The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusadt1churches, the burning of crosses, and the seizure of church property. He
move d again st the Jews with simi lar fero city. Over the next ten years
thirt y thou sandchu rch es weredestr oyed, and unto ld numb ers of
Chri stiansconverted to Islam simply to save their lives. In1009,al-Hakim
gavehi s mos t spe ct ac ula r ant i-Ch ris tia n ord er: He com man ded tha t
th eChurch of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem be destroyed, along with
severa l oth er chu rch es (in clu din g the Chu rch of the Res urr ect ion ),
TheChurchof the Holy Sepulcher, rebuilt by the Byzantines in the seventh
century after the Persians burned an earlier version, marks the traditional
site of Christ's burial; it also served as a model for the Al-Aqsa Mosque.
Al-Hakim commanded that the tomb within be cut down to the bedrock.
He ordered Christians towearheavy crosses around their necks (and for
Jews, heavy blocks of wood in the shape of acalf]. He piled on other
humili ating decre es, culmin ating in the order that they accep t Islam or
leave his dominions."
The erratic caliph ultimatel y relaxed his persecut ion of non-Muslims
and even returned much of the property he had seized from the Church.
A partial cause of al-Hakim's changed attitude was probably his
increasingly tenuous connection to Islamic orthodoxy. In 1021, he
disappeared under mysterious circumstances: some of his followers
proclaimed him divine and founded a sect based on this mystery and other
esoteric teachings of a Muslim cleric, Muhammad ibn Ismail al-Darazi
(after whom the Druze sectis named, Thanks to al-Hakim's change of
policy, which continued after his death, the Byzantines were allowed to
rebuild the ChurchoftheHoly Sepulcher in 1027
Nevertheless. Christians were in a precarious position, and pilgrims
rem ain ed und er thr eat. In 105 6, the Mus lim s exp ell ed thr ee hun dre d
Christia ns from Jerusal em and forbade European Christi ans from
entering the Churc h of the Holy Sepul cher ." When the fier ce and
fana ticalSeljuk Turks swept down from Central Asia, they enforced a new
Islamicrigor,making life increasingly difficult for both native Christians
and pil-