islamic-jihad-legacy-of-forced-conversion-imperialism-slavery

Islamic Slaveryattention, it killed large number of them, especially those who were already very weak or suffering fromdiarrhoea or dysentery. On one occasion, wrote Mouette, it killed one in four of the French slaves. 794At the imperial palace, a most insignificant mistake could earn death to Moulay Ismail’s slaves. Thesultan’s son Moulay Zidan once ‘‘killed his favorite black slave with his own hand’’ for accidentallydisturbing pigeons the prince was feeding. The sultan ‘‘was of so fickle, cruel and sanguine a nature thatnone could be even for an hour secure of life,’’ wrote Pellow. 795Nine decades earlier, John Harrison had made repeated diplomatic visits to the court of SultanMoulay Abdallah Malek (r. 1627–31) for releasing British captives. While on these failed missions, Harrisonobserved the torture and suffering of slaves, of which, he wrote: ‘‘He (sultan) would cause men to bedrubbed, or beaten almost to death in his presence… cause some to be beaten on the soles of their feet, andafter, make them run up and down among the stones and thorns.’’ Harrison added that the sultan orderedsome of his slaves be dragged by horses until they were torn to shreds, while a few had been dismemberedwhile alive, with ‘‘their fingers and toes cut off by every joint; arms and legs and so head and all.’’ A fewyears earlier, captive Robert Adams wrote to his parents from his miserable captivity in the Barbary corsairtown of Salé that ‘‘He (owner) made me work at a mill like a horse from morning until night, with chainsupon my legs, of 36 pounds weights apiece.’’ 796These instances should give one a rough idea of the sufferings that the enslaved endured in Muslimhands at different stages of the captive life. It is widely accepted that 80 to 90 percent of those captured byMuslim slave-hunters and traders in Africa died before reaching the slave-markets. A great many of thesedied in the process of castration—a procedure, universally performed upon male black slaves to be sent to theMuslim world. What an enormous suffering and loss of human life that was! The pain, strain and agony—both mental and physical—they endured, is simply indescribable, probably even unimaginable.FATE OF SLAVESWhen Prophet Muhammad died in 632, he had left behind a few thousand dedicated Muslim converts, whomainly engaged in raiding and plundering for making a living as well as for expanding the Muslim territory.This rather small band of Muslim warriors embarked on a stunning mission of conquest bringing vastterritories of the world under their sway within a short time. In the process, they enslaved great multitude ofthe vanquished infidels, a large majority of whom involuntarily became Muslim.Upon entering Sindh with only 6,000 Arab soldiers, Qasim had enslaved approximately 300,000Indian infidels in three years. Similarly, Musa (698–712) had enslaved 300,000 Blacks and Berbers in NorthAfrica. The early community of Muslims in Sindh consisted of a larger number of slave Muslims and a muchsmaller number of their Arab masters. Combined together, they formed the administrative machinery of thenew Islamic state. Running such an enterprise needed a large amount of manpower in that non-technologicalera. Consequently, large numbers of these infidels, turned Muslims through enslavement, had to be engagedin many kinds of activities—as sex-slaves to the expansion of the military. In India, ‘There was no occupationin which the slaves of Firoz Shah were not employed,’ noted medieval chronicle Masalik. 797 This was the caseunder all Muslim rulers, not only in India, but also everywhere else. In Southeast Asia under the Muslim rule,794. Ibid, p. 99795. Ibid, p. 124–25796. Ibid, p. 16,20–21797. Lal (1994), p. 97228