Near Mecca in the Hejaz, Banu Bakr attacked Banu Khuza'a with assistance from members of the Quraysh, violating the truce agreed at al-Hudaybiya in 628. Muhammad treated the assault as a breach of the treaty. His subsequent march on Mecca ended with the city's largely peaceful conquest in 630.

The treaty and its breach became central episodes in Arabic sira, hadith and devotional verse. Traditional accounts say that a poetic appeal by the Khuza'a leader Amr ibn Salim communicated the attack to Muhammad, illustrating poetry's diplomatic role in early Arabia.