______________________________
______________________________________
Many of us would be startled if we are told that in the 9th century,
an Arab fleet based in Sicily sailed up the Tiber and occupied and sacked
Rome and the Vatican for days together till they were defeated and expelled
by the papal militia along with the armies of the Holy Roman empire and
Frankish contingents. This attack was brief, mercifully very brief, but the
Arabs could reach Rome - a feat that even Hannibal could not achieve! To be
precise the Arab attack took place on August 28, in the year 846 CE when the
Arabs arrived at the mouth of the river Tiber and sailed into Rome.
The Arabs did not succeed in entering the fortified inner city of Rome that
was defended by the Romans, but the churches of St. Peter and St. Paul, in
today’s Vatican that lay outside the fortified boundaries of Rome, were
violated by the Arabs. The Pope Leo IV had to briefly flee Rome and appeal
for help from the neighboring kingdoms.
______________________________ 
After the Muslim occupation
of Sicily, the Christian resistance began immediately to recapture the
island. The Franks tried to take back the island in the 9th century, but
failed. By the 11th century, the baton of resistance to the Saracens was
taken up by the Normans. The Normans undertook an attempt to liberate Sicily
by sending in an expeditionary assault in 1068 with just sixty knights. But
with their shock tactics, they gave a stunning blow to the Arab chieftain
Ayub ibn Temim at the Battle of Misilmeri (then called by the Arabs Menzil el
Emir), outside
Palermo. __________________________________
In response to the Papal plea for help, an army started the descent by
land from Civitavecchia in direction of Rome. Another army began the march
from Portus and Ostia.
The valiant attempts of the Saxons, Longobards, Frisians and Franks to defend St. Peter up to
the last man proved to be in vain. The Arabs murdered all the defenders and plundered all the treasures of St. Peter. They
tore the silver leaves of the doors, the gold foils of the floor of the
confession, devastated the bronzy crypt of the apostle, took the gold cross
that stood on the grave of Peter. They laid waste all the churches of the
district Suburb.
The marquis Guy of Spoleto, arrived to help Rome, and with small band of
bravehearts succeeded in defeating the Arabs who withdrew partly towards
Civitavecchia and partly towards Fondi, following the Appian Way.
During their retreat, the Arabs' in flight, inflicted ruin and devastation in
all the Roman countryside. At Gaeta, the Longobard army clashed again with
the Arabs. Guy of Spoleto found himself in serious difficulties, but the
Byzantine troops of Cesarius, son of Sergius, magister militum in Naples,
arrived in time. But in November of 846 a storm provoked numerous damages to
the ships of the Arabs, some of which were shipwrecked on the coast.
Taking advantage of this Arab retreat, the Pope Leo IV, in consequence of the
attack against St. Peter, in 848 undertook the construction of the Civitas
Leonina to protect the Vatican hill. The enclosing walls were completed in
June 27 in the year 852 CE.
______________________________ 
The fortress of Palermo
whose name derived from the Arab Balarm - defines its origins as an
Arab city. Palermo, when it was an Arab emirate for five hundred years, was
described as "the city of the 300 mosques, very few of which survive today,
with most of them having been converted into Churches by the Franks who
liberated Palermo. __________________________________
The Arabs to the assault of the coasts and the Italian islands
(813)
The Arab attack on Italy began in 813 when they attacked and occupied
Centumcellae (Civitavecchia) by surprise. Ischia and Lampedusa were also
devastated and occupied. The Arabs also attacked Sardinia and Corsica in the
same year.
The Arabs attack on Ancona (848)
In 848 the Arabs ransacked Ancona.
The Arabs defeated in the naval battle of Ostia (849)
But in 849 it was rumored of the organization of a great Arabic fleet that
would have attacked Rome from Sardinia. In response to this rumor, a league
was constituted among the maritime cities of the South: Amalfi, Gaeta and
Naples gathered their fleets to the mouth of the river Tiber near Ostia.
When the Arabic ships appeared on the horizon the Italian fleet, led by
Cesarius, attacked. The Arabs were defeated. The survivors were made
prisoners and enslaved. These Arab slaves were conscripted to contribute with
their work to the reconstruction of what they had destroyed three years
before! And so justice prevailed.
But in consequence of these attacks of the Arabs, the Christian population
abandoned Ostia, and withdrew to Portus where there created some
fortifications to ward off further Arab attacks. Portus survived as a
Christian Corsican colony thanks to these fortifications.
The Arabs attack Canosa (856)
In 856 the Arabs attacked and destroyed the Cathedral of Canosa in Puglia.
The Arabs assault against Ascoli (861)
In 861 the Arabs occupied Ascoli in Marche, they destroyed all the Churches
and slaughtered the children, while they carried off the adults as slaves.
The women were forced into Harems of the Arabs as sex slaves.
The Arabs besiege Salerno (872)
In 872 the emperor Ludovicus II attacked and freed Salerno from the Arabs who
had been besieging the fortified town for six months.
The Arabs in Latium and in Umbria (876)
Despite these reverses at the hands of the Franks and Italians, the Arabs
regrouped and again attacked Rome in 876. Before reaching the city, the Arabs
ransacked the surrounding villages, the farmers slaughtered, the villages and
churches knocked down. The Roman countryside was turned by the marauding
Muslim Arabs into an lifeless desert.
In response to this carnage, John VIII fitted out a fleet and led it to the
victory against the Arabs at Circeo. 18 vessels were captured and 600
Christian slaves were freed from Muslim captivity. But inspite of this
defeat, the Arabs regrouped and continued to devastate Latium both along the
coast and in the hinterlands. In these attacks they overran and destroyed
the significant town of Subiaco for the second time.
The Arab invaders arrived at around Tivoli which defended itself by resisting
the Arab assault on the castle of Saracinesco. A reporter Benedict of Saint
Andrea of the Soratte wrote: "regnaverunt Agareni in romano regno". “Narni,
Nepi, Orte, the countries of the Tiburtino, the valley of the Sacco, the
lands of Tuscia, the Argentario mountain fell into the hands of the
infidels.”
______________________________ 
In 1127, Roger II the son of
Count Roger, led a second invasion of Malta; having overrun the Island he
placed it under a more secure Norman domination under the charge of a Norman
governor. He also garrisoned with Norman soldiers the three castles then on
the islands. From about this period the Maltese moved back gradually into the
European orbit to which they had belonged for a period of five hundred years
prior to the Arab interlude. After the Norman liberation, there were
no Muslims left in Sicily, Malta, Sardina and other surrounding islands that
had been under Muslim occupation. All the Muslims were reconverted to
Christianity. This ensured that the population forgot about the Islamic
interlude. The Normans acted as an exorcist to exorcize the influence of
Islam on the population and returned the lands to Christendom.
__________________________________
The Arabs in Campania (881)
In 881 the Bishop of Naples Athanasius played traitor when to compete with
against Rome and against Byzantium he entered into an alliances with the
infidel Arabs. As part of this nefarious alliance, the Arabs established at
the feet of Vesuvius and at Agropoli, near Paestum.
Another traitor, Docibile, the duke of Gaeta, enemy of the Pope, granted the
Arabs the right to settle near Itri, then on the right bank of Garigliano
near Minturno. The Arabs built a castle, from which they conducted repeated
raids on the countryside. They attacked the monasteries of Montecassino and
St.Vincenzo and set them on fire.
The Arabs at Farfa (890)
In 890 the Arabic troops set siege to the Abbey of Farfa, in Sabina. The
Abbot Peter resisted for six months then he was forced to surrender due to
lack of food supplies for his flock. In consequence the Arabs slaughtered the
inhabitants who had surrendered in good faith. The Arabs occupied Farfa and
made it their base in Sabina.
The Arabs defeated and expelled from Latium and Garigliano in the year 916
CE
Mercifully, in the 10th century the Kingdom of Italy was reconstituted. In
December of 915 CE Berengarius was crowned by the pope John X. And in April
in the spring of 916 the struggle against the Arabs acquired a new impulse.
Berengarius put at disposal the Tuscan troops of the marquis
Adalbertus and those Umbrian of the marquis Albericus of Spoleto. The
Byzantine emperor Constantine sent his own fleet to the orders of the
strategist Nicolaus Picingli. Landulf, prince of Capua and Benevento, Gaimar,
prince of Salerno, and the dukes of Gaeta and Naples entered the alliance.
Pope John X personally put himself to the head of the land troops.
The Longobards of Rieti, led by Agiprandus, advanced towards Sabina and
liberated it. The troops of Sutri and Nepi defeated the Arabs near Baccano on
the Cassian Way. Pope John X carried off another victory between Tivoli and
Vicovaro. The Arabs were forced to withdraw to their fortress at Garigliano.
In June 916 CE, another attack was launched against the Arabs. For three
months the Arabs resisted waiting for reinforcements from Sicily. When the
reinforcements were intercepted and defeated the Arabs occupying the besieged
fortress at Garigliano escaped from the fortress when the Italians stormed
into it. The fleeing Arabs tried to flee into the mountains, but they were
overtaken and defeated by the Italian troops. Italy had convincingly defeated
the assault of the Arabs on Italy. But Sicily was still prisoner of the
infidels. The attack and occupation of Sicily is one painful but less known
chapter in Italian history.
______________________________ 
The Turks launched two
attacks against the island in 1547, and again in 1551 and again in 1565 till
they were finally routed decisively at the naval battle of Lepanto in 1571.
The Turks had a policy of ravaging the Maltese countryside to terrorize the
peasantry, while they ignored the fortified towns. They turned their
attention to the island of Gozo and carried away the entire Christian
population into slavery, the children being brought up as Muslims who were to
be thrown into battle as suicide warriors named Janissaries (from Jan = life
and Nisar = given away).
__________________________________
The Arab occupation of SicilyThe Arab attack on Sicily in the
7th century initially was confined to the coastal zone and the smaller
islands off the coast. But gradually the Arabs established their based at
Palermo and from there proceeded to attack and occupy the entire island of
Sicily.
But before this could happen, Sicily resisted for many decades and forced the
armies of the invaders to retreat albeit temporarily. But the Sicilians
finally had to surrender and accept Muslim rule over their homeland. Once the
Arabs overran Sicily they set about the Islamification of Sicily through the
destruction of churches and ertection of Mosques over the sites, they changed
the composition of the population with the hundreds of thousand of Muslim
immigrants who destroyed a civilization that had lasted from the 8th century
before Christ had contributed to the creation of the identity of the
West.
After the rampage in Sicily, the Arabs used it as a base to attack Italy
(they overran Ponza, Gaeta, Ancona, Ascoli, and Civitavecchia) and eventually
they also occupied Salerno, Naples, Bari, Brindisi, Taranto. Finally they
resolutely headed for Rome to strike to the heart the Christianity.
The infidels profaned St. Peter but the Aurelian walls resisted to the
assault and Rome within its fortified walls was safe.
To resist the initial attacks Pope John X, himself formed an army of Italians
of various origin (Romans, Greeks, Longobards, Franks, etc.), speaking
different languages but united by faith and culture. This army eventually
defeated and drove from Lazio and Campania, the Arabs, who after their brief
attack and occupation of Rome had constituted a Muslim state near the
Garigliano.
The Arabs conquer Sicily after a sustained and bloodied assault
(827-965)
In 805 the Byzantine governor of Sicily stipulated an essay with
the Aghlabidi rulers of Tunisia.
In 813 the Byzantine governor of Sicily signed a decennial truce with the
Arabs.
But resistance to the Muslims began almost immediately. In 827 the Byzantine
admiral Euphemius who had earlier surrendered to the Muslims, rebelled and
killed the Muslim governor of Sicily. He conquered Syracuse and proclaimed
himself emperor independent of Byzantium. But when the troops faithful to
Byzantium, led by the Armenian general Palata, resumed the control. Euphemius
fled to Africa.
______________________________ 
In 1571, Don John of Austria
commanding the fleet of the Holy League, met the Ottoman Turks in the waters
at the mouth of the Gulf of Patros. Don John of Austria met his fleet off
Messina and saw that
he had 300 ships, great and small, under his command. The Pope himself had
outfitted twelve galleys and the depth of his war chest had paid for many
more. The next largest contingent was that of Venice.
Although they were no longer the dominating power of yesteryear, the
Venetians could still assemble a fleet of more than a hundred vessels beneath
the winged Lion of St. Mark’s standard. The Venetians provided the
technological cutting edge that was to win the battle.
__________________________________
Then Euphemius proposed to the Aghlabide emir of Kairuan, Ziyadat Allah I, to
conquer Sicily and to make it tributary province. In exchange he asked to be
recognized as governor with the title of emperor.
On June 17th 827, the Saracen general Asad ibn al-Furat with an army of
10,000 soldiers and 7000 cavalrymen disembarked at Mazara del Vallo. The
general Theodorus stopped and defeated the Arab army before it reached
Syracuse. So a new Arab army was sent to the help of the Arabs who decided to
head for Palermo rather than Syracuse. On September 11th 831 Palermo fell.
In 835 the Arabs took Pantelleria and in 843 Messina.
But Enna and Cefalù fought for years before being conquered, razed to the
ground and burnt. Cefalù fell in 858. Enna fell in 859 through treason. Then
it was the turn of Malta.
Syracuse was conquered only in 878. The Arabs massacred the entire Christian
population. The Greek language was replaced by the Arabic. Christianity was
replaced by the Islam. The bloodied sword of Islam dominated from Palermo,
Sicily’s new capital. Sicily was lost for the next few centuries.
Syracuse never regained the role, that it had had for 1500 years, of being
the primary city of Sicily. The glorious history of ancient Sicily finished
in the bloody struggle with the Muslims.
But the Muslim occupation was never complete. Some hotbeds of resistance kept
recurring. Taormina resisted up to 902, it was finnaly overrun and then was
burnt and all its inhabitants killed. Rometta, on the mountains west of
Messina, was the last to fall in 965.
An African Muslim army in 938-940 devastated wide zones of the southwest of
Sicily, but at that point there was nothing more to be plundered.
In the cities that had opposed resistance all the residents were killed and
the women and the boys reduced in slavery. The women and the most beautiful
boys were sent to Africa for the pleasure of the conquerors and their
co-religionists.
______________________________ 
Sicily had been under
Muslim occupation for nearly three centuries from 812 up to 1071. The
population had been wholly converted to Islam, and there was not a single
church left standing. They had either been reduced to rubble or burnt and had
been converted into Mosques.
__________________________________
The inhabitants of the Sicilian cities that had surrendered without fighting
could keep on practising the Christian religion but:
- they had to bring identification marks on their suits and on their
houses;
- they had to pay more taxes (Jaziya);
- they could not occupy positions that entailed authority over the Muslims;
- they could not marry a Muslim (but a Muslim could marry a Christian);
- they could not build new churches;
- they could not ring Church bells;
- they could not organize processions;
- they could not read the Bible within the earshot of a Muslim;
- they could not drink wine;
- they had to get up when a Muslim entered the room;
- they had to let the Muslims pass first in the public road;
- they could not bear weapons;
- they could not ride horses;
- they could not saddle their mules;
- they could not build great houses as those of the Muslims.
The Christian women could not have access to the baths.
______________________________ 
After the victory at the
battle of Palermo, all mosques that had been churches (before the Arabs'
arrival two centuries earlier) were re-converted into Churches. But even
after the conquest of Palermo, the Normans had liberated only a part of
Sicily, the rest of the island still lay under Arab occupation.
Illustration courtesy:
Nafpaktos __________________________________
After the Arab conquest, hundreds of thousand of Muslims immigrated to
Sicily. The juridical advantages granted to them, the availability of lands
seized to the Christians, the possibility to have labor at low cost
(Christians driven to hunger because of plunderings), the abundance of slaves
(girls and boys) constituted an irresistible attraction for people who lived
in the desolation of the desert. The Africans found in Sicily a terrestrial
heaven, the Christians found it to have become the proverbial hell.
The Arabs at Centumcellae (829)
In 829 the Arabs destroyed Centumcellae.
The Arabs at Naples (836)
In 836 the Longobards of the dukedom of Benevento laid siege to Naples, a
Byzantine city. Shamelessly, the Neapolitans asked help to Ziyadat Allah I,
aghlabide emir of Tunisia. Taking advantage of this intra-Christian war,
Ziyadat sent a fleet that forced the Longobards to interrupt the siege.
The Arabs at Subiaco (840)
In 840 the Arabs devastated the monastery of Subiaco.
The Arabs conquer Bari (840-871)
In 840 the Longobard Radelchi, duke of Benevento, was engaged in fighting
against the rival Siconolfo. The Arabs intervened and they took advantage for
conquering Bari.
But in 871 the Carolingian emperor Ludovico II succeeded in freeing the
city.
The Arabs at Ponza and Capo Miseno (845)
In 845 the Arabs took possession of Capo Miseno, in the gulf of Naples, and
of Ponza, to make of them bases in view of an attack against Rome.
The Arabs at Brindisi and Taranto (846-880)
In 846 the Arabs ransacked Brindisi and conquered Taranto. But in 880 the
Byzantine emperor Basil I the Macedonian succeeded in freeing Taranto.
______________________________ 
With the fall of
Constantinople in 1453, the prospect of the conquest of Europe was reignited
in Muslim hearts. This prospect had been defeated at the battles of Poitiers
and Palermo and had been rolled back by the Reconquista in Spain.
After the conquest of Constantinople, the Ottomans now moved toward
Malta which had remained a peaceful Christian bastion for more than four
centuries after its liberation by the Normans in 1127. In the meanwhile Malta
had become the base for the Crusader knights of Malta and it played an
important role as a transit point for the crusaders to go to the holy land.
So Malta was a marked fortress for the Muslims who bided their time to
seek revenge when they could again come within striking distance. This was
the second Muslim lunge at
Italy. __________________________________
But in spite of their raids into Italy, the sustained Muslim
occupation of a part of Italy was in Sicily when the island was tyrannized by
the Muslim for three centuries.
By the mid 7th century, after overrunning North Africa, the Arab
Muslims turned their attention towards the North Mediterranean coast in an
effort to invade the Byzantine Empire from the West. By then the Arabs, who
already controlled the North African coast and Spain, considered Sicily a
highly strategic step for their expansion towards the north of Italy and an
advance into Europe.
The Arabs who had started developing pretensions of becoming a naval
power, sent a fleet to Sicily and conquered the undefended fortress of
Palermo in Sicily in 830. With Sicily as a base they started harassing the
mercantile shipping in the Mediterranean, and more importantly they tried
repeatedly to invade Italy from Sicily. The Battle of
Palermo The Christian resistance began immediately to recapture the
island of Sicily. The Franks tried to take back the island in the 9th
century, but failed. By the 11th century, the baton of resistance to the
Saracens was taken up by the Normans. The Normans undertook an attempt to
liberate Sicily by sending in an expeditionary assault in 1068 with just
sixty knights. But with their shock tactics, they gave a stunning blow to the
Arab chieftain Ayub ibn Temim at the Battle of Misilmeri (then called by the
Arabs Menzil el Emir), outside Palermo.
This was followed by the main Norman assault in 1071, when they
attacked and defeated the Arabs at Palermo. This fortress whose very name
derived from the Arab Balarm - defines its origins as an Arab city.
Palermo, when it was an Arab emirate for five hundred years, was described as
"the city of the 300 mosques, very few of which survive today, with most of
them having been converted into Churches. Norman Valor drove the
Arab Muslims from Sicily The Battle of Palermo stands as one
of the most astounding Norman escapades in Italy against the Muslims. It
rivals the Battle of Hastings (1066) in importance. Socially, the Normans'
occupation of Arab Palermo was far more significant than their conquest of
Saxon London, as it brought Sicily back into the European orbit, a
development which eventually established an Italianate presence in the
central Mediterranean.
The Normans had taken Messina during an early morning battle in Spring
1061. In the ten years since, they had sought to consolidate their control of
Sicily and the southern part of the Italian Peninsula, fighting the Arabs in
a string of skirmishes. At Palermo, the Arabs were again led by their wily
and intrepid commander Ayub ibn Temim and the Normans by a young and
energetic leader named Robert Guiscard de Hauteville and his younger
brother, Roger de Hauteville. But the Normans with their conquests in
other parts of Europe, notably England, where they fought the battle of
Hastings in 1066 and defeated the Saxons, were chronically short of trained
knights. (Indeed, it would be years following the Battle of Palermo before
they could wrest back control of Enna, from the Muslims. Enna had been an
Arab-Muslim stronghold in east-central Sicily
In 1072 Palermo had something over a hundred thousand residents. On
the morning of January 5, 1072 Robert's cavalry attacked the al Kasr district
(high ground near what became the cathedral, Piazza Vittoria and the Norman
Palace). Fighting was fierce, and penetrating the walls seemed like an
impossible feat. Leaving his brother, Roger, to maintain the attack on al
Kasr, Robert and some knights attacked al Khalesa, the administrative
district on the coast, built around the emir's
fortress. Re-conversion of Mosques into Churches and of the
Muslim populace into Christianity rolled back the Jihad in its
entirety
This was taken by nightfall, though most of the adjacent al Kasr
district, further inland, remained in Saracen hands. Nevertheless, a Saracen
delegation surrendered to the Normans the following morning. Specifically,
the Normans first entered al Khalesa over a wall near what is now the
Spasimo. (In a corner of this structure there remain the vestiges of an
eight-century Mosque that the Normans changed into a church. The traces of
this change can be seen clearly even today.)
______________________________ 
Sicily had been under Muslim
occupation for nearly three centuries from 812 up to 1071. The population had
been wholly converted to Islam, and there was not a single church left
standing. They had either been reduced to rubble or had been burnt and
converted into Mosques. When the Normans retook Sicily, they reversed history
in equal measure and with equal ruthlessness.
__________________________________
The ceremonial entry of the Norman Christians into Palermo took place on
January 10, 1072 with a Greek Rite mass celebrated by the Orthodox bishop
Nicodemus of Palermo in the old cathedral (on the site of the present one),
that had then been hastily re-converted into a church from its use as a
mosque. Here was a historic juncture where Robert and Roger chose to
defy convention and their own Christian tradition. All mosques that had been
churches (before the Arabs' arrival two centuries earlier) were re-converted
into Churches. But even after the conquest of Palermo, the Normans had
liberated only a part of Sicily, the rest of the island still lay under Arab
occupation.
But in spite of the Norman attack, the Arabs in Sicily were divided,
and taking advantage of the situation, Count Roger, after a series of
campaigns, subdued the rest of the island and brought it under Norman Rule.
Count Roger also invaded other islands to make sure his southern flank was
secure from a possible Arab attack, having reduced the Arabs to a state of
vassalage and releasing the foreign Christian slaves, he returned to Sicily
without even bothering to garrison his prize.
In 1127, Roger II the son of Count Roger, led a second invasion of
Malta; having overrun the Island he placed it under a more secure Norman
domination under the charge of a Norman governor. He also garrisoned with
Norman soldiers the three castles then on the islands. From about this period
the Maltese moved back gradually into the European orbit to which they had
belonged for a period of five hundred years prior to the Arab interlude.
Lessons from the Battle of Palermo Sicily had been under Muslim
occupation for nearly three centuries from 812 up to 1071. The population had
been wholly converted to Islam, and there was not a single church left
standing. They had either been reduced to rubble or had been converted into
Mosques. When the Normans retook Sicily, they reversed history in equal
measure and with equal ruthlessness. After the Norman liberation, there were
no Muslims left in Sicily, Malta, Sardina and other surrounding islands that
had been under Muslim occupation.
This ensured that the population forgot about the Islamic interlude.
The Normans acted as an exorcist to exorcize the influence of Islam on the
population and returned the lands to Christendom.
The second Muslim lunge at Italy
Although Sicily was never directly threatened again, the shadow of the
Islamic Jihad loomed once again over Italy when the Ottoman Turks started
moving into the Mediterranean after 1500 A.D. With the fall of
Constantinople in 1453, the prospect of the conquest of Europe was reignited
in Muslim hearts. This prospect had been defeated at the battles of Poitiers
and Palermo and had been rolled back by the Reconquista in Spain.
After the conquest of Constantinople, the Ottomans now moved toward
Malta which had remained a peaceful Christian bastion for more than four
centuries after its liberation by the Normans in 1127. In the meanwhile Malta
had become the base for the Crusader knights of Malta and it played an
important role as a transit point for the crusaders to go to the holy land.
So Malta was a marked fortress for the Muslims who bided their time to
seek revenge when they could again come within striking distance.
Turks ravaged the Maltese peasantry to instill
terror And so as if to prove the point, the Turks launched two
attacks against the island in 1547, and again in 1551 and again in 1565 till
they were finally routed decisively at the naval battle of Lepanto in 1571.
The Turks had a policy of ravaging the Maltese countryside to terrorize the
peasantry, while they ignored the fortified towns. They turned their
attention to the island of Gozo and carried away the entire Christian
population into slavery, the children being brought up as Muslims who were to
be thrown into battle as suicide warriors named Janissaries (from Jan = life
and Nisar = given away). That same year the Turks drove the Knights
out of Tripoli. These attacks stung the Knights into feverish activity to
improve the islands' defenses in anticipation of another, and possibly
bigger, attack. On the 18th May, 1565, the Ottoman Turks and their allies
pitted 48,000 of their best troops against the islands with the intention of
invading them, and afterwards using them as a base to make a thrust into
Southern Europe by way of Sicily and Italy.
Pan-European Christian alliance defeats the Turkish
Jihad At the battle of Malta, against the Turks were drawn up some
8,000 men: 540 Knights; 4,000 Maltese; and the rest made up of Spanish and
Italian mercenaries. Landing unopposed, the first objective of the Turks was
to secure a safe anchorage for their large invasion fleet, and with that in
mind, launched their attack on St.Elmo. After a heroic resistance of thirty
one days the fort succumbed to the massive Turkish bombardment and continuous
cavalry charges.
______________________________ 
The Turkish fleet under the
command of Ali Pasha had been reinforced
by a Calabrian traitor fisherman who had turned Moslem. His name was Uluch
Ali and he was now the Bey of Algiers, that notorious nest of the Muslim
corsairs feared by all Christian ships plying their trade in the
Mediterranean. Don John moved his force towards the anchorage of Lepanto
where he knew the Turks to be waiting and during the night of October 6th,
with a favorable wind behind him, Ali Pasha moved his fleet westward towards
the mouth of the Gulf of Patras and the approaching ships of the Holy League.
The action that was to follow was the biggest naval engagement
anywhere on the globe till then.
__________________________________
After the fort had been reduced, the Ottomans turned their attention
to the two badly fortified towns overlooking the harbor. Subjected to a
ceaseless bombardment, the Christian forces held back the enemy behind the
crumbling walls, and against all odds, kept the enemy at bay until a small
relief force of some 8,000 troops arrived from Sicily (a smaller relief force
of 600 men had previously landed at about the time that St.Elmo had fallen).
These attacks in addition to their losses from disease, fire and
steel, totally demoralized the Turks. Added to this was the fact that their
supplies were running low. The Turkish invaders were in no position to offer
further battle, and the Turks retreated never again to attempt another
invasion in that part of the Mediterranean.
The Battle of Lepanto
In 1571, Don John of Austria commanding the fleet of the Holy League,
met the Ottoman Turks in the waters at the mouth of the Gulf of Patros. Don
John of Austria met his fleet off Messina and saw that
he had 300 ships, great and small, under his command. The Pope himself had
outfitted twelve galleys and the depth of his war chest had paid for many
more. Don John's eye must have gazed with pride on the 80 galleys and 22
other ships that had been provided by his half-brother Philip II of Spain.
Each of these Spanish galleys held a hundred soldiers on top of the
rowers who propelled the ship through the water and no less than 30,000 men
in the service of Spain would fight at Lepanto. The next largest contingent
was that of Venice.
Although they were no longer the dominating power of yesteryear, the
Venetians could still assemble a fleet of more than a hundred vessels beneath
the winged Lion of St. Mark’s standard. The Venetians provided the
technological cutting edge that was to win the battle.
The Turkish fleet under the command of Ali Pasha had been reinforced
by a Calabrian traitor fisherman who had turned Moslem. His name was Uluch
Ali and he was now the Bey of Algiers, that notorious nest of the Muslim
corsairs feared by all Christian ships plying their trade in the
Mediterranean. Don John moved his force towards the anchorage of Lepanto
where he knew the Turks to be waiting and during the night of October 6th,
with a favorable wind behind him, Ali Pasha moved his fleet westward towards
the mouth of the Gulf of Patras and the approaching ships of the Holy League.
______________________________ 
The Turkish flotilla
initially arrayed in a giant crescent-shaped formation, quickly sliced into
three sections by two concentrated charges of the Venetian navy. The centre,
under Ali Pasha, nevertheless pushed forward and the action opened when the
cannon of Don John's two centre galleasses (gunships) began to do great
execution among Ali Pasha's advancing ships. Seven or more Turkish
galleys went down almost immediately as a result of the longer range of the
Christian fleet. The Turks were not lacking in murderous instinct, however,
and they pressed on in the face of intense fire from the galleasses, the
galleys' guns and crossbowmen on the Christian decks.
__________________________________
The action that was to follow was the biggest naval engagement
anywhere on the globe till then. The Turkish flotilla initially arrayed in a
giant crescent-shaped formation, quickly sliced into three sections by two
concentrated charges of the Venetian navy. The centre, under Ali Pasha,
nevertheless pushed forward and the action opened when the cannon of Don
John's two centre galleasses (gunships) began to do great execution among Ali
Pasha's advancing ships. Seven or more Turkish galleys went down
almost immediately as a result of the longer range of the Christian fleet.
The Turks were not lacking in murderous instinct, however, and they pressed
on in the face of intense fire from the galleasses, the galleys' guns and
crossbowmen on the Christian decks.
______________________________ 
At Lepanto, in a wild melee
of attack, retreat and counterattack played out on decks awash with the blood
of the slain, the air rent by the screams of the wounded and dying seamen
from both sides, the Spaniards forced their way onto the Turkish galley three
times. Twice they were beaten back but finally they stormed the Turkish poop
and a wounded Ali Pasha was beheaded on the spot. His head was spitted on
a pike and held aloft for all the Turkish fleet to see and the Ottoman
battle flag, never before lost in battle, was pulled down from the mainmast.
The Muslim centre broke and retired as best it could, their courage forgotten
in face of the grisly sight of their admirals head held aloft by the elated
Spaniards. Amen.
__________________________________
Christians follows Muslim tactics and outdo the
Muslims Ali Pasha tried to come alongside the Christian ships in
the hope of boarding. Here the legendary steadfastness under fire of the 16th
and 17th century Spanish infantryman came to the fore and attack after attack
was beaten off by killing shots from their guns and engaging in hand to hand
combat by the Spanish swordsmen. Then Don John gave the order to board Ali
Pasha's flagship. In a wild melee of attack, retreat and counterattack
played out on decks awash with the blood of the slain, the air rent by the
screams of the wounded and dying seamen from both sides, the Spaniards forced
their way onto the Turkish galley three times. Twice they were beaten back
but finally they stormed the Turkish poop and a wounded Ali Pasha was
beheaded on the spot. His head was spitted on a pike and held aloft for all
the Turkish fleet to see and the Ottoman battle flag, never before lost
in battle, was pulled down from the mainmast. The Muslim centre broke and
retired as best it could, their courage forgotten in face of the grisly sight
of their admirals head held aloft by the elated Spaniards. Amen.
______________________________ 
Lepanto was a battle to
death for both sides. Negotiations were never on the agenda. The options were
fight, flight or death. The first mistake made by Rodrigo in Spain when
he faced the first Muslim Jihad in 711, he had tried to walk his way out by
negotiating his freedom, only to be betrayed and having his head sawed off to
be paraded before the Visigothic Spanish army – a grisly sight that numbed
and demoralized the Visigoths at the Battle of the Guadalete river
between the Muslims and the Visigothic Spaniards. From
Guadalete to Palermo, the Christians had come a long way, learning what
their enemy was all about. Once having seen the bestiality of the Muslims,
the Christians never forgot nor forgave the Muslims.
__________________________________
Lessons of the Battle of Lepanto The Christians had now
learnt their lessons. Lepanto was a battle to death for both sides.
Negotiations were never on the agenda. The options were fight, flight or
death. The first mistake made by Rodrigo in Spain when he faced the first
Muslim Jihad in 711, he had tried to walk his way out by negotiating his
freedom, only to be betrayed and having his head sawed off to be paraded
before the Visigothic Spanish army – a grisly sight that numbed and
demoralized the Visigoths at the Battle of the Guadalete river
between the Muslims and the Visigothic Spaniards. From
Guadalete to Palermo, the Christians had come a long way, learning what
their enemy was all about. Once having seen the bestiality of the Muslims,
the Christians never forgot nor forgave the Muslims. And so “mercy” was a
quality not much in vogue any longer in the wars between the crescent and the
cross.
______________________________ 
Beheading and sticking the
severed head on to a pike and parading it were unchristian and uncivilized
practices, but it was the Muslims who had introduced them into Europe, and
the Christians were quick to learn and use them against the Muslims. A lesson
we need to relearn, not to behead and stick the head once again on a pike,
but to unleash a nuclear and neutron assault on the enemy, before he does it
to us at New York, London, Madrid, Toronto, Sydney, Tokyo, Paris, Moscow,
Berlin or in any city in the civilized world.
__________________________________
The Christians were quick to learn the tactics of foul warfare from
the Muslims and turn their new learning against a ruthless adversary. Apart
from the bravery of soldiers on both sides, the tactic that clinched victory
was the gruesome act of beheading of the Turkish Admiral Ali Pasha and his
deputy Uluch Ali. Beheading and sticking the severed head on to a pike
and parading it were unchristian and uncivilized practices, but it was the
Muslims who had introduced them into Europe, and the Christians were quick to
learn and use them against the Muslims. A lesson we need to relearn, not to
behead and stick the head once again on a pike, but to unleash a nuclear and
neutron assault on the enemy, before he does it to us at New York, London,
Madrid, Toronto, Sydney, Tokyo, Paris, Moscow, Berlin or in any city in the
civilized world.
The engagement at Lepanto had lasted for more than four hours and when
the smoke finally cleared it became apparent that this was a major victory
for the Holy League and a bitter defeat for the Ottoman Turks. Almost 8,000
of the men who had sailed with Don John were dead and another 16,000 wounded.
On the brighter side 12,000 Christian galley slaves had been released
from their servitude to the Ottomans. The Turks and Uluch Ali's Algerines had
suffered much more grievously. Of the three hundred and thirty Turkish ships,
fewer than fifty managed to escape and most of them were burned because they
could not be made sufficiently seaworthy for further use; one hundred and
seventeen Muslim galleys were captured intact and the rest were sunk or
destroyed after they had been run ashore by the fleeing Turks. More
than fifty thousand of the seventy-five thousand men who had entered the
battle on the Muslim side were killed, five thousand were taken prisoner
(with at least twice that number of Christian galley slaves liberated), and
only a few were able to escape either by ship or by swimming ashore. Turkey,
for the first time in several centuries, was left without a navy The
day belonged to Don John, the Holy League and Christendom. When the news of
the victory broke, church bells were rung all over in Europe in a spontaneous
outburst of joy and thanksgiving. The victory at Lepanto, put paid any
further Turkish adventure to invade Italy by sea. More so it left the
European powers without any formidable rival on the seas, paving the way for
aggressive and bolder forays by the European maritime powers to sail across
all the oceans and establish colonies in the Americas, Australia, Africa and
Asia. The Jihad had a penultimate break at Lepanto, the final one was
to come a century later at Vienna in 1683, that put paid all attempts of the
Muslims to overrun Europe. Muslim rule was thenceforth
confined to the south eastern corner of Europe in the Balkans where
the seed of Islam was not uprooted when the Christians liberated those lands
between 1850 and 1920.
______________________________ 
The overarching relevance
of the Battles of Palermo and Lepanto was that they saved the Italian
mainland from a Muslim invasion and so also indirectly prevented (or should
we say delayed) the Islamization of Europe (or Eurabia) when there was no
power strong enough in Central Europe in the 10th to the 15th centuries to
resist a successful Muslim onslaught. But modern Europeans have become
enfeebled by modernism and liberalism, qualities that the Muslim immigrants
will have nothing to do with. And if we do not wake up and reinvent the
spirit of Palermo, we shall lose our homelands to the Muslims in a few
decades from today. What the Muslims failed to achieve on the battlefields of
Lepanto and Palermo, they will achieve through lax immigration laws, and the
sacrifices of our brave knights at Lepanto and Palermo would ultimately prove
to have been in vain.
__________________________________
Modern liberalism has set the lethargy in motion that prevents the
immediate decimation of the Muslims who are a perennial threat to
civilization Modern liberalism had set the lethargy in motion a
lethargy that came to roost at Mostar and other cities in the Balkans which
saw the slaughter by the Muslims and Christians of each other. Howsoever
ideal may liberalism be, it is of no value when dealing with the
blood-thirsty Muslims. This is the lesson which the Serbs and Croats learnt
in the 1990s. But these being Christian lands originally, it was the Muslim
who were the occupiers and even if we forget the concept of anyone being an
occupier, since the world belongs to all humans, with their beastlike
behavior, the Muslims became unwelcome citizens wherever they attacked
ravaged and imposed their beastlike cult on their unwilling victims. The
Muslims have quarreled and fought with everyone wherever they went, and when
there were no non-Muslims around, they fought among themselves. Such is the
beastlike legacy that Islam has given the modern age. But the
overarching relevance of the Battles of Palermo and Lepanto was that they
saved the Italian mainland from a Muslim invasion and so also indirectly
prevented (or should we say delayed) the Islamization of Europe (or Eurabia)
when there was no power strong enough in Central Europe in the 10th to the
15th centuries to resist a successful Muslim onslaught. But modern
Europeans have become enfeebled by modernism and liberalism, qualities that
the Muslim immigrants will have nothing to do with. And if we do not wake up
and reinvent the spirit of Palermo, we shall lose our homelands to the
Muslims in a few decades from today. What the Muslims failed to achieve on
the battlefields of Lepanto and Palermo, they will achieve through lax
immigration laws, and the sacrifices of our brave knights at Lepanto and
Palermo would ultimately prove to have been in vain, unless we not only stop
the Muslims from immigrating in to Italy and other parts of the Western
World, but also take the war into the enemy's heartland as did our Crusader
forebears and destroy once and forever the barbaric creed of Islam, to remove
threat it presents not only to Italy and to the Western Civilization, but
also to the world at large and save our generation and all future generations
from the scourge of Islam. Do we have it in us to do that? The answer
to this poser decides if civilization wins or barbarism wins.
_____________________________
* For those uninitiated, PBUH expands to Perpetual Battle Upon Hagarism
(Islam) – founded by the accursed founder of Islam,
Mohammed-ibn-Abdallah (Yimach Shmo – May his name and memory be
obliterated).
________________________________________
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________________________________ 
Unfortunately for
humankind, the end of the death-seeking fiery cult of Islam can only come
about through a fiery death-giving weapon. Ironically such nuclear mushroom
clouds would be the blazing hell-fire that the Quran talks about and
acknowledges will bring about an end to Islam such that there will be no one
across the globe to say “Lah ilah il Allah, Mohammed ur Rasoolallah” (There
is no god but allah and Mohammed is his prophet).
_____________________________________
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