The Crusades were a series of 8 official military campaigns that were started by, Pope Urban II with his speech at the Counsel of Clermont in 1095. The intent of the Crusades was said to be a message from the Lord to save the Middle East from the Muslims. The goals were to regain control over Jerusalem and the territories that had been conquered by the “Turks and Arabs” that were killing and capturing many innocent people of Christian faith, to exterminate the Muslims, and Pope Urban II offered eternal forgiveness for anyone who fought and died in battle during the Crusades; however, as history documented the accounts of those who were witness to the carnage of what really happened, it can be stated that the goal of this long war is not one that is looked at without bitterness.
During the First Crusade Jerusalem was taken over with the intent of running the Muslims out of the city and restoring the heart of the Holy land. In the account of The Jewish chronicler, Solomon bar Samson, 1096, he describes “a nation bitter and impetuous Frenchman and German, set out for the Holy City”. They were sent there to “banish the Ishmaelite’s and other denizens.” What also happened was a slaughter of Jews as the Crusaders took it upon themselves to avenge Christ’s death since Jesus died at their hands. The Crusaders wanted to force their faith and views on the people. As accounted by, Fulk of Chartre on the Taking of Jerusalem in, 1099 A.C., Some Jews who were hiding in a synagogue were “burned alive within it by the Crusaders”. There were “piles of heads, hands, and feet” all over. They cut open stomachs of Jews looking for swallowed gold, walked on bodies as if they were “carpet for their convenience”, destroyed Christian Orthodox monuments and even the Tomb of Abraham. Afterwards they burned the bodies looking for any melted gold they may have missed. According to the Crusaders record, “our men rode in the blood of the Muslims up to the knees of their horses.” The account of what happened from both sides is conflicting. This was just the beginning of what was yet to come.
Then, was the account of what happened from, Usmah Ibn Munqidh, Muslim noble, 1175 tells of the piracy by the Crusaders. He wrote of the king of the Franks (Crusaders) came by boat and cut up the ship that his family was on with hatchets. The King went to the shore and claimed all that drifted up as “booty”. The King said, “But surely it is a Muslim custom that when a ship is wrecked close to land the local people pillage it?” The King had Usmah Ibn Munqidh’s family taken to a home, searched them and took everything that was found. The Crusaders took 30,000 dinar worth of goods and only gave five hundred dinar back to be divided among all fifty. The Speech given in 1187 by, Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub, also known as Saladin, was one of driving out the Crusaders in Jerusalem ( Which had been occupied by for 91 years) and for the house of his family to “unite all hearts in appreciation of its members.” It should be noted that he conquered the first Crusader kingdom in Jerusalem that year. These are small examples that made the Muslims lash out