[agere_contra]

Agreed. As they had came under attack from Islam for many hundreds of years before the Crusades started I think our Medieval ancestors understood the Muslims a great deal better than we do - and acted more forthrightly.

Syria and Anatolia were Christian - before the Muslims invaded.

[muawiyah]

Spain was a nearly depopulated economic and intellectual Dark Ages basketcase when the Moslems invaded.

It was nominally Christian (The Arian heresy in fact).

After the Reconquista, which involved the King of Cornwall and his descendants fighting a war against the Moslems (and everybody else with an interest in Spain) for the next 500+ years, Spain finally moved into the Christian mainstream. Roman standards were applied ~

[sheik yerbouty]

So was a large chunk of Egypt..