Our dear Hassan aka Pierre and the Mongol invasion v. the Arab invasion of the Middle East

Submitted by dhimmi no more (United States), Apr 16, 2007 at 07:51

Our dear Hassan aka Pierre does not seem to realize that the Arab _crusades_ or the invasion of the Middle East starting in 633CE was nothing but Arabian imperialism. So you tell us why did the arabs invade the Middle East? Was it all about looting? Or was it to spread islam? I doubt it was about spreading Islam as your Allah can change the hearts of us infidels without all this mess and war and we can be all followers of Islam! But it seems that is this case your Allah was not omnipotent and he elected to get mere mortals to do his dirty work. But wait could it be that by invading the lands of others Muslims get to collect the mafia tax aka jizya, rape, enslave and loot and give 1/5 of the loot to Allah and his rasul? What do you think ya ayuha al-faylasoof al-kabeer?

And what is the difference between the Arab invasion of Palestine in 633CE and the Crusades?

Let me help you: there is no difference except it is your Allah that declared _unconditional war_ on ahl al-kitab and the rest of humanity (Q9:29) and in this case of the Crusades they were conducted _despite_ of Christian teachings. The Christian sources were horrified by the killings when Jerusalem fell to the crusaders and included in those killed were members of the eastern Christian churches and not just Jews and Muslims and no we do not know how many were killed (the 40,000 claimed by the wannabe historian Karen Armstorng is clearly the topos of 40, 400, 4000 etc) nontheless it was a crime. There was just as much destruction when the arabs invaded palestine but non of the Muslim sources even mention it (see Hoyland survey). Cmpare this with the lack of concern that Pakistanis have about the genocide of their own Hindu ancestors by the likes of the manic Mahmud of Ghazni and for this I say: shame.

Now historians and anthropologists have a model that they follow and it goes as follows: What happens when the barbarian invade the land of the civilized? The clear answer in most cases is that the barbarian adopt the language and the religion of the civilized and this is indeed what happens to the Mongols that invaded the Middle East period. There was no Islamic miracle here except in the minds of those that flunked their history classes! So did you flunk history?

Now the Arab crusades and the invasion of the Middle East was a very different story and a different outcome and it seems to be the opposite of the above model and in this case the civilized (the great civilizations of the Middle East in the late antique period) _adopted_ the langauge and the religion of the barbarians (the Arabs) !

The great historian C. Becker wrote: "So bizarr es klingt ohne Alexander den Grossen keine islamiche zivilisation" What he was really saying is that the invading Arabs adopted for reasons we still do not understand a new religion (Islam that is) that was emerging from the sectarian debates that pre-occupied the great civilization of the Middle East in the late antique period and this very well fit in the above model but this also detaches islam from Arabia and Muhammad from the Qur'an! More bizarre is that without Mesopotamians and Persians the Arabic language would not have been what it is now. You are lost are you? But again you are pontificating about a subject that you have no command of, and now you can see why the rule of the Arabs in the transmission of the Greek learning was marginal at best.

Most damaging to your case is that many historians now regard Islam as originating in the Middle East and not in the Hijaz.

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