Talk:Qalaat al-Madiq

Whitewashing

I looked at this article with the intention of reviewing it for a DYK. I probably cannot review it, now, because I have substantially editted it.

What I want to discuss here is the modes of expression introduced to this article by editor User:Al Ameer son.

Following the peaceful surrender of Homs (Emesa) and several other cities in the area, Apamea's inhabitants welcomed the Rashidun army of Abu Ubaidah ibn al-Jarrah in 638, during the Caliphate of Umar ibn al-Khattab, and did not resist the imposition of jizya and land taxes.

• This sentence was unsupported by reference.
• You introduced three expressions into this sentence to make the process of Muslim invasion of Emesa and Apamea look like a very gentle one.
• Peaceful surrender. The surrender of Emesa was the result of a long siege. The purpose of a siege is to prevent the inhabitants of a town from having access to basic necessities, like food. A siege is never peaceful. It is a process in which most of the young children die of malnutrition and the remaining inhabitants are reduced to eating rats.
• welcomed the Rashidun army. You must be joking?

These Byzantine Christians who only a few years earlier had been forced from their homes by invaders, who had reclaimed the ruined city and commenced rebuilding their lives, now actually welcomed another army of non-Christians invaders? What history did you get this from?

• did not resist the imposition of taxes. Eh! Did they have any choice? Were they able to resist? What rights remained to them? Did the Caliph hold a referendum to see if they liked the idea of taxes?

If you are going to tell the story of Apamea/Qalaat al-Madiq, then tell it in a way that reflects reality.

Wikipedia is not the place to promote the sort of propaganda that indicates that the invasion of one people by another is a gentle and welcomed process.

Amandajm (talk) 07:13, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

Fair enough. However, I was not trying to "whitewash" history and promote "propaganda". I've been an editor here for a long time, I don't have a history of adding personal bias to articles, but occasionally I'm guilty of a lazy edit or two like everybody else so no need to assume bad faith and pepper in sarcastic commentary (what's the purpose of that? Are you really that outraged?). Does the rest of the article, which I mostly wrote, look biased?

I was getting that particular info from al-Biladhuri, an early Muslim chronicler, who writes Abu Ubaida's horsemen reached as far az-Zara'ah and al-Kastal. He then passed through Ma'arrat Hims (Ma'arrat al-Nu'man) which was named after Nu'man al-Bashir. Its people came out playing on tambourines and singing before him. Thence he came to Famiyah whose people met him in the same way and consented to pay poll tax and kharaj. I was only trying to reflect what Biladhuri was saying, which was that Apamea's inhabitants didn't resist the Muslim army after their victory in Emesa and other regional cities, and in fact welcomed those forces and accepted the taxes levied. The Muslim invasion was nothing like the Sassanid invasion which coincided with the wholesale destruction of cities and people. In fact many Syrian Christians (Monophysites) and Jews resented Byzantine rule and welcomed the Muslim armies.

Anyway, if the writing in that passage seemed a bit rosy, it was not not my intention to make it so. In any case, a primary source like al-Biladhuri should be attributed in the text. As far as your edits to the article are concerned, I think they're generally fine, although there's a small mess with the reference formatting and that first sentence about Abu Bakr's dispatch of 24,000 soldiers doesn't seem relevant or neutral. It's not neutral because we're not including the number of Byzantine troops, which was much larger, and it's not exactly relevant because it wasn't that particular Muslim army that conquered northern Syria. Khalid's army, which did not enter from Palestine, but notably traversed the length of the Syrian Desert towards Palmyra, that eventually conquered Emesa (actually Ubaidah was the supreme commander) after winning battles in Damascus and Yarmouk. I'll make it a bit simpler and keep the context I assume you were going for. --Al Ameer son (talk) 21:00, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for both your sorting out of the facts, and your explanations.

I am always suspicious of invasions that are expressed in glowing terms.

I am Australian. It wasn't until 1988 that there was any acknowledgement that eleven ships from England landing on the shores of Port Jackson (Australia) in 1788 and displacing the indigenous people who lived there actually constituted "invasion". I worked for many years in a large museum that insisted on referring to it as "invasion", which offended some people, but they just had to get accustomed to it, as the Aboriginal people became increasingly more vocal.

I have to confess that I find the story about the "playing tambourines and singing" extremely unlikely, under the circumstances. I am glad that you have named the source within the text.

Do you think it is just possible that someone made the comment as a Joke, and he interpreted it as fact?

"So how did the people of al-Biladhuri react to this?"...."Oh, what do you think? They all came out singing and playing the tambourine!" (snicker, snicker)

"And what did they think about the taxes?"....."Oh, they were very happy to pay them, as you can imagine!" (just like anybody else who pays for a protection racket)

Maybe I am letting my imagination go too far here, but the improbability of what is being suggested makes it beyond belief, so that one is forced to look for an explanation.

Perhaps it was, as you suggest, fear of the Sassanid invaders made the Muslim army look like liberators. Amandajm (talk) 10:00, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

The reason they greeted the Muslim army in that manner in this particular case isn't entirely clear, but I think it was more of a gesture of good will on their part, hoping the Muslims would reciprocate and not attack, damage property, kill or forcibly convert people in their town and instead occupy it without violence. As mentioned, the Persian experience was devastating for the area and most foreign invasions don't usually go so smoothly. Of course, the Muslim and the Byzantine/Ghassanid armies did fight several bloody battles that made the Muslim conquest possible and it was really only the smaller fortified towns that tended to surrender in this peaceful manner (Jerusalem, Damascus and Emesa underwent lengthy sieges). Apamea and Maarrat al-Numan weren't the only ones to greet the Muslim armies in this type of gesture which was a common occurrence in the Muslim conquests of the Fertile Crescent and Egypt. Al-Biladhuri wasn't joking, but I don't rule out a possible pro-Islamic bias or at least not providing the full picture, that's why we attribute... And I understand mate, I'm of Palestinian origin and you know the story. --Al Ameer son (talk) 16:56, 21 March 2013 (UTC)