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Background

According to Shia historians, one of the earliest conflicts between some of the Companions and Ahl al-Bayt is the attack on Fatima's house by Umar in order to arrest/subdue Ali, who refused to give his Bay'ah to Abu Bakr.

According to Sulaym ibn Qays, Umar set the door on fire, pushing his way into the house. Upon Fatima's resistance, Umar physically assaulted her using a sheathed sword. While this narration mentions a fight between Ali and Umar, others (Ibn Abi'l-Hadid for example) claim that Ali was busy at the Funeral of the Prophet and did not witness the incident. ibn Qays later mentions that Fatima still carried the bruises from this raid when she died soon after.

Some Shia also believe that Muhsin ibn Ali, the youngest son of Ali, brother of Husayn, was killed in miscarriage due to Umar's attack.

How was Ali's reception?

I fail to find later any response from Ali later on this attack; moreover, Islamic historians (both Shia and Sunnah) show later collaboration between both Ali and Umar. Although Shia books mention some clashes, none of them are related to the incident.

I personally interpret this incident (if we were to believe the narration's authenticity) to be a great insult to Ahl al-Bayt. My question is: Was there any reverberation from Ali or the early Shia of Ali on this incident? If the answer is no, why?

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  • Imam Ali a.s. said the Roman empire and the Persian empire both were seeking an opportunity to eliminate Islam totally as an escalating danger. so if he started a civil war the Muslim society power became weak and those powers could kill all Muslims and Islam totally finished on earth because Islam was still small and young. so he preferred to not start a civil war against those 3. so he preferred survival of Islam against his own position as a Caliph.
    – Battle of Karbala
    Commented Jan 25 at 9:47

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When prophet (s.a) was there the muslim community was one group, before that they were waring tribes.

And brought together their hearts. If you had spent all that is in the earth, you could not have brought their hearts together; but Allāh brought them together. Indeed, He is Exalted in Might and Wise. Quran 8:53

But after the prophet (s.a) left the world, groupism started within muslim community and I think it was already foretold by prophet (s.a)

I heard the Prophet (ﷺ) saying, "Do not revert to disbelief after me by striking (cutting) the necks of one another." https://sunnah.com/bukhari:7077

Ali (r.a) who is a close companion knew about this and may have decided to avoid fighting.

We may think the groupism after prophet (s.a) is unfortunate but it may be something that happened according to Allah's plan, just like banu israel were split into 12 tribes after Moses (a.s).

Quran it says

Say, "He is the [one] Able to send upon you affliction from above you or from beneath your feet or to confuse you [so you become] sects and make you taste the violence of one another." Look how We diversify the signs that they might understand. Quran 6:65

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In this regard, I must say that Imam Ali's reaction was not to fight because the Prophet had advised him to remain silent and not touch the sword for the sake of preserving Islam, and they caught him by the hand and put a rope around his neck and took him to the mosque to ask him. They forced him to pledge allegiance and told him that if he did not pledge allegiance, they would kill him and his family, and in this way, the Imamate generation would be destroyed, and nothing would remain of true Islam, and for the relationship with Umar that you said, he helped them to preserve Islam, because preserving Islam from everything. It is more important and because of this, Ahl al-Bayt were martyred in the way of Islam.

https://en.wikishia.net/view/Incident_of_Saqifa

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