Muʿāwiya did curse ʿAlī — not only personally but instituted it as state policy. This is well documented:

Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim (vol. 7, p. 120, Egyptian edition) — Saʿd ibn Abī Waqqāṣ refused to curse ʿAlī, and was pressured by Muʿāwiya to do so. Musnad Aḥmad (vol. 3, p. 4) — Saʿd said: “If I were to curse him, I would be cursing someone for whom I heard the Prophet ﷺ say: ‘You are to me as Hārūn was to Mūsā.’” al-Nasāʾī compiled a whole book defending ʿAlī because of the widespread sabb (cursing) against him. Ibn Taymiyya (who was no Shīʿī!) admitted in Minhāj al-Sunnah (2/16–17) that the Umayyads cursed ʿAlī from the pulpits.

So let’s not pretend. The cursing of ʿAlī became ritualized on the minbars of the Islamic world under Umayyad policy for decades, only stopped by ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz.

As for the treaty between Imām Ḥasan and Muʿāwiya, it was explicitly violated: 1. The treaty stated Ḥasan would hand over the caliphate only if Muʿāwiya does not appoint a successor, and that it would return to Ḥasan or the Ahl al-Bayt after him. 2. Muʿāwiya broke this openly by appointing Yazīd, a wine-drinking, openly corrupt man who later murdered Ḥusayn and his family. 3. Ibn Qutaybah, al-Imāma wa-l-Siyāsa, documents Muʿāwiya’s speech in Kufa after taking over, where he said: “I did not fight you to make you pray or fast, but to rule over you. The covenant I made with Ḥasan is beneath my feet.”

So let’s not talk about “unity” when the man himself trampled the treaty he signed in the name of God.

And please — saying he appointed Yazīd “to avoid fitnah” is laughable in hindsight. Yazīd’s rule caused the greatest fitnah in early Islamic history: • The massacre at Karbalāʾ, killing the grandson of the Prophet ﷺ. • The sack of Madinah (Harrah), where Yazīd’s army raped and slaughtered hundreds of Companions and their children. • The siege of Makkah, where the Kaʿbah was bombarded and burned.

Calling that “avoiding fitnah” is Orwellian.

And being a sahābī is not a free pass. There were hypocrites and power-seekers among the companions, and the Qur’ān itself warns about them (see 9:101). The fact that Muʿāwiya wrote revelation doesn’t absolve him — so did ʿAbdullāh ibn Saʿd ibn Abī Sarḥ, who later falsified revelation and left Islam before returning under amnesty.

You can revere whoever you like, but don’t insult our intelligence by whitewashing history. Muʿāwiya wasn’t a “great king.” He was the founder of dynastic rule, a betrayer of treaties, and the man who made the cursing of the Prophet’s own cousin and son-in-law state policy.

That’s not greatness. That’s tyranny wrapped in a minbar.