Cruel from it's awful,murderous beginnings
Islamic Terrorism – Is it a New Threat?
by MA Khan
24th July, 2006
In recent times, overshadowing the relative calm of the past few decades, there has been a sudden surge in violence and terrorist activities by the Islamic zealots and fanatics. Hence, there is a debate as to why Muslims did not indulge in terror and violence during the past decades and centuries. There might be some consolation in the thought that Islamic violence was not so evident during the early 20th century. However, there is also a general impression amongst both Muslims and the non-Muslims that there was never any Islamic violence and terrorism until the last 2-3 decades. One respected moderate Muslim columnist Tanveer Jaffri in his recent column, Terror and Terrorism in the World: The Remedy, wrote:
Obviously, in the life of Hazrat Mohammad, taking his relations with the Islam, there is no incident showing terror or terrorism. Even Hazrat Mohammad himself never fought against anyone, in his lifetime.
Presuming Mr. Jafri a good-hearted and honest person, I believe that his verdict on Prophet Muhammad’s non-involvement in any kind of violence in his life-time is his honest opinion. Not only Mr. Jafri, but most of the moderate Muslims also bear such a thought about the Prophet of Islam. Yet, such thought, even if born out of honest opinion, is thoroughly erroneous and is the result of utter ignorance. Instead of being a nonviolent person, Muhammad's life is a testament of ceaseless raids and plundering expeditions of highway caravans and waging wars against the infidel (non-Muslims community). He himself had orchestrated more than one hundred raids, plundering expeditions and wars. Even just before his death, he was in the planning of organizing an expedition, but he fell sick suddenly, from which he never recovered. By this time, he had already extirpated all the Jewish settlements around Medina by means of mass slaughter and enslavement (Banu Quraiza) and mass exile (Banu Nadhir and Banu Qainuka). He had also launched expeditions against the Jewish tribes in far-flung places like Khaybar and Kinan. In his death bed one of his last wishes was: “Let there be no other religion except Islam”. This wish was carried out to fruition by his immediate successors, notably Caliph Abu Bakar and Omar.
The fact is: the kind of terror and violence perpetrated by Prophet Muhammad has little or no parallel amongst the terrorism and violence of today’s Islamic terrorists. The extermination of the Jews from Medina requires another mention here. Consider Muhammad’s raiding the Jewish enclave of Banu Quraiza, because they did not join the Muslim army when the Meccans attacked the Muslims in the famous battle of the Trench, which, the Quraiza tribe was obligated to do because of a covenant of mutual protection signed earlier. The first reason of unwillingness of the Quraiza people to join the battle that Muhammad started was that the Jewish people were sick and tired of such violent activities and blood-baths, raiding and plundering expeditions and fighting wars one after another. Secondly, the Mecca army in this battle was too powerful to ensure a decisive victory, had it not been for the trenches Muhammad had dug – thanks to the Salman the Persian, who gave the idea to Muhammad from his Persian experience of war. After a 25-day seize by Muhammad of the Jewish enclave, the Banu Quraiza tribe surrendered unconditionally and pleaded Muhammad to let them go into exile. Instead, Muhammad decided to slaughter all the males of weapon-bearing age, around 600 to 900 in numbers, took of their women and children as slaves and took possession of their homes, properties and farms and distributed them amongst the Muslims who had participated in this genocide. The world is yet to witness an example of similar barbaric atrocity perpetrated by today’s Islamic terrorists, though we can be absolutely certain that today’s Islamist jihadists ardently crave to match their Prophet’s examples.
Another incidence which requires mentioning again here is Muhammad’s victorious entry into the city of Mecca, his paternal hometown. Upon his entry into the city, he destroyed all the temples and deities which his ancestors had worshipped for centuries. Soon after his invasion of Mecca, the Prophet sent his general Khalid bin Walid to destroy all the pagan temples of the neighboring tribes of Mecca. Khalid reached the Jazima tribe and asked them to say, “We are Muslims”. But they said, “We are Sabians” – whereupon Khalid slaughtered the whole tribe. The Jazima tribe people had never given any troubles to the Muslims. Is there a parallel of such barbarity amongst terror acts of Muslim extremists of today? No, there isn’t. The truth is: the end of his 22 years of religious campaign, Muhammad had depopulated the entire Southern Arabia of the infidel pagans, Jews, Christians and Sabians etc. through mass slaughter, enslavement and forced conversion and mass exile. These acts of violence, cruelty and barbarity of the Prophet have no parallel amongst violent acts of today’s Islamic terrorists. Of course, throughout the Islamic world, there are scattered incidences of violence and attacks on non-Muslims’ homes, churches and temples and incidences of raping the infidel women. But there is no incidence in which women of an entire community being captured as sex-slaves, all weapon-bearing males of a community put to summary execution or an entire village or community of the Kaffirs sent to exile.
The acts of violence and terrorism did not just disappear with the death of the Prophet but was redoubled by his immediate successors; namely, Abu Bakr, Omar and Othman et al. who were Muhammad’s closest friends. By the time of third Caliph Othman’s rule, all remaining Jews and Christians of entire Arabian peninsula were forcibly converted, expelled or slain which fulfilled Prophet’s death-bed wish that no second religion remain in the holy land of Arabia.
Immediately after Muhammad’s death, many Muslims who were forced to accept Islam wanted to leave Islam. Prophet’s first biographer, ibn Ishak writes, “When the apostle was dead, most of the Muslims thought of withdrawing from Islam and had made up their mind to do”. Many tribes rose in rejection of Islam, turned to their tribal leaders and rejected to pay taxes. The immediate task of the first Caliph, Abu Bakr, was to bring these fierce and intractable tribes into submission. Under the command of fierce Khalid ibn Walid, a bitter and sanguinary battle, termed the Wars of the Apostasy (ridda) followed. The revolt was cruelly suppressed and the recalcitrant tribes were forced back to the fold of Islam.
The fanaticism and barbarity associated with these conquering expeditions need a sampling here. The kind of fierce intolerance and fanaticism being inspired by Prophet Muhammad amongst his followers have no parallel in the annals of any other religion. Under his command, his followers were ready to kill even their own fathers and brothers, yet others’ wished for his approval. Prophet’s biographer Hisahm al-Kalbi notes that the son of the great hypocrite Abduallah ibn Obayi had begged for prophet’s permission to kill his own father and bring the head to the prophet. But Abdullah was an influential man and the prophet didn’t dare. According to Ibn-Ishak, in July 624, being increasingly exasperated with the Jews, the prophet ordered: “Kill any Jew whoever falls into your power.” Thereupon a Muslim convert named Muhaysa fell upon a rich Jewish merchant who happened to be on the same way and killed him, despite the fact that he belonged to his own tribe. When his elder brother, still a Jew, scolded him for killing someone of his own tribe, Muhaysa replied, “By Allah, if Muhammad commanded me to kill you also, I would have cut off your head”. So impressed was the Jewish man by his brother’s conviction to Islam that he immediately converted to Islam. The prophet’s fanatic inspiration to intolerance and violence compelled Voltaire to comment: Such conducts cannot be defended by any person, ‘unless superstition has choked all the light of reason from him.’
The violent fanaticism, inspired by the Prophet, was carried forward with ruthless zeal by his immediate followers. Khalid ibn Walid, who fought on the enemy side in the battle of Ohud but later embraced Islam, became one of the most blood-thirsty and brutal of conquerors, if judged even by the standard of his day. Yet his cruelty and rapacity were and still are greatly extolled amongst the Muslims, who honored him with the title of “the Sword of Allah” (Sayif Allah).
The utter barbarity of Khalid was displayed in May, 633, when he defeated the Zoroastrian Persians at the Battle of Olayis in Southern Iraq (between Hira and Basra). For two days, his soldiers rounded up the great multitude of prisoners and fugitives, who were then herded on to a dry river bed and were butchered until it became a crimson stream. The place thereafter proudly bore the title of ‘the River of Blood’. Abu Bakr, the caliph was overjoyed when the news of victory and massacre reached him.
On the barbarity of Khalid, Benjamin Walker writes:
A wine-lover and lustful debaucher, Khalid took sickly sadistic delight in beheading a defeated chieftain on the battle-field, selecting his wife (if young) or daughter and celebrating his nuptials with her on the spot soaked with the blood of the victim (father/husband of the bride). [Walker, Foundations of Islam, p. 316]
Before Muslims conquered Jerusalem, the scattered communities of Jews and pagans lived in harmony along with the Christians. When Caliph Omar conquered the Jerusalem, much venerated in the Koran and a holy place in Islam, in 637 – the Jewish temples and Christian Churches were razed to the ground and widespread looting and pillaging was unleashed. The Patriarch Sophronius of Jerusalem (634-638), who witnessed spread of Islam in Arabia and the fall of Jerusalem with his own eyes, described the Muslim invaders as “godless barbarians” who “burnt churches, destroyed monasteries, profaned the Crosses and blasphemed against Christ and the church.” The following year, thousands died of famine resulted from the destruction and pillage by the Muslim conquerors of Jerusalem. [Ibn Warraq, Why I am not a Muslim, p. 219]
The invading Muslims destroyed the main Jewish temple and Omar laid the foundation of the much venerated al-Aqsa mosque with his own hands in its place. He declared a decree that Jews and Christians could practice religion only in the confines of their churches and homes. No new churches would be built, no conversion should be made, crosses should not be exhibited in their churches and no public display of their faith should be made. These rather benevolent treatments were accorded to the Jews and Christians under the privileged term of the Dhimmis (Zimmis) as accorded to the people of the Book in the Koran. Yet, repression and discrimination, attacks on pilgrims, raid and ransacking of the monasteries and the destruction of the places of worship of the non-Muslims continued.
The barbaric tradition of atrocity set in motion by the Prophet in the form a command for incessant Jihad against the Kaffirs in the Koran, continued well into the late period of Ottoman caliphate. Even the highly magnanimous and well-regarded caliph, like Harun-ur-Rashid and his father al-Mamun were thoroughly brutal in dealing with the Jews, Christians and pagans. The great caliph al-Mamun of the golden age of Islam, instituting the heretic rationalistic Mutazili doctrine and non-divine nature of the Koran as state policy, too, was extremely harsh when it comes to dealing with the non-Muslim subjects. Under his rule in the 9th century, the pagans of Harran had to choose between Islam and death. Such barbaric tools of forced conversion of the infidels continued well into the late Ottoman period. Tavernier, the 17th century French traveler describes how in Anatolia “Everyday there are numerous Greeks forced to become Turks”.
Certain Western authors and historians believe that after an early onslaught of Islamic conquests lasting until about the mid-eighth century, violence subsided and relative calm and peace prevailed throughout the Islamic world for the subsequent centuries [Saunders, J.J. A History of Medieval Islam. London: Routledge, 1965; p79]. In truth, such claims of relative peace for centuries fly in the face of it. In reality, no period of the Islamic domination did ensure a peaceful life to the non-Muslims subjects – thanks to Muslims’ Jihadi campaigns in various forms, either by the state or by the Muslim mobs. Yet, some Muslim rulers were tolerant towards non-Muslim subjects in defiance of the Islamic injunctions. Islamic terror, as was unleashed by the Prophet, comprised of unprovoked attack on the unwarned and unprepared infidel territories, exiling or killing the adult male captives, taking the females and children as captives (beautiful and young women were used in the harem as sex-slaves, children for raising as Muslims and older females for sale), looting and plundering the infidels of their valuable properties and assets, imposing Jiziyah and of course, destroying the infidels’ religious institutions. Ibn Warraq, in “Why I am not a Muslims” [p. 219-240] has listed the Islamic atrocities and violence against the infidels of various sorts which I will summarized here.
7th Century
After Prophet Muhammad’s emigration from Mecca to Medina in 622, the exiling and extermination of 3 major Jewish tribes of Medina by 628, has been described above. In 630, Muhammad marched into Mecca, mercilessly captured, destroyed the most sacred pagan temple of Ka’ba and established the Islamic rule there. The pagan inhabitants were given a choice between death and Islam. To save lives, the pagans had no choice but to accept Islam. On the same day, Khalid ibn Walid’s massacre of the entire Jezima tribe for not accepting Islam has already been discussed. Khalid ibn Walid, upon command of Caliph Abu Bakr, launched the blood-letting wars of the apostasy (Ridda) to submit those, who deserted Islam immediately after Muhammad’s death, back to the faith. The utter barbarity of Khalid Ibn Walid against the defeated the Zoroastrian Persians at the Battle of Olayis in Southern Iraq in May 633, whereby he created what is famously called the River of Death has been discussed before.
After completing extermination/exiling the Jews of Medina in 628, Muhammad launched a campaign against the wealthy and prosperous Jewish community of Khaybar. He ordered his charges to destroy all the Jewish temples as they came across. Having defeated the community, he tortured the chief of tribe Kinana by setting fire on his chest to find out the whereabouts of his treasures. After extracting the location of the ensconced treasure, Kinana was beheaded, the treasures were looted, and Kinana’s wife Safiyah rendered as his share of the captive to be reduced to his sex-slave. He married and took her to bed on the same night her husband’s dead body awaited burial on the next day. Incidentally, Safiyah’s father belonged to the Banu Quraiza tribe of Medina whom Muhammad had beheaded earlier.
In the Muslim campaign of 634, the entire region between Gaza and Caesarea was devastated and four thousand peasants, comprising of Christians, Jews and Samaritans, who were simply defending their lands, were massacred. In 637, the Victorian Muslim army’s march into Jerusalem, with Caliph Omar at the lead, and the accompanying destruction of the synagogues and burning of the churches, desecration of the Crosses and setting in the Dhimmi laws of submission to the Jews and Christians of the Holy Land has already been mentioned. In the expeditions against Mesopotamia between 635 and 643, monasteries were sacked, the monks slaughtered and Monophysite Arabs executed or forced to convert. In Elam, all the people were put to the sword and at Susa all the dignitaries suffered the same fate.
Details of conquest of Egypt starting with the capture of Alexandria by Amr Ibn Al-As in 641 comes from the “Chronicle of John” – the Bishop of Nikiu, written between 693 and 700 CE. As Amr advanced into Egypt, he captured the city of Behnesa near Fayum, and exterminated the inhabitants. Nobody was spared: surrendered or captured, Old or Young or Women. Fayum and Aboit suffered the same fate. At Nikiu, the entire population was put to the sword. The Arabs took the inhabitants to captivity. In Armenia, the entire population of Euchaita was wiped out. Seventh century Armenian chronicles recount how the Arabs decimated the population of Assyria and forced a number of inhabitants to accept Islam and then wrought havoc in the districts of Daron, southwest of Lake Van. In 642, it was the turn to town Dvin to suffer. In 643, the Arabs came back with “extermination, ruin and slavery”.
It was the same ghastly spectacle in North Africa, Tripoli was pillaged in 643; Carthrage was razed to the ground and most of its inhabitants were slaughtered. Michael, the Syrian describes how the first Omayyad Caliph Muawiya, who took power in 661, sacked and pillaged Cyprus and then established his domination by a “great massacre”. In the capture of Istakhar (Persia), 40,000 Iranians were slaughtered. Indeed, Anatolia, Mesopotamia, Syria, Iraq, Iran and wherever Muslims have marched, were presented with the same spectacle.
8th Century
In 712, Governor of Iraq, Hajjaj, ordered the conquest of Sind under the commandership of his nephew, Muhammad bin Kasim. He was instructed to “bring destruction on the unbelievers… [and] to invite and induce the infidels to accept the true creed, and belief in the unity of God… and whoever does not submit to Islam, treat him harshly, and cause injury to him till he submits.” According to Al-Biladuri, after the capturing the port of Debal, the Muslim army slaughtered the inhabitants over three days and the priests of the temples were massacred.
After the initial surge of cruelty, Kasim became more tolerant and allowed the infidels to continue their profession and religious practice. Learning about this sympathetic treatment, a furious Hajjaj sent letter condemning Kasim’s method of pardoning the infidels. It read, “… The great god says in the Koran [47:7]: “O True believers, when you encounter the unbelievers, strike off their heads.” The above command of the Great God is a great command and must be respected…. Henceforth, grant pardon to no one of the enemy and spare none of them..” Kasim quickly obliged to the divinely ordained command and on his capture of Brahmanabad, he invited the infidel idol-worshipers to accept Islam. On latter’s refusal, he ordered all adult males be beheaded with swords and their women and the children were captured as slaves. Eight thousands, some say 26,000, men were put to the sword. One-fifth of the captured slaves (women and children), which amounted to 20,000, amongst whom, were the daughters of Sind Chiefs along with King Dahir’s severed head, were sent to Hajjaj as the share of the states and the remainder were distributed amongst the soldiers. [Chachanama, Muhammad al-Kufi, trs Kalichbeg, I, 155; Shashi R Sharma, Caliphs and Sultans, p. 95]. The stream of captured slaves continued to flow from India to Baghdad ever since Kassim captured Sind and Hajjaj alone is said to have forwarded 60,000 slaves from India (~1/5 of total) to the caliph Walid I (705-715 CE). [Chachnama, I, 154]
In 704-705, Caliph Walid I gathered together the nobles of Armenia in the Church of St. Gregory and in the Church of Xram on the Araxis and burned them alive. The rest were crucified and their women and children were captured as slaves. The worse happened to the Armenians between 852 and 855. Over in Egypt, in 722, the surveyor Usama b. Zaid, attacked convents and churches but Caliph Hisham later asked him to leave the Christians alone. Caliph Marwan (ruled 744-750) looted and destroyed many monasteries in Egypt while fleeing the Abbasid army. In the sacking of Euphesus in 781, 7,000 Greeks were taken captives were deported en masse.
9th century
In 853, Abbassid Caliph Mutawakil ordered all new churches to be destroyed. In 884, the convent of Kalilshu in Baghdad was destroyed. Caliph al-Mutasim, known as the Islamic hero, was a great wager of holy wars against the Christians and heretics. After the capture and pillage of Amorium in 838, there were so many captive slaves that Caliph al-Mutasim ordered them to be auctioned in batches of five and ten. During the rule of caliph al-Mamun – considered the most just Muslim ruler and harbinger of the so-called “golden age of Islam” – the pagans of Harran had to choose between Islam and death.
Ruined by the burden of imposition of Jizyah tax, the Coptic Christians of Lower Egypt revolted in 832. This revolt was ruthlessly suppressed by the Muslim rulers in which Christian villages, vineyards, gardens and Churches were burned. There were mass slaughter and those spared were deported.
10th century
In 924, the Church and convent of Mary in Damascus was plundered and burned and other churches destroyed. Further destruction occurred in Ramleh, Ascalon, Tinnis, and Egypt during the invasion of Asad ud Din Shirkuh. In the capture and sacking of Thessalonica in 903 CE, 22,000 Christian captives were divided amongst the Arab chieftains or sold into slavery. [Ibn Warraq,
There were massacres of the Spanish Christians in and around Seville. Al-Hakim biamr Illah gave orders that the Churches of his dominions should be destroyed. A Muslim historian records that over 30,000 churches built by the Greeks in Egypt, Syria and elsewhere were destroyed, their contents seized and sold in the markets and lands confiscated. [Tritton AS, The Caliphs and their non-Muslim Subjects. London, 1970, p. 54].
In Iran, the Zoroastrians faced frequent forced conversion, pressure to do so and persecution which lead to riots in Shiraz in 979. To escape persecution, they immigrated to India and live there even today as a respected community.
11th century
Six thousand Jews were massacred in Fez of Morocco in 1033. Hundreds of Jews were killed between 1010 and 1013 near Cordoba and other parts of Muslim Spain and an entire Jewish community of 4000 in Grenada was annihilated in 1066. Fatimid caliph Hakim’s jealous persecution of non-Muslims and Church demolition resulted in the destruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem in 1009. He also banned the pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Both events acted as the major causes that ignited the Crusades.
In Kairoun (Tunisia), the Jews were persecuted and sent to exile in 1016, who later returned, only to be expelled again. In Tunis, they were forced to convert or leave. During subsequent decades, there were fierce anti-Jewish persecutions throughout Tunisia.
In 1064, the Seljuk Sultan, Alp Arslan, devastated Georgia and Armenia. Those, whom he did not take captive, were executed. [Ibn Warraq, pp. 218-238]
Eleventh century also saw the barbaric assault of Sultan Mahmud of Ghazni on Hindustan starting in 1000 CE. He launched 17 plundering, looting and slave-taking expeditions to India. Abu Nasr Muhammad Utbi, Sultan Mahmud’s secretary, gloats in his official chronicle that after attacking Waihind in November 1001 CE, Mahmud’s army slaughtered 15,000 fighting men in “splendid action” before capturing 500,000 men and women as slaves. In Mahmud’s attack of Ninduna and Panjab in 1014, “slaves were so plentiful that they became very cheap and the men of respectability in their native land were degraded by becoming slaves of ordinary shop-keepers (in Ghazni)”. The extent of barbarity of Sultan Mahmud was vividly described by contemporary Muslim historians. In the attack on Thanesar, “the blood of the infidels flowed so copiously the stream was discolored and the people were unable to drink it”. Similarly in the slaughter of Sirsawa near Saharanpur, “the Musalmans paid no regard to the booty till they had satiated themselves with the slaughter of infidels.” [Utbi, Tehrik-i-Yamini, ED, Vol II, pp 41-42, 49-50]. When Mahmud learned that the famous Hindu temple at Somnath housed a monolith brought of the temple of Ka’ba that was destroyed by the Prophet of Islam in 630 CE, out of jealous piety, he rushed to destroy the Somnath temple. Hindus in great numbered assembled to protect their sacred temple and offered Mahmud great booty, which he ignored and according to Ibn Asir [Kamil-ut-Tawarikh], he massacred 50,000 Hindus guarding temple and destroyed it.
12th Century
In the 12th century, the Almohads of North Africa spread terror wherever they went. The Jews in Yemen were given choice of death or conversion to Islam in 1165. Similar choice was given to the Jews of Aden in 1198. According to Stillman [The Jews of Arab Lands], there were forced conversions of Jews under the Almohad caliphs, al-Mumin (d 1165), Abu Yakub (d 1184) and al-Mansur (d 1199). The Christians of Grenada were deported to Morocco by the Almoravids rulers in 1126.
In the Indian front, after the scourge of Mahmud Ghazni, there was a relative calm until Turk Ghaurid Sultan Muhammad Ghauri started his attacks beginning in 1175. When he became successful in 1192 to defeat Prithviraj Chauhan, he launched a scourge of conquest of Sirsuti, Samana, Khuhram and Hansi with ruthless slaughter and a general destruction of temples and their replacement with mosques. Similar events followed in Ajmer and Delhi later on [KS Lal, Theory and Practice of Muslim State in India, p. 21].
Muhammad Ghauri’s lieutenant Qutbuddin Aibak, succeeded him to become the first Muslim Sultan in India. He dispatched Ikhtiyaruddin Bakhtiyar Khalji to the East and himself concentrated in Hindustan proper. He captured Kol (modern Aligarh) in 1194. There “those of the garrison who were wise and cute were converted to Islam, but those who stood by their ancient faith were slain with the sword.” [Hasan Nizami, Taj-ul-Maasir, E.D., H, 222]
In 1195 when Raja Bhim was attacked by Aibak, he captured 20,000 slaves.
13th Century
In Aibak’s attack of Kalinjar in 1202, 50,000 slaves were captured. “The temples were converted into mosques,” writes Hasan Nizami, “and the voices of the summoners to prayer ascended to the highest heavens, and the very name of idolatry was annihilated.” Muhammad Farishtah specifically mentions that during the capture of Kalinjar “fifty thousand kaniz va ghulam, having suffered slavery, were rewarded with the honor of Islam” – which meant that enslaved captives were forced into conversion to Islam and conversion accelerated the growth of Muslim population in India.
During Aibak’s rule of 20 Lunar years, he captured Hansi, Meerut, Delhi, Ranthambhor and Kol, which accompanied similar massacres, destruction and slave-taking. When Sultan Muizzuddin personally mounted a campaign against Hindustan, Aibak proceeded as far as Peshawar to meet him, and the two together attacked the Khokhar (Hindu) stronghold in the Koh-i-Jud or the Salt Range. The Hindus (Khokhars) fled to the highest in the mountains. They were pursued. Those that escaped the sword fled to the dense depth of the jungle; others were massacred or taken captive. The result was a great plunder and many captives sold as slaves. According to Farishtah 300 to 400 hundred thousand Khokhars were converted to Islam by Muizzuddin.
Under Aibak most of Hindustan from Delhi to Gujarat, Lakhnauti to Lahore and Bihar to Bengal were brought under the sway of the Turks. In every attack great many people were killed and large number of women and children were captured as slaves. In 1202 CE, Ikhtiyaruddin Bakhtiyar Khalji marched into Bihar and attacked the University centers at Nalanda, Vikramshila and Uddandpur. The Buddhist monks and Brahmans, identified by shaved head, taken as idolaters, were massacred and the common people were captured and enslaved. Ibn Asir says that Qutbuddin Aibak made ‘war against the provinces of Hind. He killed many, and returned with prisoners and booty.” In Banaras, according to the same author, “the slaughter of the Hindus was immense; none was spared except women and children”. Fakhr-i-Mudabbir informs us that as a result of the Turkish achievements under Muizzuddin and Aibak, even poor (Muslim) householder became owner of numerous slaves.”
Following Aibak, Sultan Iltutmish, (rule 1210-1236), he continued with his war against the infidels and revolting territories including Ranthambhor (1226), Mandor (near Jodhpur), Gwalior and Ujjan (1234-35). According to contemporary chroniclers Minhaj Shiraj and Muhammad Farishtah, every campaign lead to general massacres of those who resisted and the women and children were taken captives and assets of the infidels were looted.
Minhaj Siraj writes that Ulugh Khan Balban’s “taking of captives and his capture of the dependents of the great Ranas cannot be recounted”. Talking of his war in Avadh against Trailokyavarman of the Chandela dynasty (Dalaki va Malaki of Minhaj), the chronicler says that “All the infidels’ wives, sons and dependents… and children… fell into the hands of the victors.” In 1253, in his campaign against Ranthambhor also, Balban enslaved many people. In 1259, in an attack on Haryana, many women and children were enslaved. Twice Balban led expeditions against Kampil, Patiali, and Bhojpur, and in the process enslaved a large number of women and children. In Katehar he ordered a general massacre of the male population of over eight years of age and carried away women and children. In 1260 CE, Ulugh Khan Balban marched with a large force on a campaign in the region of Ranthambhor, Mewat and Siwalik. He made a proclamation that a soldier who brought a live captive would be rewarded with two silver tankahs and one who brought the head of a dead one would get one silver tankah. Soon 300-400 living and dead were brought to his presence everyday.
Like Balban, other commanders of Iltutmish, or the “Shamsia Maliks of Hind” were marching up and down the Hindustan, raiding towns and villages and enslaving people. This was the situation prevailing from Lakhnauti to Lahore and from Ajmer to Ujjain. The Hindus used to reclaim their lands after the Muslim invaders had passed through them with fire and sword, and Turkish armies used to repeat their attacks to regain control of the cities so lost. But the captives once taken became slaves and then Musalmans for ever. The exact figures of such slaves have not been mentioned and therefore cannot be computed. All that is known is that they were captured in droves.
After the Iltutmish Sultans, war against the Hindu infidels and slave-taking received further momentum under the Khaljis. Sultan Jalaluddin Khalji (1290-1296) launched ruthless attacks against Hindus in Katehar, Ranthambhor, Malwa, and Gwalior. According to Amir Khasrau [Miftah-ul-Fatuh], he sacked temples, took booty and captured slaves making a “Hell of Paradise”.
Next Sultan Alauddin Khalji, a great war maker, sent a large army to Gujarat in 1299 in which all the major towns were sacked, temples destroyed, wealth looted and large number of slaves of both sexes captured [Khwaja AM Isami, Futu-us-Salatin, p. 243 ; Ziauddin Barani, Tarikh-i-Firoz Shahi, pp. 251-52].
...snip...http://islam-watch.org/MA_Khan/IncessantTerrorism.htm
by MA Khan
24th July, 2006
In recent times, overshadowing the relative calm of the past few decades, there has been a sudden surge in violence and terrorist activities by the Islamic zealots and fanatics. Hence, there is a debate as to why Muslims did not indulge in terror and violence during the past decades and centuries. There might be some consolation in the thought that Islamic violence was not so evident during the early 20th century. However, there is also a general impression amongst both Muslims and the non-Muslims that there was never any Islamic violence and terrorism until the last 2-3 decades. One respected moderate Muslim columnist Tanveer Jaffri in his recent column, Terror and Terrorism in the World: The Remedy, wrote:
Obviously, in the life of Hazrat Mohammad, taking his relations with the Islam, there is no incident showing terror or terrorism. Even Hazrat Mohammad himself never fought against anyone, in his lifetime.
Presuming Mr. Jafri a good-hearted and honest person, I believe that his verdict on Prophet Muhammad’s non-involvement in any kind of violence in his life-time is his honest opinion. Not only Mr. Jafri, but most of the moderate Muslims also bear such a thought about the Prophet of Islam. Yet, such thought, even if born out of honest opinion, is thoroughly erroneous and is the result of utter ignorance. Instead of being a nonviolent person, Muhammad's life is a testament of ceaseless raids and plundering expeditions of highway caravans and waging wars against the infidel (non-Muslims community). He himself had orchestrated more than one hundred raids, plundering expeditions and wars. Even just before his death, he was in the planning of organizing an expedition, but he fell sick suddenly, from which he never recovered. By this time, he had already extirpated all the Jewish settlements around Medina by means of mass slaughter and enslavement (Banu Quraiza) and mass exile (Banu Nadhir and Banu Qainuka). He had also launched expeditions against the Jewish tribes in far-flung places like Khaybar and Kinan. In his death bed one of his last wishes was: “Let there be no other religion except Islam”. This wish was carried out to fruition by his immediate successors, notably Caliph Abu Bakar and Omar.
The fact is: the kind of terror and violence perpetrated by Prophet Muhammad has little or no parallel amongst the terrorism and violence of today’s Islamic terrorists. The extermination of the Jews from Medina requires another mention here. Consider Muhammad’s raiding the Jewish enclave of Banu Quraiza, because they did not join the Muslim army when the Meccans attacked the Muslims in the famous battle of the Trench, which, the Quraiza tribe was obligated to do because of a covenant of mutual protection signed earlier. The first reason of unwillingness of the Quraiza people to join the battle that Muhammad started was that the Jewish people were sick and tired of such violent activities and blood-baths, raiding and plundering expeditions and fighting wars one after another. Secondly, the Mecca army in this battle was too powerful to ensure a decisive victory, had it not been for the trenches Muhammad had dug – thanks to the Salman the Persian, who gave the idea to Muhammad from his Persian experience of war. After a 25-day seize by Muhammad of the Jewish enclave, the Banu Quraiza tribe surrendered unconditionally and pleaded Muhammad to let them go into exile. Instead, Muhammad decided to slaughter all the males of weapon-bearing age, around 600 to 900 in numbers, took of their women and children as slaves and took possession of their homes, properties and farms and distributed them amongst the Muslims who had participated in this genocide. The world is yet to witness an example of similar barbaric atrocity perpetrated by today’s Islamic terrorists, though we can be absolutely certain that today’s Islamist jihadists ardently crave to match their Prophet’s examples.
Another incidence which requires mentioning again here is Muhammad’s victorious entry into the city of Mecca, his paternal hometown. Upon his entry into the city, he destroyed all the temples and deities which his ancestors had worshipped for centuries. Soon after his invasion of Mecca, the Prophet sent his general Khalid bin Walid to destroy all the pagan temples of the neighboring tribes of Mecca. Khalid reached the Jazima tribe and asked them to say, “We are Muslims”. But they said, “We are Sabians” – whereupon Khalid slaughtered the whole tribe. The Jazima tribe people had never given any troubles to the Muslims. Is there a parallel of such barbarity amongst terror acts of Muslim extremists of today? No, there isn’t. The truth is: the end of his 22 years of religious campaign, Muhammad had depopulated the entire Southern Arabia of the infidel pagans, Jews, Christians and Sabians etc. through mass slaughter, enslavement and forced conversion and mass exile. These acts of violence, cruelty and barbarity of the Prophet have no parallel amongst violent acts of today’s Islamic terrorists. Of course, throughout the Islamic world, there are scattered incidences of violence and attacks on non-Muslims’ homes, churches and temples and incidences of raping the infidel women. But there is no incidence in which women of an entire community being captured as sex-slaves, all weapon-bearing males of a community put to summary execution or an entire village or community of the Kaffirs sent to exile.
The acts of violence and terrorism did not just disappear with the death of the Prophet but was redoubled by his immediate successors; namely, Abu Bakr, Omar and Othman et al. who were Muhammad’s closest friends. By the time of third Caliph Othman’s rule, all remaining Jews and Christians of entire Arabian peninsula were forcibly converted, expelled or slain which fulfilled Prophet’s death-bed wish that no second religion remain in the holy land of Arabia.
Immediately after Muhammad’s death, many Muslims who were forced to accept Islam wanted to leave Islam. Prophet’s first biographer, ibn Ishak writes, “When the apostle was dead, most of the Muslims thought of withdrawing from Islam and had made up their mind to do”. Many tribes rose in rejection of Islam, turned to their tribal leaders and rejected to pay taxes. The immediate task of the first Caliph, Abu Bakr, was to bring these fierce and intractable tribes into submission. Under the command of fierce Khalid ibn Walid, a bitter and sanguinary battle, termed the Wars of the Apostasy (ridda) followed. The revolt was cruelly suppressed and the recalcitrant tribes were forced back to the fold of Islam.
The fanaticism and barbarity associated with these conquering expeditions need a sampling here. The kind of fierce intolerance and fanaticism being inspired by Prophet Muhammad amongst his followers have no parallel in the annals of any other religion. Under his command, his followers were ready to kill even their own fathers and brothers, yet others’ wished for his approval. Prophet’s biographer Hisahm al-Kalbi notes that the son of the great hypocrite Abduallah ibn Obayi had begged for prophet’s permission to kill his own father and bring the head to the prophet. But Abdullah was an influential man and the prophet didn’t dare. According to Ibn-Ishak, in July 624, being increasingly exasperated with the Jews, the prophet ordered: “Kill any Jew whoever falls into your power.” Thereupon a Muslim convert named Muhaysa fell upon a rich Jewish merchant who happened to be on the same way and killed him, despite the fact that he belonged to his own tribe. When his elder brother, still a Jew, scolded him for killing someone of his own tribe, Muhaysa replied, “By Allah, if Muhammad commanded me to kill you also, I would have cut off your head”. So impressed was the Jewish man by his brother’s conviction to Islam that he immediately converted to Islam. The prophet’s fanatic inspiration to intolerance and violence compelled Voltaire to comment: Such conducts cannot be defended by any person, ‘unless superstition has choked all the light of reason from him.’
The violent fanaticism, inspired by the Prophet, was carried forward with ruthless zeal by his immediate followers. Khalid ibn Walid, who fought on the enemy side in the battle of Ohud but later embraced Islam, became one of the most blood-thirsty and brutal of conquerors, if judged even by the standard of his day. Yet his cruelty and rapacity were and still are greatly extolled amongst the Muslims, who honored him with the title of “the Sword of Allah” (Sayif Allah).
The utter barbarity of Khalid was displayed in May, 633, when he defeated the Zoroastrian Persians at the Battle of Olayis in Southern Iraq (between Hira and Basra). For two days, his soldiers rounded up the great multitude of prisoners and fugitives, who were then herded on to a dry river bed and were butchered until it became a crimson stream. The place thereafter proudly bore the title of ‘the River of Blood’. Abu Bakr, the caliph was overjoyed when the news of victory and massacre reached him.
On the barbarity of Khalid, Benjamin Walker writes:
A wine-lover and lustful debaucher, Khalid took sickly sadistic delight in beheading a defeated chieftain on the battle-field, selecting his wife (if young) or daughter and celebrating his nuptials with her on the spot soaked with the blood of the victim (father/husband of the bride). [Walker, Foundations of Islam, p. 316]
Before Muslims conquered Jerusalem, the scattered communities of Jews and pagans lived in harmony along with the Christians. When Caliph Omar conquered the Jerusalem, much venerated in the Koran and a holy place in Islam, in 637 – the Jewish temples and Christian Churches were razed to the ground and widespread looting and pillaging was unleashed. The Patriarch Sophronius of Jerusalem (634-638), who witnessed spread of Islam in Arabia and the fall of Jerusalem with his own eyes, described the Muslim invaders as “godless barbarians” who “burnt churches, destroyed monasteries, profaned the Crosses and blasphemed against Christ and the church.” The following year, thousands died of famine resulted from the destruction and pillage by the Muslim conquerors of Jerusalem. [Ibn Warraq, Why I am not a Muslim, p. 219]
The invading Muslims destroyed the main Jewish temple and Omar laid the foundation of the much venerated al-Aqsa mosque with his own hands in its place. He declared a decree that Jews and Christians could practice religion only in the confines of their churches and homes. No new churches would be built, no conversion should be made, crosses should not be exhibited in their churches and no public display of their faith should be made. These rather benevolent treatments were accorded to the Jews and Christians under the privileged term of the Dhimmis (Zimmis) as accorded to the people of the Book in the Koran. Yet, repression and discrimination, attacks on pilgrims, raid and ransacking of the monasteries and the destruction of the places of worship of the non-Muslims continued.
The barbaric tradition of atrocity set in motion by the Prophet in the form a command for incessant Jihad against the Kaffirs in the Koran, continued well into the late period of Ottoman caliphate. Even the highly magnanimous and well-regarded caliph, like Harun-ur-Rashid and his father al-Mamun were thoroughly brutal in dealing with the Jews, Christians and pagans. The great caliph al-Mamun of the golden age of Islam, instituting the heretic rationalistic Mutazili doctrine and non-divine nature of the Koran as state policy, too, was extremely harsh when it comes to dealing with the non-Muslim subjects. Under his rule in the 9th century, the pagans of Harran had to choose between Islam and death. Such barbaric tools of forced conversion of the infidels continued well into the late Ottoman period. Tavernier, the 17th century French traveler describes how in Anatolia “Everyday there are numerous Greeks forced to become Turks”.
Certain Western authors and historians believe that after an early onslaught of Islamic conquests lasting until about the mid-eighth century, violence subsided and relative calm and peace prevailed throughout the Islamic world for the subsequent centuries [Saunders, J.J. A History of Medieval Islam. London: Routledge, 1965; p79]. In truth, such claims of relative peace for centuries fly in the face of it. In reality, no period of the Islamic domination did ensure a peaceful life to the non-Muslims subjects – thanks to Muslims’ Jihadi campaigns in various forms, either by the state or by the Muslim mobs. Yet, some Muslim rulers were tolerant towards non-Muslim subjects in defiance of the Islamic injunctions. Islamic terror, as was unleashed by the Prophet, comprised of unprovoked attack on the unwarned and unprepared infidel territories, exiling or killing the adult male captives, taking the females and children as captives (beautiful and young women were used in the harem as sex-slaves, children for raising as Muslims and older females for sale), looting and plundering the infidels of their valuable properties and assets, imposing Jiziyah and of course, destroying the infidels’ religious institutions. Ibn Warraq, in “Why I am not a Muslims” [p. 219-240] has listed the Islamic atrocities and violence against the infidels of various sorts which I will summarized here.
7th Century
After Prophet Muhammad’s emigration from Mecca to Medina in 622, the exiling and extermination of 3 major Jewish tribes of Medina by 628, has been described above. In 630, Muhammad marched into Mecca, mercilessly captured, destroyed the most sacred pagan temple of Ka’ba and established the Islamic rule there. The pagan inhabitants were given a choice between death and Islam. To save lives, the pagans had no choice but to accept Islam. On the same day, Khalid ibn Walid’s massacre of the entire Jezima tribe for not accepting Islam has already been discussed. Khalid ibn Walid, upon command of Caliph Abu Bakr, launched the blood-letting wars of the apostasy (Ridda) to submit those, who deserted Islam immediately after Muhammad’s death, back to the faith. The utter barbarity of Khalid Ibn Walid against the defeated the Zoroastrian Persians at the Battle of Olayis in Southern Iraq in May 633, whereby he created what is famously called the River of Death has been discussed before.
After completing extermination/exiling the Jews of Medina in 628, Muhammad launched a campaign against the wealthy and prosperous Jewish community of Khaybar. He ordered his charges to destroy all the Jewish temples as they came across. Having defeated the community, he tortured the chief of tribe Kinana by setting fire on his chest to find out the whereabouts of his treasures. After extracting the location of the ensconced treasure, Kinana was beheaded, the treasures were looted, and Kinana’s wife Safiyah rendered as his share of the captive to be reduced to his sex-slave. He married and took her to bed on the same night her husband’s dead body awaited burial on the next day. Incidentally, Safiyah’s father belonged to the Banu Quraiza tribe of Medina whom Muhammad had beheaded earlier.
In the Muslim campaign of 634, the entire region between Gaza and Caesarea was devastated and four thousand peasants, comprising of Christians, Jews and Samaritans, who were simply defending their lands, were massacred. In 637, the Victorian Muslim army’s march into Jerusalem, with Caliph Omar at the lead, and the accompanying destruction of the synagogues and burning of the churches, desecration of the Crosses and setting in the Dhimmi laws of submission to the Jews and Christians of the Holy Land has already been mentioned. In the expeditions against Mesopotamia between 635 and 643, monasteries were sacked, the monks slaughtered and Monophysite Arabs executed or forced to convert. In Elam, all the people were put to the sword and at Susa all the dignitaries suffered the same fate.
Details of conquest of Egypt starting with the capture of Alexandria by Amr Ibn Al-As in 641 comes from the “Chronicle of John” – the Bishop of Nikiu, written between 693 and 700 CE. As Amr advanced into Egypt, he captured the city of Behnesa near Fayum, and exterminated the inhabitants. Nobody was spared: surrendered or captured, Old or Young or Women. Fayum and Aboit suffered the same fate. At Nikiu, the entire population was put to the sword. The Arabs took the inhabitants to captivity. In Armenia, the entire population of Euchaita was wiped out. Seventh century Armenian chronicles recount how the Arabs decimated the population of Assyria and forced a number of inhabitants to accept Islam and then wrought havoc in the districts of Daron, southwest of Lake Van. In 642, it was the turn to town Dvin to suffer. In 643, the Arabs came back with “extermination, ruin and slavery”.
It was the same ghastly spectacle in North Africa, Tripoli was pillaged in 643; Carthrage was razed to the ground and most of its inhabitants were slaughtered. Michael, the Syrian describes how the first Omayyad Caliph Muawiya, who took power in 661, sacked and pillaged Cyprus and then established his domination by a “great massacre”. In the capture of Istakhar (Persia), 40,000 Iranians were slaughtered. Indeed, Anatolia, Mesopotamia, Syria, Iraq, Iran and wherever Muslims have marched, were presented with the same spectacle.
8th Century
In 712, Governor of Iraq, Hajjaj, ordered the conquest of Sind under the commandership of his nephew, Muhammad bin Kasim. He was instructed to “bring destruction on the unbelievers… [and] to invite and induce the infidels to accept the true creed, and belief in the unity of God… and whoever does not submit to Islam, treat him harshly, and cause injury to him till he submits.” According to Al-Biladuri, after the capturing the port of Debal, the Muslim army slaughtered the inhabitants over three days and the priests of the temples were massacred.
After the initial surge of cruelty, Kasim became more tolerant and allowed the infidels to continue their profession and religious practice. Learning about this sympathetic treatment, a furious Hajjaj sent letter condemning Kasim’s method of pardoning the infidels. It read, “… The great god says in the Koran [47:7]: “O True believers, when you encounter the unbelievers, strike off their heads.” The above command of the Great God is a great command and must be respected…. Henceforth, grant pardon to no one of the enemy and spare none of them..” Kasim quickly obliged to the divinely ordained command and on his capture of Brahmanabad, he invited the infidel idol-worshipers to accept Islam. On latter’s refusal, he ordered all adult males be beheaded with swords and their women and the children were captured as slaves. Eight thousands, some say 26,000, men were put to the sword. One-fifth of the captured slaves (women and children), which amounted to 20,000, amongst whom, were the daughters of Sind Chiefs along with King Dahir’s severed head, were sent to Hajjaj as the share of the states and the remainder were distributed amongst the soldiers. [Chachanama, Muhammad al-Kufi, trs Kalichbeg, I, 155; Shashi R Sharma, Caliphs and Sultans, p. 95]. The stream of captured slaves continued to flow from India to Baghdad ever since Kassim captured Sind and Hajjaj alone is said to have forwarded 60,000 slaves from India (~1/5 of total) to the caliph Walid I (705-715 CE). [Chachnama, I, 154]
In 704-705, Caliph Walid I gathered together the nobles of Armenia in the Church of St. Gregory and in the Church of Xram on the Araxis and burned them alive. The rest were crucified and their women and children were captured as slaves. The worse happened to the Armenians between 852 and 855. Over in Egypt, in 722, the surveyor Usama b. Zaid, attacked convents and churches but Caliph Hisham later asked him to leave the Christians alone. Caliph Marwan (ruled 744-750) looted and destroyed many monasteries in Egypt while fleeing the Abbasid army. In the sacking of Euphesus in 781, 7,000 Greeks were taken captives were deported en masse.
9th century
In 853, Abbassid Caliph Mutawakil ordered all new churches to be destroyed. In 884, the convent of Kalilshu in Baghdad was destroyed. Caliph al-Mutasim, known as the Islamic hero, was a great wager of holy wars against the Christians and heretics. After the capture and pillage of Amorium in 838, there were so many captive slaves that Caliph al-Mutasim ordered them to be auctioned in batches of five and ten. During the rule of caliph al-Mamun – considered the most just Muslim ruler and harbinger of the so-called “golden age of Islam” – the pagans of Harran had to choose between Islam and death.
Ruined by the burden of imposition of Jizyah tax, the Coptic Christians of Lower Egypt revolted in 832. This revolt was ruthlessly suppressed by the Muslim rulers in which Christian villages, vineyards, gardens and Churches were burned. There were mass slaughter and those spared were deported.
10th century
In 924, the Church and convent of Mary in Damascus was plundered and burned and other churches destroyed. Further destruction occurred in Ramleh, Ascalon, Tinnis, and Egypt during the invasion of Asad ud Din Shirkuh. In the capture and sacking of Thessalonica in 903 CE, 22,000 Christian captives were divided amongst the Arab chieftains or sold into slavery. [Ibn Warraq,
There were massacres of the Spanish Christians in and around Seville. Al-Hakim biamr Illah gave orders that the Churches of his dominions should be destroyed. A Muslim historian records that over 30,000 churches built by the Greeks in Egypt, Syria and elsewhere were destroyed, their contents seized and sold in the markets and lands confiscated. [Tritton AS, The Caliphs and their non-Muslim Subjects. London, 1970, p. 54].
In Iran, the Zoroastrians faced frequent forced conversion, pressure to do so and persecution which lead to riots in Shiraz in 979. To escape persecution, they immigrated to India and live there even today as a respected community.
11th century
Six thousand Jews were massacred in Fez of Morocco in 1033. Hundreds of Jews were killed between 1010 and 1013 near Cordoba and other parts of Muslim Spain and an entire Jewish community of 4000 in Grenada was annihilated in 1066. Fatimid caliph Hakim’s jealous persecution of non-Muslims and Church demolition resulted in the destruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem in 1009. He also banned the pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Both events acted as the major causes that ignited the Crusades.
In Kairoun (Tunisia), the Jews were persecuted and sent to exile in 1016, who later returned, only to be expelled again. In Tunis, they were forced to convert or leave. During subsequent decades, there were fierce anti-Jewish persecutions throughout Tunisia.
In 1064, the Seljuk Sultan, Alp Arslan, devastated Georgia and Armenia. Those, whom he did not take captive, were executed. [Ibn Warraq, pp. 218-238]
Eleventh century also saw the barbaric assault of Sultan Mahmud of Ghazni on Hindustan starting in 1000 CE. He launched 17 plundering, looting and slave-taking expeditions to India. Abu Nasr Muhammad Utbi, Sultan Mahmud’s secretary, gloats in his official chronicle that after attacking Waihind in November 1001 CE, Mahmud’s army slaughtered 15,000 fighting men in “splendid action” before capturing 500,000 men and women as slaves. In Mahmud’s attack of Ninduna and Panjab in 1014, “slaves were so plentiful that they became very cheap and the men of respectability in their native land were degraded by becoming slaves of ordinary shop-keepers (in Ghazni)”. The extent of barbarity of Sultan Mahmud was vividly described by contemporary Muslim historians. In the attack on Thanesar, “the blood of the infidels flowed so copiously the stream was discolored and the people were unable to drink it”. Similarly in the slaughter of Sirsawa near Saharanpur, “the Musalmans paid no regard to the booty till they had satiated themselves with the slaughter of infidels.” [Utbi, Tehrik-i-Yamini, ED, Vol II, pp 41-42, 49-50]. When Mahmud learned that the famous Hindu temple at Somnath housed a monolith brought of the temple of Ka’ba that was destroyed by the Prophet of Islam in 630 CE, out of jealous piety, he rushed to destroy the Somnath temple. Hindus in great numbered assembled to protect their sacred temple and offered Mahmud great booty, which he ignored and according to Ibn Asir [Kamil-ut-Tawarikh], he massacred 50,000 Hindus guarding temple and destroyed it.
12th Century
In the 12th century, the Almohads of North Africa spread terror wherever they went. The Jews in Yemen were given choice of death or conversion to Islam in 1165. Similar choice was given to the Jews of Aden in 1198. According to Stillman [The Jews of Arab Lands], there were forced conversions of Jews under the Almohad caliphs, al-Mumin (d 1165), Abu Yakub (d 1184) and al-Mansur (d 1199). The Christians of Grenada were deported to Morocco by the Almoravids rulers in 1126.
In the Indian front, after the scourge of Mahmud Ghazni, there was a relative calm until Turk Ghaurid Sultan Muhammad Ghauri started his attacks beginning in 1175. When he became successful in 1192 to defeat Prithviraj Chauhan, he launched a scourge of conquest of Sirsuti, Samana, Khuhram and Hansi with ruthless slaughter and a general destruction of temples and their replacement with mosques. Similar events followed in Ajmer and Delhi later on [KS Lal, Theory and Practice of Muslim State in India, p. 21].
Muhammad Ghauri’s lieutenant Qutbuddin Aibak, succeeded him to become the first Muslim Sultan in India. He dispatched Ikhtiyaruddin Bakhtiyar Khalji to the East and himself concentrated in Hindustan proper. He captured Kol (modern Aligarh) in 1194. There “those of the garrison who were wise and cute were converted to Islam, but those who stood by their ancient faith were slain with the sword.” [Hasan Nizami, Taj-ul-Maasir, E.D., H, 222]
In 1195 when Raja Bhim was attacked by Aibak, he captured 20,000 slaves.
13th Century
In Aibak’s attack of Kalinjar in 1202, 50,000 slaves were captured. “The temples were converted into mosques,” writes Hasan Nizami, “and the voices of the summoners to prayer ascended to the highest heavens, and the very name of idolatry was annihilated.” Muhammad Farishtah specifically mentions that during the capture of Kalinjar “fifty thousand kaniz va ghulam, having suffered slavery, were rewarded with the honor of Islam” – which meant that enslaved captives were forced into conversion to Islam and conversion accelerated the growth of Muslim population in India.
During Aibak’s rule of 20 Lunar years, he captured Hansi, Meerut, Delhi, Ranthambhor and Kol, which accompanied similar massacres, destruction and slave-taking. When Sultan Muizzuddin personally mounted a campaign against Hindustan, Aibak proceeded as far as Peshawar to meet him, and the two together attacked the Khokhar (Hindu) stronghold in the Koh-i-Jud or the Salt Range. The Hindus (Khokhars) fled to the highest in the mountains. They were pursued. Those that escaped the sword fled to the dense depth of the jungle; others were massacred or taken captive. The result was a great plunder and many captives sold as slaves. According to Farishtah 300 to 400 hundred thousand Khokhars were converted to Islam by Muizzuddin.
Under Aibak most of Hindustan from Delhi to Gujarat, Lakhnauti to Lahore and Bihar to Bengal were brought under the sway of the Turks. In every attack great many people were killed and large number of women and children were captured as slaves. In 1202 CE, Ikhtiyaruddin Bakhtiyar Khalji marched into Bihar and attacked the University centers at Nalanda, Vikramshila and Uddandpur. The Buddhist monks and Brahmans, identified by shaved head, taken as idolaters, were massacred and the common people were captured and enslaved. Ibn Asir says that Qutbuddin Aibak made ‘war against the provinces of Hind. He killed many, and returned with prisoners and booty.” In Banaras, according to the same author, “the slaughter of the Hindus was immense; none was spared except women and children”. Fakhr-i-Mudabbir informs us that as a result of the Turkish achievements under Muizzuddin and Aibak, even poor (Muslim) householder became owner of numerous slaves.”
Following Aibak, Sultan Iltutmish, (rule 1210-1236), he continued with his war against the infidels and revolting territories including Ranthambhor (1226), Mandor (near Jodhpur), Gwalior and Ujjan (1234-35). According to contemporary chroniclers Minhaj Shiraj and Muhammad Farishtah, every campaign lead to general massacres of those who resisted and the women and children were taken captives and assets of the infidels were looted.
Minhaj Siraj writes that Ulugh Khan Balban’s “taking of captives and his capture of the dependents of the great Ranas cannot be recounted”. Talking of his war in Avadh against Trailokyavarman of the Chandela dynasty (Dalaki va Malaki of Minhaj), the chronicler says that “All the infidels’ wives, sons and dependents… and children… fell into the hands of the victors.” In 1253, in his campaign against Ranthambhor also, Balban enslaved many people. In 1259, in an attack on Haryana, many women and children were enslaved. Twice Balban led expeditions against Kampil, Patiali, and Bhojpur, and in the process enslaved a large number of women and children. In Katehar he ordered a general massacre of the male population of over eight years of age and carried away women and children. In 1260 CE, Ulugh Khan Balban marched with a large force on a campaign in the region of Ranthambhor, Mewat and Siwalik. He made a proclamation that a soldier who brought a live captive would be rewarded with two silver tankahs and one who brought the head of a dead one would get one silver tankah. Soon 300-400 living and dead were brought to his presence everyday.
Like Balban, other commanders of Iltutmish, or the “Shamsia Maliks of Hind” were marching up and down the Hindustan, raiding towns and villages and enslaving people. This was the situation prevailing from Lakhnauti to Lahore and from Ajmer to Ujjain. The Hindus used to reclaim their lands after the Muslim invaders had passed through them with fire and sword, and Turkish armies used to repeat their attacks to regain control of the cities so lost. But the captives once taken became slaves and then Musalmans for ever. The exact figures of such slaves have not been mentioned and therefore cannot be computed. All that is known is that they were captured in droves.
After the Iltutmish Sultans, war against the Hindu infidels and slave-taking received further momentum under the Khaljis. Sultan Jalaluddin Khalji (1290-1296) launched ruthless attacks against Hindus in Katehar, Ranthambhor, Malwa, and Gwalior. According to Amir Khasrau [Miftah-ul-Fatuh], he sacked temples, took booty and captured slaves making a “Hell of Paradise”.
Next Sultan Alauddin Khalji, a great war maker, sent a large army to Gujarat in 1299 in which all the major towns were sacked, temples destroyed, wealth looted and large number of slaves of both sexes captured [Khwaja AM Isami, Futu-us-Salatin, p. 243 ; Ziauddin Barani, Tarikh-i-Firoz Shahi, pp. 251-52].
...snip...http://islam-watch.org/MA_Khan/IncessantTerrorism.htm
posted by moderationist at 7:11 AM
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