The Crusades Through Arab Eyes

Nūr al-Dīn’s forces set their sights on Fatimid Egypt, which they seized in campaigns between 1163-1169. There were three primary figures in this affair. Shāwar was a treacherous Egyptian vizier under the Fatimid caliphate. The Crusader king, Amalric, wanted to conquer Egypt, while Shīrkūk was one of Nūr al-Dīn’s skilled generals and uncle of Saladin, the man who succeeded Nūr al-Dīn and one day governed Egypt.

Shāwar rose to power in 1162 but within nine months a subordinate deposed him, and Shāwar fled to Syria, where he sought Nūr al-Dīn’s support. The new Frankish king in Jerusalem, Amalric, observed the discord in Egypt, which he dreamt of conquering. Frankish control over Ascalon facilitated their access to the Nile valley, and thus they invaded Egypt just after Shāwar’s fall. However, the Franks were mired in the Nile’s seasonal flooding in September and forced to retreat, but the affair “had awakened Aleppo and Damascus to Amalric’s intentions” (161). Shāwar agreed to cover the expenses of any campaign if Nūr al-Dīn intervened in Egypt, and he promised to acknowledge him as his overlord if he were restored.

Nūr al-Dīn thus gave command of the Egyptian campaign to the well-respected general, Shīrkūk. Shīrkūk strategically maneuvered his forces toward Egypt undetected, took Cairo in May, and restored Shāwar, who immediately turned against Nūr al-Dīn and sought support from Amalric to expel Shīrkūk from Egypt. Nūr al-Dīn attacked and defeated the Franj, who sought a truce with Shīrkūk. Both parties “agreed to leave Egypt simultaneously” (164), which benefitted Shāwar, who was able to consolidate power in their absence. Shāwar also negotiated a treaty with the Franj to defuse Shīrkūk. Nūr al-Dīn therefore tasked Shīrkūk with creating an “expeditionary corps” (164) when he discovered this treachery.

A new conflict with the Franks over Egypt thus began. Shīrkūk’s forces defeated the allied Franj and Egyptians at al-Babayn in 1167, and “without waiting even a single day before his enemies had time to recover their wits, had crossed the entire length of Egypt […] and had entered Alexandria in triumph” (167). His opponents besieged the city and cut off resources while Shīrkūk gave command to his nephew, Saladin, so that he could return to southern Egypt.

This strategic move created a second front in the war that would extend the conflict and forced Amalric to negotiate. Both sides again departed Egypt, only for conflict to surge again the next year because the Franj left a garrison in Egypt that alienated the population. The caliph’s men suggested allying with Nūr al-Dīn, keeping Shāwar in the dark. This final conflict ended in Frankish defeat again and Shāwar’s assassination.

Shīrkūk became Fatimid Egypt’s new vizier but died only two months later. The caliph made Saladin his uncle’s successor. He suppressed an army mutiny and another Frankish invasion in 1169: “Saladin soon began to distance himself from his master. He continually assured Nūr al-Dīn of his loyalty and submission, of course” (171). Saladin consolidated power in Egypt while tensions mounted, but never instigated direct confrontation. Nūr al-Dīn ordered Saladin to “abolish” the Fatimids in 1171 since he was a Sunni Muslim and they were Shia. Saladin delayed, fearing local backlash and knowing the Fatimid caliph had appointed him.

The Fatimid caliphate’s fall was ultimately bloodless when the caliph, al-‘Adid, died without knowing that prayers had been proclaimed in the name of the Abbasid caliphate instead. The caliphate’s demise “invested Saladin with a political dimension he hitherto lacked” (173). His relationship with Nūr al-Dīn broke down and the latter readied an offensive. Nūr al-Dīn, however, became seriously ill and died in May 1174 before his plans were put in motion. Saladin became his successor, but not without challenges.

Amalric died shortly after Nūr al-Dīn, leaving his crown to his son, Baldwin, who was only 13 and suffered from debilitating leprosy. The Franj were not a threat to Saladin for the moment, nor were the Byzantines who were plunged into “anarchy” when their emperor died in 1176. Saladin was thus a powerful man, but surviving sources also praise him for humility, compassion, and generosity: “He could not bear to let someone who had come to him depart disappointed” (179). Like Nūr al-Dīn, he wanted to unite Muslims and retake Jerusalem, but he lacked his predecessor’s religious zealotry.

Some of the Syrian emirs weighed a potential alliance with the Franks in 1174 against Saladin and in support of Nūr al-Dīn’s son, al-Sālih. Saladin sent them a sternly-worded letter threatening war if they betrayed him. Saladin’s letter concerned al-Sālih, who left Damascus for Aleppo. Saladin entered Damascus by October 1174 when supporters opened the city’s gates. He went on to take Hama and Homs, in central Syria, while claiming that his advances were to shield al-Sālih from the Franks. He claimed his siege of Aleppo defended al-Sālih against corrupt counsel. Al-Sālih’s advisors resorted to the services of the Assassins, who wanted vengeance against the man who had destroyed the Fatimids. Their attacks twice failed, and Saladin later “sought to conciliate them, thus depriving his enemies, Muslim and Frank alike, of a precious auxiliary” (183). Resolution came when al-Sālih unexpectedly died in 1181.

Saladin united Egypt and Syria under a single dynasty when he took Aleppo 18 months later. The Franks, however, did not unite against this new, powerful threat, and Baldwin IV’s condition worsened. Saladin used this situation to his advantage and sought not to disturb the peaceful movements of Muslim travelers through Christian territory that the Muslim pilgrim, Ibn Jubayr, observed in his account. When the king died in 1185 power passed to the Frankish count of Tripoli, Raymond III, who governed as a regent for six-year-old Baldwin V. The count was aware that he would require time to consolidate his power, thus seeking a truce with Saladin, to which Saladin consented.

However, this four-year truce fell apart a year later when the young Baldwin died, and his mother married Guy of Lusignan and made him the new King of Jerusalem. Guy “was no more than a puppet” of Reynald of Châtillon, a notorious thorn in the side of Muslim governors in Syria for some years: “Reynald sought to impose the same policy as that pursued by the first Frankish invaders: to fight relentlessly against the Arabs, to pillage and massacre without restraint, to conquer new territories” (186).

For example, he violated an agreement between the Franj and Saladin that allowed Islamic merchants to travel freely between Damascus and Jerusalem. He attacked a caravan passing through on the way to Mecca, with Baldwin IV being too cowardly to punish him for the theft of the goods. He was thus emboldened to raid Mecca and left his men to plunder settlements along the Red Sea. He became a hated figure throughout the Islamic world. Reynald later massacred a group of merchants to whom he responded with vitriol when they reminded him of the protective truce. Saladin was enraged; he called on the emirs throughout his realm to take up jihād after the Franj broke the truce. Meanwhile, Guy and Count Raymond were locked in a power struggle. Raymond temporarily allied with Saladin, who crushed the obstinate Templars, giving his troops a “foretaste” (189) of triumph.

Saladin opted to confront the Franj before his allied forces dispersed. He besieged the Frankish city of Tiberius, which lay between Damascus and Jerusalem and where Count Raymond’s wife was ensconced. It was a trap that drew the Franj into a scenario where they were deprived of drinking water, harassed, and exhausted. His emirs encircled them during the night, making retreat impossible. Saladin’s men massacred the Frankish troops when they tried to reach a lake downhill from their encampment the next morning. Saladin spared Raymond, who fled to Tripoli. Guy and Reynald were taken captive and presented to Saladin, who personally executed the latter while sparing Guy and many Frankish prisoners. Men from the monastic-military orders, the Hospitallers and the Templars, did not meet with such mercy.

Saladin went on to claim Tiberius, Acre, Jaffa, Beirut, Ascalon, and other Franj settlements with little bloodshed. He now centered his efforts on Jerusalem. He offered the Franks generous terms of surrender, which they refused, forcing Saladin to take the city by force: “As it happened, the resistance of the Franj was courageous but short-lived, and conducted with few illusions” (197).

The Frankish inhabitants negotiated the terms of their freedom, which included paying compensation that replenished Saladin’s depleted coffers. Saladin entered Jerusalem on October 2nd, 1187, the very date in the Islamic calendar that celebrates the Prophet Muhammad’s Night Journey to the city. He showed benevolence toward the city’s Christians. For example, “he strengthened the guard at the Christian places of worship and announced the Franj themselves would be allowed to come on pilgrimage whenever they liked” (199). He liberated the poor without ransom and permitted the city’s aged, widows, and children to leave freely. Saladin’s primary motive for reconquering Jerusalem was religious, not financial, hence his generosity.