ThePoliticallyIncorrect Guide to Islam (and the CrusadeAlthou gh "a little discri minatio n"isall that most Islamicapologi st
will acknowledge about dhimmitude, the long-term effects of the dhimma
were much more dama ging for non-Musl ims. Even cent uries after the
Muslim conquest of Egypt, theCoptic Christians maintained an over-
whelming majority there. Yet today the Copts amount to just 10percent
orless,of the Egyptian population.
It's the same story with every non-Muslim group that has fallen
completely under Islamic rule.
The Zoro astr ians, or Pars is, are foll ower s of the Pers ian prie st and
proph et Zoroas ter, or Zarat hustr a (528-551 B.C.]. Befor e the advent of
Islam, Zoroastrianism was for a long period the official religion of Persia
(mo der n-day Ira n), and was the dom ina nt rel igi on whe nthe Per sia n
Empire spann ed from the Aegean Sea to the Indus River , Zoroas trian s
were commonl y found from Persia to China. But after the Muslim con-
quest of Persia, Zoroastrians were given dhimmi status and subjectedcruel
persec utions , which often includ ed forced conver sions. Manyfled to
India to escape Muslim rule, only to fall prey to the warrior s of jihad
again when the Muslims started to advance into India.
The suffering of the Zoroastrians under Islam was strikingly similar to
that of Christians and Jews under Islam farther to the West, and it
continued well into modern times (even to this very day under the Iranian
mullaho crac y). In 1905, a missi onar y name d Napie r Malc olm
publ ishe d a book in which he related his adventures among the
Zoroastrians in the Persian town of Yezd.
Up to 1895 no Parsi (Zoroastrian) was allowed to carry an
umbrell a. Even during the time that I was in Yezd they could
not carry one in town. Up to 1895 there was a strong prohi bi-
tion upon eye-glasses and spectacles; up to 1885 they were pre-
ven ted fro m wea rin g rin gs; the ir gir dle s had to be mad e of
rough canvas, but after 1885 any white material was permitted.