"I am afraid Ayodhya is not

an end but only a beginning"

-- Sudhir Kakar

"Nonetheless, from my perspective as a secular humanist and my personal

experience, I regard a typical liberal Indian Muslim to be as good a human
being as any other Indian." -- C. J. S. Wallia
=======================

In The Colors of Violence, Sudhir Kakar, visiting professor of psychology at

the University of Chicago, focuses on the psychodynamics of religious riots
between the Hindus and Muslims in India.

Dr. Kakar, a psychiatrist in New Delhi, notes that his study is not grounded in
psychoanalytic theory; it is a trained clinician's cold-eyed analysis of a
complex, emotionally charged, social problem.

As his case study, Kakar took the Hindu-Muslim violence of 1990 in the south
Indian city of Hyderabad, where 300 people were killed. Based on his field
research and psychological measurements, Kakar argues that beginning in
childhood the social identity of every Indian is grounded in his or her religious
community, which in times of intercommunity conflict readily erupts into
violent communalism.

Among the most revealing sections of The Colors of Violence are his analyses
of the speeches of two typical demagogues, one from each community.
Ubedullah Khan Azmi, a member of Parliament, and secretary of the Muslim
Personal Law Conference, said: "...And you [Hindus] raise slogans about
Muslim loyalty. Have you ever looked at your own face in the mirror? It was
the believers in the Qur'an who taught you the graces of life, taught you how to
eat and drink. All you had before us were tomatoes and potatoes. What did you
have? We brought jasmine, we brought frangipani. We gave the Taj Mahal, we
gave the Red Fort. India was made India by us. We have lived here for eight
hundred years and we made India shine.... Our personal law is being
proscribed, our community's very way of life is being restricted. Beware,
history may repeat itself. Atal Behari Vajpayee may have to read the kalma [i.e.,
convert to Islam]...."
Dr. Kakar accurately diagnoses the major malady as symptomized in Azmi's
repeated assertion of Muslims' having come from the outside. "There has been
a historical tendency among upper-class Muslims (or those aspiring to higher
status in the community) to stress or invent Persian, Arab, or Turkish ancestry
rather than rest content with their more humble Indian origins.... The nature of
the vicious circle is immediately apparent: the anchoring of Muslim identity in
Islam spurs Hindu suspicion of Muslim loyalty to the nation, which makes
Muslims draw closer in the religious community for security, which further
fuels Hindu distrust of Muslim patriotism, and so on." Kakar quotes an earlier
study of Hyderabad Muslims by anthropologist S.C.Dubey: "A Hindu
untouchable of yesterday becomes a Muslim today; and tomorrow he will start
proclaiming that his forefathers lived in Arabia." Clearly, Azmi's speech
exhibits a colonizer complex. It was the hauteur of a full-blown colonizer
complex afflicting the Muslims that led to the partition of India and continues
to plague South Asia. The two things Azmi concedes the Hindus had before the
Muslim invasions, namely tomatoes and potatoes, they ironically they certainly
didn't have.

A very different view from Azmi's is expressed by Anwar Shaikh in his much-
discussed recent book: "Before the entry of Islam, India was not only a free
country but also the richest and technically the most advanced in the world. Its
inventiveness through steel, cotton, and water technology made a tremendous
contribution to the international culture, and its philosophical and religious
movements have orientated the human mind in the East and West. But now she
is at lower rung of the Third World. ...The Muslims of South Asia prefer Arabia
to their own motherlands. They do not realise that the grandeur of Arab
nationalism has paralysed their own sense of national honour. This is the height
of brain-washing." (Islam: The Arab National Movement , published by the
Principality Publishers, P.O. Box 918, Cardiff, CF2 4YP, U.K.)

Three decades before the partition of India, Sri Aurobindo raised the question
about the fundamental intolerance of Islam: "How is it possible to live
peacefully with a religion whose principle is 'I will not tolerate you?' How are
you going to have unity with these people?" Sri Aurobindo cited the Koranic
injunction (chapter IX, verse 5): "Slay the Idolaters wherever ye find them, and
take them captive, and besiege them, and prepare for them each ambush. But if
they repent [i.e. convert to Islam] and establish worship and pay the poor-due,
then leave them free. Lo! Allah is forgiving, merciful."

Kakar also analyzes the speech of a typical Hindu demagogue. Sadhavi

Rithambra, a young Punjabi Hindu, is a charismatic speaker for the"Hindutva"
cause. In her speech after the Hyderabad riots, she said: "I have come to the
Hindus of Bhagyanagar [Hyderabad] with a message...We have never said, 'O.
World! Believe in our Upanishads, Believe in our Gita. Otherwise you are an
infidel and by cutting off the head of an infidel one gains paradise.' Our
sentiments are not so low. They are not narrow-minded. They are not dirty. We
see the world as our family.... In Kashmir, the Hindu was a minority and was
hounded out of the valley. Slogans of 'long live Pakistan' were carved with red
hot iron rods on the thighs of our Hindu daughters. Try to feel the unhappiness
and the pain of the Hindu who became a refugee in his own country.... What is
this impartiality toward all religions where the mullahs get the moneybags and
Hindus the bullets? We also want religious impartiality but not of the kind
where only Hindus are oppressed....People say there should be Hindu-Muslim
unity. Leave the structure of the Babri mosque undisturbed. I say, 'Then let's
have this unity in case of the Jama masjid too. Break half of it and construct a
temple. Hindus and Muslims will then come together.' "

Sadhavi Rithambra's refusal to articulate the current name of the city points out
that one of the Hindutva agendas is to restore the classical Hindu names of
cities like Allahabad (Prayag). Her assertion about money bags for the mullahs
refers to the Congress party's policy of buying Muslim votes by subsidzing
mullahs and at the same time ignoring impoverished Hindu priests. These kind
of psuedo-secular policies of the longtime-ruling Congress party have led to its
recent steep decline. The action Sadhavi Rithambra suggests about the Jama
Masjid is, from her Hindutva point of view, merely a token of equitable
treatment because, during the centuries of Islamic imperialism, Muslims
demolished numerous Buddhist and Hindu temples in Afghanistan and India
and atop their foundations erected mosques.

Explaining the methodology of his study, Kakar writes, "I have sought to
analyze the fantasies, social representations and modes of moral reasoning
about the out-groups -- 'them'-- that motivate and rationalize arson, looting,
rape, and killing." The studies' psychological instruments included Erik
Erikson's toy-construction method for examining identity development in
children; and, with adults, the widely-used Giessen Test statements as well as
structured interviews on morality.

Kakar is fully aware of a basic problem in studies of such social phenomena:

the bias of the observer. Whereas quantum physicists have acknowledged the
inseparability of subject and object, most social scientists continue to pretend a
dualistic or Cartesian separation. Psychoanalysts, however, because of the very
nature of their discipline, do regard their subjectivity as an important source of
their observations -- countertransference is regarded as highly significant.
Accordingly, Kakar devotes an entire chapter in recalling his childhood
memories of the Partition riots in the Punjab. He writes about these
recollections with the narrative skills of a consummate novelist and describes
his own current religious persuasion as a liberal-rationalist Hinduism with a
"streak of agnostic mysticism."

Kakar criticizes several prominent contemporary Indian historians, such

as the Marxist historians Romila Thapar and Gyanendra Pandey, for
having "underestimated the extent of the historical rift between Hindus
and Muslims and have thus invited a backlash to their Panglossian view of
the past."

An example of just such a "Panglossian view of the past" is a statement at a

recent public lecture I attended at the University of California, Berkeley. Ashis
Nandy, director of Delhi's Center for the Study of Developing Societies, said:
"The history of communalism in India goes back only a hundred years." It is
precisely to repudiate this sort of wishful, self-deluding reconstruction of
history that Koenraad Elst, the Belgian scholar, recently published
Negationism in India: Concealing the Record of Islam (published by the
Voice of India, 2 / 18 Ansari Road, New Delhi, http://www.voi.org). To be sure,
other Western historians have written of this record before. In The Histoire d
l'Inde, French historian Alain Danielou wrote: "From the time Muslims started
arriving in 632 A.D., the history of India becomes a long monotonous series of
murders, massacres, spoilations, destructions. It is as usual in the name of 'a
holy war' of their faith, their sole God, that the barbarians have destroyed
civilisations." In the words of the well-known American historian,Will Durant,
"the Islamic conquest of India is probably the bloodiest story in history. It is a
discouraging tale, for its evident lesson is that civilization is a precious good,
whose delicate balance can at any moment be overthrown by barbarians
invading from without..."

From my own perspective as a secular humanist, I believe that reconstruction

of history to suit any ideology is counterproductive. Fabricating history for the
sake of a current cause, no matter how lofty its ideals, tempts the fates. To
forget history will always be fateful; to forgive some of its frightful facts can be
redemptive. Forgive -- but never forget -- history. An excellent example of
making sure that history is not forgotten is the contemporary German state's
stipulation making it illegal to publish a reconstructed World War II history that
attempts to negate or conceal the holocaust the Nazis perpetrated on the Jews,
Gypsies, and Poles.
The historical record of Islamic ideology practised in India is heavily
tainted.(To cite two sources: The Story of Islamic Imperialism in India by Sita
Ram Goel, published by Voice of India; The Koran and the Kafir: All That An
Infidel Needs to Know About the Koran But Is Embarrassed to Ask by Arvind
Ghosh. See Endnotes.)

As a secular humanist, however, I make a distinction between an ideology and

its adhering victims, especially those born into it. And, nonetheless, from my
own experience, I regard a typical liberal Indian Muslim to be as good a human
being as any other Indian.

Kakar sharply questions another historical reconstruction, the so-called

composite culture of the Hindus and Muslims: "Even the Sufis had serious
limits to their tolerance. In the question of faith they were unequivocal about
the superiority of Islam and the hellish fate in store for the Hindu infidels on
judgment day." Kakar quotes Muzaffar Alam, a contemporary Muslim
scholar at Jawaharlal Nehru University: "Indeed in relation to Hindus, it
is difficult to distinguish between an orthodox theologian and a liberal
mystic [Sufi].... An average literate Muslim believed that Islam and
Hinduism belonged to two radically diverse traditions and that the twain
would never meet."

A glaring omission in Kakar's critique of the composite culture is a historical

review of the Sikh religion. This omission is all the more puzzling because of
the author's deep Punjabi roots. The Sikh religion, from its very founding by
Guru Nanak in the late fifteenth century, aimed to create just such a composite
culture of the Hindus and Muslims. Guru Nanak, himself a high-caste Hindu,
chose as his constant companion a low-caste Muslim, Bhai Mardana. The fifth
guru, Arjun Dev, invited the Sufi Mian Mir to lay the foundation stone of the
Hari-mandir Sahib (The Golden Temple), and included the hymns of Muslims
like Mardana, the Sufi Farid, Kabir, Satta, Balwand, and others in the religion's
holy book, The Granth Sahib. Despite these sustained attempts at creating a
composite culture, Guru Arjun Dev, upon his refusal to convert to Islam, was
publicly tortured to death by the tyrant Jehangir in 1605. This barbarity was
inflicted at the instigation of Sufi Sheikh Ahmed Sirhindi, head of the Sufi
community of the Naqshbandi order. (Jehangir mentions in his autobiography
the order he gave for the execution of the Sikh guru. The venomous letter sent
by the leader of the Sufis is also a historical document.) In 1675, upon their
refusal to convert to Islam, the ninth guru, Tegh Bahadur and three of his
accompanying disciples were publicly tortured to death on the orders of
Aurangzeb. To intimidate Tegh Bahadur into conversion to Islam, the
executioners made him watch the gruesome execution of his disciples: Bhai
Sati Das was made to climb a pyre and burnt alive; Bhai Mati Das was slowly
sawed in two, starting from the top of his skull; Bhai Dayala was made to sit in
a cauldron and boiled alive. These barbarities were perpetrated in the main
market center, Chandani Chowk, across from the Red Fort in Delhi.

So, what is Dr. Kakar's prognosis? "I am afraid Ayodhya is not an end but only
a beginning.... The optimist realist, a breed with which I identify, believes that
we are moving toward an era of recognition of Hindu-Muslim differences
rather than pursuing their chimerical commonalities. We are moving toward a
multiculturalism, with majority and minority cultures, rather than the
emergence of a 'composite culture.' '' However, Kakar predicts that this will not
happen very soon and hopes that "the violence will be short-lived."

I am afraid Kakar's prognosis is right. I would like to add that multiculturalism

in India will finally emerge from genuine secularism and the Hindus'
forgiveness of Islamic history in India, not from the pseudo-secularists' self-
deluding denials and glossy, yes Panglossian, cover-ups tacked onto the
documented facts of that history.

=======================================
Islamic Terrorism – Is it a New Threat?
by MA Khan

24 Jul, 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 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). 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 Nadir and Banu Qainuqa). He had also launched
expeditions against the Jewish tribes in far-flung places, namely the prosperous Jewish
settlement of Khaybar. 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 have 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 the case
of 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 allegedly obligated to do because of a covenant of
mutual protection signed years 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, which became the prominent feature of the Medina
citizens' life once Muslims became powerful. 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 idea given to Muhammad by Salman the Persian from his Persian
experience of war. After a 25-day seize of the Jewish enclave the Muslims, the Quraiza
tribe surrendered unconditionally and pleaded with 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, captured their women and children as slaves and took possession
of their homes, properties and farms as spoils of war 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 utter barbarity amongst terror acts of
today's Muslim extremists? No, there isn’t. The truth is: by 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
refused 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,
if given approval by the Prophet. 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 by the Muslims, honoring 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 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 the 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 resulting 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 (Solomon Temple) and Omar
laid, in its place, the foundation of the prestigious al-Aqsa mosque with his own hands.
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 the
Ottoman caliphate. Even the highly magnanimous caliphs, like Harun-ur-Rashid and his
son al-Mamun were thoroughly brutal in dealing with the Jews, Christians and pagans.
The great caliph al-Mamun of the golden age of Islam, who instituted 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
existence of centuries of peace 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
desperate minority of 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 prisoners, 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 was
rendered as his share of the booty. 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
have 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, irrespective of 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 of the town of 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 and 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.

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 that 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 from the temple of Ka’ba, which 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.”

After Aibak, Sultan Iltutmish (rule 1210-1236) 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].

Away from the Indian front, the Christians of Damascus were killed or sold into slavery
and their Churches were burned down. Sir Steven Runciman records that Sultan Baibars
had promised the safety of the garrison of Safed if they surrendered to the Muslims.
When they surrendered, the Muslims fell upon the population and massacred them. At the
capture of Antioch by the Muslims, “Even the Muslim Chroniclers were shocked by the
carnage that followed”, says Runciman. The Jews of Marrakesh were massacred in 1232.
Following this, the Jews of Morocco were persecuted, forced to convert or leave. The
Jews of Tabriz were obliged to convert in 1291 CE [Ibn Warraq; p. 227]

14th Century

The riots of 1321 in Cairo, in which several churches were destroyed, which in turn, set
on destruction of churches throughout Egypt resulting in desecration of more than 50
churches. The Jews of Tabriz were again made to convert to Islam in 1318 CE and those
of Baghdad in 1333 and 1344.

Late 14th and the early 15th centuries witnessed the horrible barbarity of Amir Tamur
(aka, Tamurlane). Information about Timur comes mainly from “Zafer Nama” written
during early 15th century and his own diary, Mulfuzat-i-Timuri, which are full of Koranic
references in justification of his invasions, wars and mass murders and destructions. He
set out on his campaign in 1399 against India solely because the Muslim rulers were, to
him, too lenient towards the idolater Hindu subjects. By the time, he reached Delhi; he
had gathered around 100,000 pagan captives. A few thousands artisans and clever
mechanics, including builders and stone masons, were taken back to Samarkhand while
the rest were massacred in a single day [Mulfuzat-i-Timuri, trs ED, III, 447]. He built
victory pillars with the severed heads of the infidels. On his way out of India, he pillaged
Miraj, pulled down the monuments and flayed the Hindu inhabitants alive. [Why I am
Not a Muslim, ibn Warraq, p. 234-235].
In the Indian front, Sultan Allauddin Khaliji (1296-1316) continued his terrorizing
massacre, slave-taking and looting mission in the early 14th century, which made him the
greatest rulers of the so-called Sultanate period (c 1200-1500 CE). In the sack of
reconstituted Somnath temple for a second time, Wassaf recounts that the Muslim army
captured 20,000 women and children as salves. [Wassaf, Bk IV, p. 448]. In 1301
Ranthambhor was attacked and in 1303, Chittor. In the Chittor attack 30,000 people were
massacred in cold blood [Khazain, Habib trs p 49], and women and children were taken
captives. Similar things happened in the attack of Malwa, Sevana and Jalor (1305-1311).
According to Shams Shiraj Afif in the days of the Khaljis, “the Turks, whenever they
please, can seize, buy or sell any Hindu.” [Nuh Sephr, trs, in ED III, 561]. No wonder
that 50,000 slave boys were engaged in his personal services and 70,000 slaves worked
continuously in his buildings. Ziauddin Barani describes the continuous arrival of batches
of slaves in the markets of Delhi and elsewhere.

Following the Khaljis, the Tughlaqs ascended to the Sultanate and they outstripped the
notorious Khaljis in making wars against the Hindus and enslaving them. Shihabuddin
Ahmed Abbas writes of Muhammad Tughlaq, “The Sultan never ceases to show the
greatest zeal in making war upon the infidels… Everyday, thousands of slaves are sold at
a very slow price, so great is the number of prisoners”. [Masalik-ul-Absar, E.D. III, 580].
He subjugated as far as Dwarsamudra, Malabar, Kampil, Warangal, Lakhnauti, Satgaon,
Sonargaon, Nagarkat and Sambhal amongst the prominent places. [Qaraunab Turks, 96,
126, 129-30, 173]. He also ruthlessly put down 16 major rebellions. In each campaign,
after defeat and massacre of the opponent, slaves were captured with gusto. The famous
Muslim traveler Ibn Battutah testifies that in the defeat of Halajun rebellion (of Lahore),
the capture of the women of the rebels were sent to the far-off Gwalior fort whom
Battutah had seen there. [Battutah, p. 123]. The Tughlaqs would capture the Hindu slaves
round the years, convert them to Muslims and on the two Eid-days, he will marry them
off according to the Islamic tradition. [Battutah, p. 63].

Firoz Tughlaq, who ascended to the throne in 1351, outstripped his father and
grandfather in slave-taking by all kind of methods and means, so much so that he
acquired 180,000 of them. Contemporary Shams Shiraj Afif further testifies that during
Firoz Tughlaq “Slaves became too numerous” and that the institution took root in every
centre of the country. [Afif, pp. 267-273]. Firoz Tughloq was known to be relatively kind-
hearted of the Sultans and yet according to Afif he killed 180,000 Bengalis in his
expedition in Bengal and had erected a Tower of skulls [Lal, p. 73].

15th Century

Amir Timur’s barbarism continued in the 15th century. In 1400, Timur devastated the
country in and around Tifflis. In 1403, he returned to Tifflis to devastate the country again
and destroyed the 700 large villages and minor towns, massacred the inhabitant and razed
the Churches to the ground. Amir Timur thoroughly and systematically destroyed the
Christians and as a result, the Nestorians and Jacobites of Mesopotamia have never
recovered. At Sivas, 4,000 Christians were buried alive; at Tus, there were 10,000
victims. Historians estimate the number of dead at Saray to be 100,000; at Baghdad
90,000 and at Isfahan 70,000 [Why I am Not a Muslim, Ibn Warraq, pp. 234-235].

Over in Constantinople, Sultan Mehemet unleashed utter barbarism. When

Constantinople fell to the Muslim army, the Sultan allowed his soldiers to massacre the
population for three days. They poured into the city and slew every men, women and
children they met in the streets [Ruchimen, The Fall of Constantinople, 1453, p. 145].

16th Century

The Muslim Sultanate of India became divided into a few largely independent territories
under different Muslim rulers during much of the 15th century, although the condition of
the Hindus never changed. War against the Hindu community continued along with
capture of slaves for selling. Then came Zahiruddin Muhammad Babur, a descendent of
the barbaric Amir Timur, who defeated the fanatic Sikandar Lodi in 1526 and instituted
the Mogul rule (1525 – 1707) in India. Babur, an orthodox Muslim, continued the Jihadi
wars against the Hindu dominated regions of India. He continued with the destruction of
the Hindu temples, the prominent example is the much controversial Babri Mosque in
Ayodhya. Babur’s determination to exterminate the vestiges of Hindu idolatry was
explicitly narrated in his own diary before battle against Rana Sanga. Babur wrote in
Jihadi zeal, “I made public the resolution to abstain from wine. My servants… dashed
upon the earth, the flagons and the cups. They dashed them into pieces as God willing,
soon will be dashed, the Gods of the idolaters” [Babur Nama, Vol II, p. 554-5]. Babur
and his soldiers destroyed Hindu temples in many parts of the country. [Babur Nama, Vol
II, p. 340]. After winning the War against Rana Sangha, Babur ordered the set-up of a
Tower of slaughtered pagan heads as a trophy for the victory. Similar tower of dead
pagan heads was created after the victory at Chanderi against Medini Rai [Baburnama,
pp. 483-84, 596]

However, the misery and persecution of Hindu and other non-Muslims eased up a little
bit after emperor Akbar came to the throne in 1656, who abolished discrimination,
including Jizya, against the Hindus despite severe displeasure and protests from the
Ulema and Muslims in general. However, persecution against the Hindus continued in
various forms, especially his extreme eagerness and success in capturing the lands under
the non-Muslim control. In the attack of Rana Pratap Singh in Rajastan; when the news of
defeat of the Rajputs reached the palace, a few hundred noble women set fire on
themselves to commit Jauher, in order to avoid being captured at the hands of Akbar’s
lustful soldiers. Akbar accumulated a mind-boggling 5,000 women in his harem through
various means.

17th Century

The Jews of Yemen were forced to choose between death and conversion in 1678. In
1617 and 1622, the Jews of Persia were declared apostates and suffered a wave of forced
conversion and persecution. During the reign of Shah Abbas II (1642-1666), all the Jews
of Persia were forced to convert, between 1653 and 1666. Taverniar, the 17th century
French traveler, records as to how in Anatolia, “Everyday there were numerous Greeks
who are forced to become Turks”.

Over in Persia, the persecution of the Zoroastrians got worse in the 17th century.
Persecutions included levying extra hefty taxes, frequent looting of their homes and
properties, forcing them to wear distinctive clothing, prohibiting building new houses or
repairing old ones.

In the Indian front, following Akbar’s death, the semblance of equality that was
instituted, started a reversal by his own son Jahanghir, which further worsened under
Shahjahan. Jahangir writes that 500-600 thousand people were killed during the rule of
Akbar and Jahangir. However, it was all undone when Akbar’s great grandson Aurangzeb
ascended throne in 1658. He instituted Islamic Sharia as the ruling principle, reintroduced
Jizya and launched a Jihadi campaign of forced conversion of the non-Muslims and
destruction of non-Muslim religious institutions. When the Sikh Guru Tegh Bahadur
Singh went to Aurangzeb’s palace to inquire about forced conversion of the Hindus of
Kashmir, he was tortured and executed in 1675. Aurangzeb’s rule saw destruction of
nearly 10,000 Hindu, Jain and Buddhist temples. In the campaign of 1679-1680, 123
temples were destroyed in Udaipur, 63 in Chittor, 66 in Jaipur [Ibn Warraq, p. 224]. After
defeating and taking Maratha king Sambhuraj and his minister Kavikalash prisoner, their
eyes were extracted, tongue were cut off and after a fortnight’s torture, their limbs were
hacked one by one and thrown to the dogs (1689). [Lal, p. 75]

18th Century

Persecution of the Zoroastrians continued in the 18th century so much so that their
numbers “declined disastrously due to combined effects of massacres, forced
conversions, and emigration” [Encyclopedia of Islam, Ed II].

The Jews of Jedda were expelled between 1770 and 1786, who flew to Yemen. In 1790,
Jews were massacred in Tetuan (Morocco).

Aurangzeb’s policy of persecution and destruction of temples continued in the early 18th
century until he died in 1707.

19th Century
In Persia, there was forced conversion of Jews in 1839. According the Bernard Lewis,
there was also forced conversion of Persian Jews in the 1840s.

In 1828, Jews of Baghdad were massacred. In 1834, a cycle of violence and pillage
began against the Jews and their properties in Safed. In 1839, massacre of Jews occurred
in Meshed (Iran). The survivors had to suffer forced conversion. A massacre of the Jews
took place in Barfurush in 1867. In 1840, the Jews of Damascus suffered first in a series
of blood libels, which spread to many cities. Other outbreaks of violence, murder and
pillage of the Jews and their properties occurred in Morocco, Tunisia, Libya and the Arab
countries.

Starting in the 7th century, the Armenian Christians suffered terribly in the 19th century.
The Turks massacred about 250,000 Armenian Christians in 1894-1896 in a planned and
methodical design. General pillage was unleashed. Villages were burned and hundreds of
Churches were plundered.

The Zoroastrians faced increased persecution too, such that they were living in complete
insecurity and poverty in the 19th century.

20th Century

Massacre of the Armenians continued in the early 20th century. In 1904 and in 1909 CE,
about 30,000 Armenians were slaughtered in Adana. The most horrible mass murder of
Armenians occurred in 1915, which can be rightly described as the first genocide of the
20th century. More than 1,000,000 (one million) Armenians were systematically
massacred – thousands were shot to death, drowned (included Children), thrown over the
cliffs and the survivors were deported or reduced to slavery – which served as the model
for Hitler’s massacre of the Jews in the WW-II.

There is clear evidence of slavery persisting in Saudi Arabia and the Yemen even in the
1950s. A report in a French Magazine in the 1990s gave an estimate of 45,000 Blacks are
being kidnapped by the Muslims to be sold in slavery in the Gulf states and the middle
east [L Vie, no.2562, Oct 6, 1994].
Islam a legacy of incessant Jihad since it inception

To this long list of Islamic violence, we have to add another major incidence, termed
‘Dewshirme’ which was instituted by the Ottoman Sultan Orkhan in 1330. Following the
Prophet’s tradition of one-fifth of the booty captured from the infidels belonging to the
State, Dewshrime consisted of periodic collection of one-fifth of the Christian children
over 7 years of age as the property of the state. The Christian parents, belonging to Greek
aristocracy, the Serbs, Bulgarians, Armenians, and Albanians, were obligated to surrender
1/5th of their children to the state every four years. They were converted to Islam and
trained as soldiers so that they can wage war against their own blood-brothers in their
adulthood. Some scholars say 12,000 while other claim 8,000 children were collected
every year under this scheme.

The Jihadi campaign Muhammad had initiated in the 620s until his death in 632, there
was not a single period of let-up ever since until this day as accounted in the above
chronology. The account of violence, persecution and massacre listed above are only a tip
of the iceberg that has occurred to the non-Muslim subjects under the Muslim conquest
and rule. Only the prominent events were recorded by the contemporary historians and
chroniclers and royal secretaries. While there are numerous other violent incidences
which the chroniclers have cited with few details and are hard to make a grasp of the
extent of death, destruction and enslavement in those cases.

The Silent Persecution

Another serious form of persecution of the non-Muslims in Muslim countries has

received little attention that requires mention. I will discuss it in the context of moderate
Muslim countries like Bangladesh and Pakistan which will apply to minorities of all
Muslim countries across the globe. The post-separation Hindu population in 1947 stood
at 15% in Pakistan and 30% in Bangladesh (East Bengal until 1971). However, the
current Hindu population stands at ~1% in Pakistan and ~10% in Bangladesh. On the
other hand, the proportion of the Muslim population in Hindu-dominated India has
increased instead.
This massive exodus of Hindu population from Pakistan and Bangladesh (East Bengal)
represent a very grave and yet unnoticed and uncared for persecution of the minorities in
Muslim countries. In recent time, multiple reports in news media have given accounts of
how the Hindus and other minorities are being forced to convert to Islam in Pakistan.
Living in the subcontinent Muslim country, I have witnessed how a Hindu person, having
lands and properties next to an influential Muslim village leader, would be harassed by
the latter such that the latter would be forced to sell the land to the village leader and
leave the country in humiliation. He would not be allowed to sell his lands to a third party
and finally have to surrender the land to the Muslim leader at highly reduced price than
that on the market.

The second form of persecution that leads to exodus of Hindus is the rape of the Hindu
girls and women by the Muslims in the locality. Indeed, there is a massive rape of Hindu
women which is hardly reported to the media and the law agencies. Of the nearly a dozen
good-looking Hindu women I have known personally from nearby quarters, about 75% of
them were raped by the Muslims – which came to my knowledge from various
confidential sources. Surprisingly, as I was told of these stories when I was a believing
Muslim, such horrible incidences would not strike our conscience with sadness and guilt
but instead would make raunchy and enjoyable pieces of gossips. The general attitude is
that it is OK to rape Hindu girls or they deserve to be humiliated by Muslims.

In a conservative society of the subcontinent, the rape of a woman is seen as a great

dishonor and humiliation to the victim’s party, not to the rapist. It invariably brings life-
long suffering to the victim. This social constraint compels most of such rape cases being
kept secret by the victims and their families and relatives if possible. In cases, where the
victims seeks to report them to the law agency, there are threat of violence and death on
the victim and her family members which further lead to under reporting of the rapes of
the Hindu women in these countries. More importantly, a respectable father would never
like to see his daughter gets raped and would like to escape the chances at any cost so
long there is a means. Indeed, having been blessed with a beautiful daughter is the
greatest headache of the Hindu parents in these countries, especially in the countryside. I
have seen how the Hindu parents rush to marry off their daughter at an early age, when
the girl is a beautiful one. In many cases, parents send their beautiful daughters to India at
an early age for studies. The main purpose is to keep them out of the reach of the
Muslims, where they normally get married and never return to the home country.

The other kind of the persecution is the kidnapping of the young Hindu girl by Muslim
men who like them and rape, forcefully marry and convert them to Islam
(http://www.hinduhumanrights.org/Pakistan/index.htm). As a growing-up Muslim, I have
witnessed the general notion amongst the Muslims that if you can convert Hindu (or
non-Muslim) to Islam through marriage or whatsoever means, Allah will grant paradise
to you and your past seven generations in the afterlife. Hence, if there is a beautiful girl in
the neighborhood, there is a general feeling amongst the young Muslim boys that it will
be auspicious to somehow marry this girl and convert her to Islam to achieve a passport
to paradise for your seven generations. There is no greater way to serve to your parent,
grandparents and so on. This tendency often encourages Muslim youths to take recourse
of kidnapping the Hindu girls they like with assistance from illegal gangs, marry them
under coercion and convert them to Islam.

These constraints and difficulties keep minorities in a state of continuous mental

persecution, which they can neither complain about, nor bear with. Those who have
nominal means, make a journey across the border to the other side to India to secure the
safer and honorable future to the subsequent generations. These kinds of silent or soft
persecutions which result in such massive exodus and displacement of minority
population from their ancestral home in silence to wherever they can to acquire better
safety, constitutes a much graver form of persecution than the much publicized terrorism
and suicide bombing.

If we consider that Hindu birthrate is similar as Muslims in Bangladesh/East Pakistan, a

reduction of Hindus from 30% to 10% since 1947 means there have been an effectively
displacement of massive 30 million Hindu people from Bangladesh, given current
Bangladesh population stands at 150 millions. And this silent terrorizing and persecution
has never received much attention nor termed terrorism, which indeed a tactical form of
religious terrorism/persecution. And this kind of persecution continues in Pakistan and
Bangladesh without respite and with increasing zeal.

This kind of soft terrorism occurs on the non-Muslim population in most Muslim-
dominated countries. Given that Pakistan Bangladesh are considered rather moderate
Muslim countries, in more fundamentalist Islamic countries, this soft-terrorism is likely
to be worse. However, in every country, such persecution does not necessarily result in
exodus of the non-Muslims, since there may not be countries that are willing to give
shelter like India unofficially did to the Hindus of Pakistan Bangladesh.

It should be fathomed that this kind of grave and yet unnoticed and unreported soft-
terrorism by Muslims continues on such massive scales even in today’s world of justice,
massive media reporting, obligation for respecting human rights, equality of all citizens
and pressures from a whole groups of international bodies, powerful democratic
countries and rights groups. Hence, such soft-terrorism, persecution and other forms of
smaller scale violence against the non-Muslim subjects have continued incessantly
throughout the entire period of Islamic conquest, domination and rule. The chronological
details of the Islamic violence, terrorism and persecution listed above would only form a
fraction of the real total.

There should not be any doubt by now that since late 620s, the violence that was initiated
by Prophet Muhammad had continued without respite ever since although there may have
been some depressions along the way. There must have also been changes in the means of
carrying out such terrorism and violence. However, there is one notable difference. The
terrorism perpetrated by the Muslims since the early days of Islam to until the early 20th
century was perpetrated by the Muslim states. Indeed, it is an obligation of the Islamic
state to uphold and carry on the propagation of Islam through violence or whatsoever
means as was unleashed by Prophet Muhammad as head of a nascent Islamic state.
However, since those much more devastating terrorism and violence were perpetrated by
the Muslims states, they are not being recognized as terrorism.
However, the state-terrorism of Islam was brought to an end mainly by the British which
came to a virtual end when secular humanist Kemal Ataturk of Turkey dissolved Islamic
caliphate in 1924 and introduced secularism. Although there has been a lull in the overt
form of terrorism since then for several decades, the soft form of Islamic terrorism has
continued as reflected in the steady decline of Hindu population in Pakistan and
Bangladesh since 1947.

The development on the world stage especially after the WW-II, such as the formation of
UN, various human rights bodies etc. have changed the ways, means and obligations of
individual states. Thus although many Muslim countries got back their sovereignty after
the WW-II from the former European colonialists, the Governments have been bounded
up with all sorts of obligation and treaties that demands respectable treatment of the
citizens of any states, irrespective of race, religion and color. Thus the Governments of
the Muslim states are unable to re-launch the same type of overt terrorism and violence
against the non-Muslims as used to be done in India in the days of bin Kasim, Sultan
Mahmud, the Khaljies, the Tughlaqs and the Mughals. Hardly have the Muslim
Governments failed to unleash overt terrorism to dominate and expand the Islamic
religion, it has changed hands from the state-body to underground fringe groups at the
gap of just 3-4 decades. The innovation and easy availability of guns, bombs, rockets,
missiles and other modern weapons and Muslim terrorist groups’ ruthless usages of them
have added further prominence to the present scourge of Islamic violence.

Although Islamic terrorism started a surge in the 1980s in India, there was little
recognition of it as terrorism. But instead, a great part of the Eastern and Western world
recognized it as independence movement by Kashmiri Muslims. It was a legitimate
movement for self-determination. Then there started terrorism in Chechnya, which again
much of the world recognized as legitimate independence movement by the Muslims of
Chechnya.

Although there have been isolated terror attacks on Western (mainly US) targets and
nationals over the last couple of decades, they have occurred mainly in overseas location,
such as, in Lebanon, Yemen and Kenya etc. These terrorist acts, despite being of big
impact, did not get its deserving label of Islamic terrorism until the attack of 9/11 in New
York. Further uncovering of terrorist cells all across the Western world has further
heightened concerns and media-hype of Islamic terrorism over the last few years.

The bottom-line is that Islamic terrorism that we see today is not a new phenomenon. It
has occurred continuously since the 7th century institution of the Islamic faith. The only
difference is that throughout the Islamic history, the onus of terrorizing the non-Muslims
were undertaken by the Islamic states. The ferocity, destruction and violation have been
of much greater scales in the Islamic rulers’ devastating attacks of innocent infidel
territories and out-posts, slaughtering both military and civilian population (mainly men)
in tens of thousands, enslaving their children and women in great multitude and
destroying their religious institutions and forcing them to conversion. The present
scourge of terrorist atrocity is virtually negligible as compared to those unleashed by the
Islamic rulers on the infidels throughout the Islamic history. Just because the tentacles of
Islamic terrorism have reached the Western world – it has become such a hype in the last
few years post-9/11.