan because in 2005 it was still very easy to infiltrate the tribal areas, and we had massive numbers of informants there. They could find any Arab but not Bin Laden."^[10]

In 2007, the Afghans specifically identified two Al-Qaeda safe houses in Manshera, a town just miles from Abbottabad, leading them to believe that Bin Laden was possibly hiding there. But Amrullah Saleh says that Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf angrily smashed his fist on a table when Saleh presented the information to him during a meeting in which Afghan President Hamid Karzai also took part.^[10] According to Saleh, "He said, 'Am I the president of the Republic of Banana?' Then he turned to President Karzai and said, 'Why have you brought this Panjshiri guy to teach me intelligence?'"^[10]

A BBC journalist confronting Musharraf with Saleh's allegations writes: "The former leader of Pakistan plays the dispassionate broker very well. ... [But] this is when Mr Musharraf's camouflage starts to slip. The substance of the claim he handles like a politician (it was actually a case of mistaken identity involving the CIA, he says). But he bristles with anger at the mention of Amrullah Saleh's name."^[23] Accusing Saleh of "impertinence" and being "lowly", Musharraf stated: "Amrullah Saleh I have never liked and therefore he has no right to present anything to me."^[23]

A December 2011 analysis report by the Jamestown Foundation, however, came to the conclusion that "in spite of denials by the Pakistani military, evidence is emerging that elements within the Pakistani military harbored Osama bin Laden with the knowledge of former army chief General Pervez Musharraf and possibly current Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani. Former Pakistani Army Chief General Ziauddin Butt (a.k.a. General Ziauddin Khawaja) revealed at a conference on Pakistani–U.S. relations in October 2011 that according to his knowledge the then former Director-General of Intelligence Bureau of Pakistan (2004–2008), Brigadier Ijaz Shah (retd.), had kept Osama bin Laden in an Intelligence Bureau safe house in Abbottabad."^[24] Pakistani General Ziauddin Butt said Bin Laden had been hidden in Abbottabad "with the full knowledge" of Pervez Musharraf.^[24]

Recent activity[link]

In 2010 Saleh launched a peaceful campaign to warn that Hamid Karzai had lost conviction in the fight against the Taliban and was pursuing a compromise that could come at the cost of democracy, stability and human rights, especially women's rights. He criticized Karzai's policy, which he called a "fatal mistake and a recipe for civil war".^[25]

"My view is there must not be a deal with the Taliban. Ever. There must be a process. And according to that process, based on that process, the Taliban should become part of the society and play according to the script of democracy. They should be demobilized, disarmed, reintegrated the way the Northern Alliance was. ... And also they should denounce violence. And that process will bring a lasting stability. Minus that, if there is a deal, deals never bring stability. They create fragile peace. ... if there is a deal, we will resist against the deal, "we" meaning all the forces who fought the Taliban. ... [T]he Taliban have no message, no vision except intimidation, spreading fear, bringing exclusion in the Afghan society, stopping development and destroying pluralism. ... We all want to make peace, but we do not want to Talibanize Afghanistan."^[3]

—Amrullah Saleh, November 2010

He also warned:

"Psychologically, there is no government. People do not recognize an authority. There are people who are paid by the government, who protect themselves and there are Taliban groups who go around and spread intimidation and fear. In between, the population is caught between two fighting forces and they do not go to [either] for a solution."^[7]

—Amrullah Saleh

Amrullah Saleh consequently founded the Basej-e Milli (National Movement), also known as Afghanistan Green Trend, a political movement which has successfully established itself in Afghanistan. In May 2011, more than 10,000 of his followers took part in an anti-Taliban demonstration in the capital Kabul.^[26][27][28]

In December 2011, Saleh also criticized the corruption of the Karzai government. He warned that if the Afghan government did not commit itself to necessary reforms and to battling corruption, the year 2014 - when international troops plan on having finalized their exit strategy - would be "a year of challenges rather than opportunities".^[29] Saleh especially emphasized the need for fundamental reforms in Afghanistan's Independent Electoral Commission.

"2014 is a year of opportunities, some coalitions will form and whoever wins transparently or in an almost transparent situation, the Afghan people will support the new order ... If there are no reforms, I can foresee a popular uprising, a just uprising different from the Taliban's.^[29]

—Amrullah Saleh, December 2011

Speaking during the inauguration of an Islamic foundation in Kabul, Saleh said the Karzai government and the United States of America cannot represent the anti-Taliban Afghan civilians and initiate peace talks while simultaneously excluding them. The former Afghan Intelligence Chief insisted on considering the views of the Afghan people during the peace talks process, as a majority of Afghans both in the northern and southern regions, he said, have negative views of the Taliban.^[30] He also questioned the honesty of the Taliban's involvement in peace talks.^[31] The recent objections by nearly all major opposition parties come amid growing efforts by the US and Hamid Karzai to make headway in secret talks with the Taliban and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's Hezb-i Islami.^[31] In these talks representatives from the anti-Taliban United Front, which fought the Taliban from 1994 until 2001 and unites leaders representing roughly 60% of Afghanistan's population, are being excluded. Critizising the secretive nature of US talks with the Taliban, which they suspect might end in a return of the Taliban to power, opposition leaders have asked for a transparent UN-led peace process.^[32]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Amrullah Saleh

Official

• Amrullah Saleh on Facebook

2011

• BBC's "Secret Pakistan": Amrullah Saleh about Bin Laden and Abbottabad
• BBC Hardtalk: Amrullah Saleh: Moderate Taliban is 'an invention'
• Interview with CNN
• 'Afghanistan's Top Spy' with Amrullah Saleh by CBS
• 'Uniting a polarized Afghanistan' about Amrullah Saleh by Al Jazeera
• Anti-Taliban rally May 2011 (BBC Persian)
• Anti-Taliban rally May 2011 (Tolonews)
• Amrullah Saleh appeared on the 3rd of 3 segments featured in the Tuesday, Jan. 18th, 2011 episode of PBS's Frontline, called The Spy Who Quit.

2004-2010

• Amrullah Saleh speech at the Jamestown Foundation's Conference on Terrorism (Dec. 2010)
• Amrullah Saleh Interview with PBS's Frontline in 2006
• Amrullah Saleh Interview (Part 1 & Part 2) with Al Jazeera in 2008
• Amrullah Saleh Interview with ToloTV Part 1
• Amrullah Saleh addressing the Afghan parliament see video
• ToloTV report "Afghan Intelligence Chief Resignation Details"

References[link]