Ghazw or
Ghazah (plural
ghazawat) (
Arabic ????) was originally an Arabic term referring to the battles in which the
Islamic prophet Muhammad personally participated.
[1] It has since evolved into a term for battle associated with the expansion of Muslim territory. The term
ghazi or
Warrior for the faith came to represent participants in these later battles
[2] and is
cognate with the terms
ghaziya and
maghazi. In modern Turkish the word means "veteran".
In English language literature the word often appears as razzia, deriving from the French word razzier (rezzou) which entered the language at the time of the French colonization of North Africa, and which is itself a transliteration of the colloquial Arabic word ghazya. "Ghazawat" in some Muslim countries has the meaning of "Judgement".
Ghazi (Arabic ?????) is an originally Arabic word, from ghaza (contracted from *ghazawa) = "he raided" or "he made war", and was also adopted by such languages as Turkish for Muslims vowed to combat non-believers. As such it is essentially equivalent to Mujahideen waging jihad bis-saif, i.e. holy war.
Also
