The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said, "The Ansar are my inner garment, and the rest of the people are my outer garment."
قال رسول الله ﷺ: الأنصار شعاري، والناس دثاري.
Nasai narrated it in Kubra (8265), Ahmad (9434), and Ibn Manda in Iman (539), all of them through the route of Qutayba bin Saad, who said, Yaqub bin Abdul-Rahman Qari narrated to us, from Suhayl bin Abu Salih, from his father, from Abu Hurairah, who said, then he mentioned it. Its chain is hasan because of Suhayl bin Abu Salih, for he is hasan al-hadith.Regarding his saying "my shiar," Sindi said, the shiar, like the word kitab in form, is the garment that lies next to the body, meaning that they are like that garment, and that they are the special ones, the inner circle, and the people closest to me.Regarding his saying "my dithar," this is the garment that lies over the shiar.A note, this is part of a longer hadith comprising three matters. It includes, "No man who believes in Allah and the Last Day hates the Ansar," and "Were it not for the migration, I would have been a man from the Ansar, and had the Ansar taken a valley or a mountain pass, I would have taken their valley or their pass."The first part was narrated by Muslim in Iman (130:76) with this chain. The second part was narrated by Bukhari in the Virtues of the Ansar (3779) through another route from Abu Hurairah.