Quote:



Uhhh, the Crusades did end.  It ended in failure after the 3rd Crusade.  The goal of the Crusades was for European Christians to wrest the control of Jerusalem from the Muslems by force.  They failed.

However, there have been other violent encounters between Christians and Muslems, such as the invasion of Eastern Europe by the Ottoman Turks, the Moors invading Spain, etc.  And now we have the violence involving islamic radicals.  What we have today cannot be construed at a continuation of the Crusades.

Quote:

Winners write history, losers have to swallow anything the winner writes about them. No side came out clean handed, heroes or not.

---

Quote:

OK gonna list all 4 crusades and the factions involved. Dont forget that there was probably even less unity at the Muslim side of the conflict than on the Christian side...

Turks means Turkic here...
1st crusade:
Participants

Seljuk Turks (Sunni Turks) controlling turkey and large parts of Syria. Fighting not only against the crusaders but also with their three own factions

Fatimids (Shia Arabs) Just captured Jersualem from the Seljuks

Crusaders: France, Germany, Italy, Byzantines
Results:
Mass murder of Jews and almost the total population of Jerusalem killed.

2nd crusade
Mainly Seljuks against Crusaders. Resulted in the capture of Damascus, but some important strongholds on the southeastern coast of what is now Turkey were lost.

3rd crusade
Fatimids getting in trouble with the Seljuks who want to take Egypt. Things are getting interesting here now.
Fatimids getting really scared after the Seljuks lay siege to Cairo. They ask for and get help from the (Christian) king of Jerusalem. Seljuks raid Antioch to get the Crusaders attention. After the raid both armies retreat to their territories.
Second invasion attempt, same story, Seljuks retreating to Alexandria. After that success for some reason the Crusader king breaks his alliance and attacks the city where they gained a victory the last time. Seljuks and Fatimids unite against the crusaders.
Logically after that unity the Fatimid commander is found guilty of treason and killed. The succeeding head of state of the combined nation dies a few weeks later and is succeeded by Saladin. Remember that even while he is the ruler of both Seljuk and Fatimid territory now, Saladin does NOT have full control over all his forces (being a Sunni)

For a while there were very few hostilities, but internal conflicts at the Crusaders side (piracy and raids on Haji caravans by some of the factions)finally angered Saladin so much that he decided to get rid of the crusader kingdom.

After killing almost the whole Crusader army in a desert battle he marched on Jerusalem, laid siege to the city which eventually gave up. Saladin agreed on a sum to pay for each inhabitant alive. The sum was paid partially by the crusaders and by Saladin himself, allowing all the surviving inhabitants to leave the city unharmed

4th crusade
For the record... they never got past Byzantium after they laid siege to the city when denied access....

Rest of the crusades is totally out of context, but there was one where there was a short period of Christian control over Jerusalem.

---

OK now Spain (especially for dcunning as he's talking BS here Quote:

Moors invading Spain, etc

)
Basically there was a civil war there, in which one of the factions decided to take a chance and form an alliance with the Arabs. The first wave could land unnoticed as the locals thought that they were mere traders.

After that recon mission the main force landed (1700 arab soldiers + 12000 of the spanish commander), which eventually managed to win a battle in which they were outnumbered. With the Spanish (Catholic Visigoth) king killed there wasn't much to stop further invasion. Eventually it became independent of its African roots, and at that time was one of the richest areas in europe.

Most interesting fact about that period in history is that often Jewish soldiers fought alongside the Arab soldiers against the Christian (read: Catholic) armies. Also there were large groups of jews that went to Al-Andalus in that time. The situation got worse when the Berber invasions started...

And the aftermath...

Saladin eventually became an Arabic icon, even though he wasn't an Arab at all.

Shia branch was pushed to the outskirts of the Arab empire, with some small concentrations left in the area once under control of the Fatimids (that's why Saudi Arabia has a grudge against Iran, as the Saudis claim that Iran is inciting civil unrest in the Shia areas on the eastern coast). This whole thing should be seen in context of the Quoran... as every faction claimed his right by alleged family links to certain Imams and such, being with the wrong faction could be seen as high treason.

Al-Andalus was reconquered with much bloodshed, ethnic cleansing and the other usual war stuff that happens when religion is involved

My pieces come from the detail texts on the individual crusades.

And if you actaully take the time to read the Al Andalus article you get a much more balanced view.

The wikipedia article you bring up here is the literature definition from the 1800s, which makes the word Moors a general denominator for north africans in general.

Anyway... gonna summarize it ONE MORE TIME
After the Visigoth king dies, the Al Andalus kingdom eventually becomes a mixed society (that's why i talk about 'Berber invasions), which is culturally different compared to the area where the 'arab' (actually Berbers and Ethiopians) came from. Only after the african faction decides to enlarge its influence again (probably jealous about the wealth of their spanish neighbours) they start harassing the other religions followers after they invade the iberian peninsula.

And ontopic now
What most people forget is that the majority of the Sunni population doesn't share ANY of the ideas that are part of the Al Qaeda philosophy (Wahhabism), except the anti-americanism.

Shias hate them because the Wahhabbites see them as heretics.
Most Sunnis don't share their extremist views on society either, as they conflict with their local / regional / national customs.

And the most troubling thing about it is that the whole thing was 'invented' by a british spy who wanted the saudis to topple the ottoman empite...

Very interesting. I've had a quick search & found several accounts of the Moors being invited to Spain. It's difficult to know how reliable these accounts are & if there's any substance to them. Here's one example. http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/eagle/congress/cantrell.html
Quote:

In some accounts Roderic impregnated Cava, Count Julian's daughter.

Quote:

That's about the gist of it. http://history-world.org/history_of_spain6.htm

Quote:

Most profound.