Facts? Jimmy Wales, your Wikipedia bio of me is a propaganda piece full of half-truths, distortions, & outright lies, & has been for years. Wikipedia… - Robert Bruce Spencer

Inflamed by this mindset, Muslims all around the perimeter of the Islamic world are fighting their neighbors of other religions—Hindus in India, Communist and Buddhist Chinese, Jews, Christians in a score of countries, and pagan animists in Africa. In this light, it is wishful thinking to bracket Islam and peace.

Of course, when Hindus fought Hindus they observed these restraints because they shared the same values: both sides revered the same temples, monasteries, and, for that matter, cows. But Sita Ram Goel is right that the actions of the Muslims were in accord with Islamic law and precedent; these actions can't be attributed solely to attempts to end resistance and demoralize the locals. The Muslim invaders' behavior was consistent with the example of the Prophet who once enjoined one of his followers "to attack Ubna in the morning and burn the place."

Whatever the case, the records make clear that toward the end of the seventh century and the beginning of the eighth, the Umayyads began to speak much more specifically about Islam, its prophet, and eventually its book.