Korståg och jihad är inte samma sak

”What was at stake was nothing less than the preservation of Christianity, and the civilization which had, even if imperfectly, sought to embody its teachings in the world. This was also evidenced by the increasingly hostility to Christians still living in the Levant (the Holy Land), as well as those who went on pilgrimage; in 1009, the Fatimid caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah ordered the Chruch of the Holy Sepulcher – in an act the Catholic Encyclopedia rightly calls a “fit of madness” - razed to the ground. This was followed by an even broader campaign against Christianity throughout the Levant, culminating in the destruction of thousands of Christian churches.

Given the scale of the unprovoked and ceaseless attacks, as well as the persecution of Christians within the Holy Land itself, I believe the Crusades were more than justified. When we understand that they were in fact a belated response to centuries of violent Islamic expansion, and not a random and spontaneous act of aggression (like every Muslim assault on Christian territories was), I don’t see how a reasonable person could deny it.”

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It may also be worth remembering that it was not until the so-called Age of Enlightenment that Europeans actually did conquer and colonize the Middle East and North Africa. Evidently all of the supposed wisdom gained from the rejection of “medieval religions” and the embrace of secularism, skepticism, humanism, and the rest didn’t preclude unprovoked wars and imperialist conquests out of Europe against the rest of the world. Of course I’m sure the counter to that will be, “we just hadn’t gotten far enough away from religion yet.”

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