[Archaea]

I found this review of Fletcher's book interesting.

"Mr. Fletcher provides a quick and concise overview of how the European Christian nations interacted and conflicted with their Islamic neighbors from the Middle-east. This book is a rare balanced account of the centuries-old international rivalry between the two regions. Although most people tend to believe that the conflicts were about religion, the fact is dominance in trade and other economic factors were far more prevalent. In fact, it was often the case that Islamic principalities valued military and trade alliances with Christian powers over that of potential or blatant rivals among their fellow Muslims. The same is true for some Christian principalities.
Mr. Fletcher points out both the positive and negative factors in cross-cultural contact, such as the advances in the sciences and technology passed on to Western academics, particularly in the 12th and 13th centuries. In open conflict, atrocities were commited by both sides. Under occupation, neither fared well under the rule of the other, but conditions varied by place and time. One of the author's main points is that neither side was particularly interested in the other's religion, but also that religious persecution was in fact a major concern.
It has been a recent trend that many books on the subject of Christian-Islamic conflict tend to openly disparage the Christian side, over-emphasizing the Crusading Era. However, these facts need to be considered, and they are covered in this book:
-Christianity first experienced Islam (in 634) as an invading conqueror, suppressing and exploiting all non-Islamic people.
-The Islamic powers have made several attempts to invade, conquer, and permanently colonize vast regions of Europe: the conquest of Spain in 711-18, remaining as a presence until 1492; the conquest of Sicily in 827; a raid on Rome in 846; destruction of the Byzantine Empire in 1453; conquest of the Balkans in 1521, Hungary in 1526, and besieging Vienna in 1529 and later in the early 1600s. These were deep incursions into Europe, with the intent of permanent occupation.
The Crusades, however, were limited to establishing control of the relatively small region of Isreal, with no real interest in taking larger areas of the Middle-east.
Islam had open disdain for the Christian world, but the Christians had much interest in studying Arabic culture and language. It is a fact that early Islam did much to improve the sciences inherited from the ancient Greeks. This knowledge was in turn improved and expanded upon by the Christian nations. But due to Islam's disregard of the West, its not surprising that as the Western culture began to grow and thrive, the Middle-east stagnated into obscurity, becoming a shadow of their former prominence for many centuries after Europe's Renaissance."