lots of people talk about the Crusades but they talk about the Crusades like they know what they are talking about . Liars can then exploit ignorance and claim that the Crusaders were as bad as the islamic jihadists 'jihads' that are murdering today . Anyway , this video explains the Crusades and the reason for the Crusades . ---
Take Five Minutes And Watch The Spread Of Islam Via Jihad Before The Crusades 8902 Dc Gazette# --- check it out , see what you think .
Bill Warner's hate sites just show how ignorant of history he is.
Here's the lowdown on Bill Warner from the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate groups.
The Anti-Muslim Inner Circle Southern Poverty Law Center
BILL FRENCH
ORGANIZATION Heads the for-profit Center for the Study of Political Islam in Nashville.
CREDENTIALS Former Tennessee State University physics professor; author of
Sharia Law for Non-Muslims (2010; under the pen name Bill Warner).
SUMMARY French has no formal training or background in law, Islam or Shariah law — which in any case is not an established legal code, as the book title implies, but a fluid concept subject to a wide range of interpretations and applications. He garnered attention recently by leading the opposition to a proposed mosque in Murfreesboro, Tenn.
IN HIS OWN WORDS "The two driving forces of our civilization are the Golden Rule and critical thought. … There is no Golden Rule in Islam. ... There is not really even a Ten Commandments."
—Quoted in
The [Blount County, Tenn.]
Daily Times, March 4, 2011
The Crusade really were terrible, and they were not "Defensive".
The worst thing you can say about them is that they actually made matters worse, Before the crusades, the Caliphate had broken up into dozens of squabbling kingdoms. They had stopped advancing in any meaningful way.
Then the Crusades gave them a common enemy. Worse than that, they actually WEAKENED the Byzantine Empire, which was the only thing really standing between Europe and the East. The wonderfully amusing Fourth Crusade, for instance, never got anywhere NEAR a Muslim. Instead the crusaders got in the middle of a Byzantine civil war, sacked Constantinople and by the time it was over the Byzantine empire was kind of done for.
But if you want to see who the good or bad guys were, one only need compare the taking of Jerusalem by the Crusaders in 1099 (During the First Crusade) and compare it to the retaking of the city By Saladin in 1186 (which triggered the Third Crusade)
to recap- when the Crusaders took the city, they didn't just kill all the Muslims, but Christians and Jews as well.
When Saladin retook the city, he not only didn't slaughter civilians, he allowed most of them to leave for territory the Crusaders still occuppied, after exacting a ransom for the richer ones. Poorer Christians were let go without a ransom being paid.