THROUGHOUT the period of the Crusades that had begun almost two centuries earlier, it was the French that were most active in participation. Italians too participated and initially led the Crusades through the Pope of the Catholic Church. There were also Germanic Crusaders and English Crusaders. The Muslims referred to the Crusaders collectively as ‘the heathen’ and also as ‘Franks’ because the majority of them spoke French. The French were dazzled by the lavish lifestyle of the Moors, particularly that of the Syrians. France then became Europe’s centre of chivalry in imitation of the black Moors. However, the Crusader version of chivalry was associated with barbaric warfare backed up by false religious rhetoric. In France of 1199 CE, the Crusaders made fresh plans to carry out attacks on Jerusalem and the black Muslims of that area. The organisers of this Srusade were planning on attacking Egypt first so as to acquire wealth that would sustain their warfare and livelihood in Jerusalem. They decided to engage Venice in the plot to attack Egypt and sought to purchase war supplies from them. The Venetians had the most advanced commodities in Europe because they were in close trade ties with the Moors, Egyptians and Turks. Venice was led by a blind man of 80 years of age who was known as Henricus Dandalo or Enrico, as he is remembered in the English language. Although blind, Enrico was far from foolish. He was not about to risk ruining his nation’s good relations with the wealthy Egyptians just to make money from the poor Barbarian Crusaders. At the same time, Enrico was not going to let the Crusaders go without leaving the little wealth they had. Enrico then sent emissaries to Egypt to inform them of the plans of the Crusaders to attack Jerusalem after annexing Egypt. He then made a pact of loyalty to the Egyptians, guaranteeing them that the Crusaders would not set foot in Egypt and that he would personally intercept them. This pact between the leader of Venice and the Egyptians was not known to the Crusaders. Enrico then sold the Crusaders all the things they had requested and much more than they could afford. Everything was deliberately overpriced and the French did not object, but tried to enjoy the lavishness of Venice to the full without exposing their poverty. Before long, the Crusaders were greatly indebted to the Venetians and the goods they had been sold were worth six times the money they managed to pay. One of the commodities that the French requested from Enrico was troops. The recruitment of troops in Europe was getting more and more difficult as the unsuccessful Crusades were getting unpopular. The Crusaders requested for an army 33 000 strong, but Enrico initially agreed to 10 000. Eventually Enrico did raise the supply of troops to the figure of 33 000 so as to get the Crusaders more indebted. Soon after this, Enrico started donning the Crusaders’ cross on a skull cap so as to gain their trust and loyalty. Before long, Enrico became the central figure of the Crusades because he had been the supplier of the weaponry and many Venetian troops. However, Enrico was not leading the Crusaders to Egypt, but to Constantinople. Enrico went on a propaganda campaign, saying that if Byzantine in the time of Emperor Alexius had not let their Christian brothers (Crusaders) down, the Crusaders would have won the war for Jerusalem a long time ago. He then said that if the Crusaders desired wealth to pay their debt to the Venetians and to fund their army’s conquests, it was best to attack Constantinople and loot them. The Crusaders bought into the idea for they had now been held prisoners by their debt and this was also a way to settle historical scores with Byzantium which comprised a combination of Greeks and Romans. The attack was swift and unexpected. Constantinople was looted and destroyed. The heir of the throne of Byzantine was deposed, kidnapped and held for ransom. When they did not pay the ransom, Enrico looted the relics of the Higher Sophia Church and took all the gold of the city. After this, Enrico declared the Crusaders victorious, though in actual fact they had been tricked and used. Ironically, it was the Emperor of Byzantium who wrote the Pope of the Catholic Church, asking him to rally troops to fight the black Muslims that had taken Constantinople. Pope Irvin used this letter as an excuse to begin the Crusades and made Jerusalem the main target. Now the tables had turned and the Empire of Byzantine came to its ruin, not by the hands of black Muslims but white Christians. Enrico had honoured his vow to the Egyptians and intercepted the Crusaders. The stolen treasures of Constantinople are in Venice to this day and Enrico was buried in the Higher Sophia Church. Enrico’s Crusade was the forth. After a while, others followed in 1218 CE, 1239 CE and in 1248 CE against Egypt and Jerusalem. The whites were getting increasingly envious and intolerant of blacks and Islam continued to be demonised in Europe. The Muslims offered the Crusaders treaties that would allow them to live in Jerusalem so as to stop the warring. However, the Crusaders would not settle for less than being Jerusalem’s rulers. They did not negotiate with Muslims, but tried dutifully to wipe them out. The man who totally destroyed the Crusader conquests was called Beibaz. Beibaz was a black Egyptian who was formerly an army slave. He was a dedicated Muslim and had grown up fighting in battle from a young age. Since Salahdin’s reign, the rulers of the region between Egypt and Syria were from Salahdin’s lineage. Salahdin, though black like the Egyptians, had Kurdish ancestry. In 1250 CE, the Egyptian army conducted a coup against Salahdin’s family and Beibaz the Egyptian was its leader. He became the ruler of the region. Beibaz attacked Antioch first, because they had harboured the white Crusaders under the supposed brotherhood of Christianity, but at the clear expense of the stability of the region. Beibaz spared most of the indigenous Arameans, but slew every European Christian in the land. He desecrated the tombs of their patriarchs and burnt down every Crusader settlement. He burnt the crosses calling them idols and burnt the false testaments. From Antioch, Beibaz went town to town destroying Crusader settlements until he arrived in Acre. Acre had become a sin city which had been built by the Crusaders. Beibaz butchered them and they were gotten rid of swiftly. Lastly, Beibaz sent his large army to make a desert of the land east of the Mediterranean Sea; from Jaffa to the outskirts of Jerusalem. They uprooted every tree so as to promote land infertility and as a result, discourage future settlement by Crusaders. In Jerusalem the Crusaders were purged and every Church was turned into a Mosque. From this time up to the 20th century, there were no European settlers in Jerusalem. Evidently, the fanaticism, racism and religious intolerance that plague the world today originated from the white Christians during the period of their Crusades against Islam. The barbarism of the white people was not at all a new phenomenon, but in the case of the Crusades, the whites exercised barbaric warfare in the name of Christianity. The Crusades caused numerous crimes to be committed against humanity. From a historical perspective, the Crusades were a complete failure because the Crusaders did not meet their objective of taking over Jerusalem. Today, however, we find white settlers in Jerusalem with a recent history of settlement that is apparently as barbaric as that of the Crusaders of old. The hostility of these whites towards Muslims and their close ties with the Western Christians is very much reminiscent of the Crusaders. They entered Jerusalem forcefully and displaced the Muslim Palestinians. The invasion of Palestine by these whites who masquerade as Jews today is therefore evidence of modern day Crusades? After all, the main objective of the Crusades was for white non-Muslims to take over Jerusalem, and this is the case in the current era.