Quote Originally Posted by Didz
That would be my view also, although there is some evidence to suggest that there were abuses of Islamic teaching even then.
a key problem with islam is that you do not have to manipulate (abuse) the teachings or examples of mohammed to find excuses for some pretty rough stuff. In ther person of mohammed you have someone who was an active warlord during his lifetime, broke his own rules (eg in respect to the number of wives he had), and had sex with a child (aisha).

i am not a christian and woud agree that christian regimes during the medieval period were in many cases worse behaved than islamic ones. i do however find the tendency of people to hold up the muslim invadors as people of virtue slightly bizzare.