Do you know anythng about either of these religions?
Yes, I do. All the branches in my family tree go directly back to Spain and my ancestors were fighting radical Islamists since 711 A.D. Let's just say that my family has a little more experience with Islamist fanaticism than yours does.
My family tree is filled with officials and even a Grand Inquisitor in the Spanish Inquisition and, if you like, I can provide a list of names of people who were burned at the stake at the order of the brother of one of my X times-great-grandmother in 1559 in the "auto de fe" in the city of Valladolid.
Let's just say that my family has a little more experience with "Christian" fanaticism than yours does.
And, yes, the Protestant fanatics in Calvinist Geneva were acting the same way. It was a 16th Century thing. We've mellowed considerably since then.
In a given population, the religious activity tends to follow a path from Fanaticism to Less-Fanatic to Observant to Non-Observant to Decadent. Then, after the population is sickened by Decadence, the cycle can repeat.
Iran is a good example of that cycle. It is now back in the Fanatic stage and will be until the younger population that has know nothing but religious oppression rises up and strings up the ayatollahs from lamp-posts. Then, they may jump directly to the Observant to Non-Observant stage of the cycle.
The initial waves of Muslim invaders in Spain were ALWAYS Islamist Fanatics. After a while, they settled down, their sons started enjoying the "Good Life" and their grandsons became merely Observant. By then, they would even be your allies to fight off the next wave of crazy Islamist nutjobs flooding in across the Strait of Gibraltar to take away their "Good Life".
Take Massachusetts, for example. No matter how conservative and pious you believe yourself to be, the Fanatic Puritans would consider your present lifestyle as that of an abominable heathen and you would be lucky to escape with your life. Now, Massachusetts, is mostly Non-Observant to Decadent.
Today, if resurrected Puritans tried to reestablish their theocratic government, the Massachusetts Liberals would start joining the NRA by the hundreds of thousands.
By the 1960's, most Arab countries were at the Observant stage. Study Nassar. Study the Baath Party rule in Syria. These guys were Muslims in name only. Their appeal was nationalism, not religious fanaticism and religious fanatics were severely dealt with.
Our enemy is the Taliban .... not the entire population of Afghanistan that also happens to be Muslim.
We bombed factories full of innocent civilians and prisoners during WW II, and as far as I know neither Atomic Bombs were dropped on real military targets, it was war, and we had to remove the enemies ability to wage war, and destroy their will to fight.
This is not about "civilians". This is about "allies".
This is about Friendly Fire.
We Atomic Bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki and fire-bombed Dresden and Tokyo.
We did not carpet-bomb Paris. During Vietnam, the hawks yelled "Bomb Hanoi". They did not yell "Bomb Saigon".
Most of the Afghan population is not composed of radical Fanatics. They are merely Observant.
Insulting EVERY Muslim because the Fanatics are evil is as counterproductive as insulting EVERY Catholic during World War II because both Hitler and Mussolini were raised Catholic or insulting EVERY Korean during the Korean War because the North Korean were over-the-top Commie fanatics.
One of our best Aliies during the Korean were were the Turks. By that point in History, the Turks were Observant to non-Observant Muslims who, at home, were fighting the extreme Islamist Fanatics at home, since the 1920's, when most of Western Civilization did not know what an "Islamist" was.
In war, you must remember who your enemy is and who your allies and comrades are. Just because Hitler was raised Catholic does not mean that corporal O'Hara in the same foxhole with you is your enemy.