Second Fitna: The Battle of al-Harra was fought between Umayyad forces and the rebel defenders of Medina at a lava field northeast of the city.

The Second Fitna was a period of general political and military disorder and civil war in the Islamic community during the early Umayyad Caliphate. It followed the death of the first Umayyad caliph Mu'awiya I in 680, and lasted for about twelve years. The war involved the suppression of two challenges to the Umayyad dynasty, the first by Husayn ibn Ali, as well as his supporters including Sulayman ibn Surad and Mukhtar al-Thaqafi who rallied for his revenge in Iraq, and the second by Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr.

The Battle of al-Harra was fought between the Umayyad army of the caliph Yazid I led by Muslim ibn Uqba and the defenders of Medina from the Ansar and Muhajirun factions, who had rebelled against the caliph. The battle took place at the lava field of Harrat Waqim in the northeastern outskirts of Medina on 26 August 683 and lasted less than a day.

The Umayyad Caliphate or Umayyad Empire was the second caliphate established after the death of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and was ruled by the Umayyad dynasty. Uthman ibn Affan, the third of the Rashidun caliphs, was also a member of the clan. The family established dynastic, hereditary rule with Mu'awiya I, the long-time governor of Greater Syria, who became caliph after the end of the First Fitna in 661. After Mu'awiya's death in 680, conflicts over the succession resulted in the Second Fitna, and power eventually fell to Marwan I, from another branch of the clan. Syria remained the Umayyads' main power base thereafter, with Damascus as their capital.

Medina, officially al-Madinah al-Munawwarah, also known as Taybah and known in pre-Islamic times as Yathrib (يَثْرِب), is the capital of Medina Province in the Hejaz region of western Saudi Arabia. It is one of the oldest and most important places in Islamic history. The second holiest city in Islam, the population as of 2022 is 1,411,599, making it the fourth-most populous city in the country. Around 58.5% of the population are Saudi citizens and 41.5% are foreigners. Located at the core of the Medina Province in the western reaches of the country, the city is distributed over 589 km² (227 sq mi), of which 293 km² (113 sq mi) constitutes the city's urban area, while the rest is occupied by the Hejaz Mountains, empty valleys, agricultural spaces and older dormant volcanoes.