"War may become necessary only to stop evil from triumphing in a way would corrupt the earth" Qur'an 2:25

Yes, we taught each other our beliefs, and learned from one another. Still, it had never existed to try and convert others to one's faith. We were all faithful peoples, and despite living under an Islamic rule, there was never a pressure on those who weren't practicers to convert. At least, not until al-Hakim ordered the destruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. It wasn't just those who practiced in the church who grieved, nor was it only those who practiced the Christian faith. It was the entire city who mourned its destruction. This was not the practice of Islam, nor was it the mission. This wasn't a catastrophe resulting from an Islamic rule, it was resulting from a madman's. There was restlessness among us all, a hurry to restore and rebuild the church. However, those west of us never saw this piece of the tale. They only saw what they wanted to see.
Nor did they see what al-Hakim's heir did. Ali az-Zahir was just as horrified with his father's actions as we were. He demanded the rebuilding of the church just as it was, wanting to rebuild it in the majesty it had previously known, right on the spot it had fallen. His apologies had not fallen on deaf ears of those in the city, but beyond that...beyond our city, no one heard. Certainly not Pope Urban II. Certainly not his crusaders, nor their families.
Amity had always taught us about the christian belief of "original sin". The thought that all men were born sinful. She taught us of the search to purge oneself of this sin, and how Jesus died for humanity's sins. The Pope promised the cleansing of sins to those who came on the crusade...were these the sins those men feared? Or was there another reason they came?
I want to believe these men had once been good people, but the more I think on it, the more my mind runs. Had this inherent evil prevailed inside them? Could it be possible that these men had simply found an excuse to let it run free? I will never know, but I'm not sure I want to.
They had marched 2, 979 kilometers to take back a city that had never been stolen from them. They had traded with muslim merchants on their way, ate the food of people poorer than them without remorse. They took what was given to them, the hospitality of all those kind people, only to kill their families that resided in my city. That resided here, in Jerusalem. They ate our spices while on their way to slaughter us like cattle.
The moment we felt the reverberations of the wall, being slammed with...something, my parents rushed me downstairs. We weren't sure what it was, but we could tell it wasn't good. I cried out for us to go check on my friends, on Sunniva, who was home alone as her father had gone to Mecca to sell goods. She was alone, and likely as afraid as I was.
"We can't leave Sunniva!" I had cried, "She's all alone, we can't! I won't!" My tears streamed down my face like the river I had seen when my father had brought me to Egypt. Crashing against the rocks, thrashing to escape the path it was hurling down. To escape the nightmare that lied before it.
"I shall go make sure she is safe. Go, Hadiya." My mother told me as my father hurried out the door. Soon, she was following him, and I was to hide in the small hidden space below the boards of our floor. It was originally made to hide my mother's old keepsakes. I never learned where they went. I contemplated it, an attempt to distract myself from the inevitability of my situation.
I was entirely powerless to what was happening outside my cramped space as the dusty scent of dirt filled my nostrils. Through panicked breaths, the small bits of rocks and dried mud came through my nose and mouth, coating my throat. I kept feeling the vibrations of our wall as it further and further crumbled. Women screamed out, calling for children, men for their wives, and children for anyone. Anyone at all to come help them.
But nobody came to save us. We were alone and helpless to the army attacking us, unable to do anything but cry out for help. Our walls were tumbling and cracking onto us as we tried to find a way to prevent our destruction, but nothing was to be done. I could hear soldiers on the wall fighting back, but their orders were to frighten, not harm. Shoot arrows not to kill but to cause fear. If we had any chance at all, it would lie in the decision to maim, in hopes a few dead would prevent the death of all of us.
The wall caved, men screamed out as they likely fell to their deaths. The screeching started then, when the menaces came flooding in over the tumbled structure. They wouldn't cease for a long time, and in this time I stayed put, trying to silence my racking sobs to little avail.
Suddenly, the screaming grew, a crackling taking over the background. A smoky tinge filled the air, slipping through the cracks of my cell, stinging my eyes. Thick, grey, dark. The smoke seeped into the air, into every crevice of the city, suffocating the inhabitants. To swords, we were weak, but to the smoke and flames, we were defenseless as infants. We would cry for the protection of our parents, but they would only be heard by the wind.
We hadn't done anything to them! Why were they attacking us so? What had we done to
deserve this vile treatment!? Who were they to determine our lives were worth less than theirs? Why were they so keen on our demise? Were we not all children of the almighty? Were we not all human? Apparently, not to them.
Because what happened next was more horrible than anything you could ever imagine. At first, I didn't know what it was, I could only feel it as it slid down the dirt wall of my box. Warm, smooth liquid, slipping down the crack of my secret door. I touched it, my fingers getting covered in a moment of confusion that came before the storm of my horror.
It was the choking sobs that told me what it was, as no light could enter my fortress. A girl's voice, crying out for her father, her mother begging someone to stop. That she was only a child. Right outside the door of the home of me and my parents, I heard the sobbing of the girl stop. Simply cut off, like her voice had been lost to oblivion. But the mother's cries worsened.
All she could say was, "No! No, my daughter! No!" Like her pleas would somehow reanimate the girl. My throat ran dry as I heard this, the realization of what was happening sitting before me. It was calm against my storms of emotions. Strikes of lightning going through me in hot fits of anger as my thundering terror begging for me to be able to cry out its feeling. The rain poured down my face in confused emotions that longed for this to be nothing more than a dream. But this was real, no matter how much I hoped it wasn't.
As I heard the footsteps hurrying off, I climbed out, knowing hiding would be futile. I could do nothing to prevent my death. No more than the crying girl could have prevented hers. The crying girl...
All she had done was cry for her fallen father, she had done the most human and natural thing she could with her voice. She had used her voice, and for that, they had silenced her. Forever. Not just her, they had silenced hundreds, possibly thousands of people, already.
I peaked my head carefully from my house, my heart falling to my stomach. Our streets were no longer visible beneath the spilt blood. Bodies scattered about. I could see an old Christian monk, a man who were the cross around his neck and never left home without his bible. It sat about a meter away from him, and with his last bouts of strength, he attempted to reach it. Silently, I slipped out the door, and grabbed it, scurrying towards him. His eyes filled with tears at me as I handed it to him.
"Thank you, my child." He said in a cracked whisper, a tear slipping down his cheeks as he pulled it to his chest as best he could. A long wood piece prevented him from moving it too close to his heart despite his attempts to put it over.
"We receive comfort from our prayers." He had told me that once, I remembered it. Through his agony, he smiled sadly. He nodded once, and tried to say something more, but his eyes fell clouded before he could, body going limp and dropping his book next to him. Another silenced before their time, that was all I could think. I looked around at the corpses that had been amassed. All these voices lost to the greed of these pagans...
I couldn't save my life, but there was something I could do, and I was going to do it. They had taken the voices of my people, of my family that stretched all over this city. And here, I write for the final time, an account of my story. Of the horrors my people suffered at the hand of a man that didn't know us for a city we never stole. He didn't just kill my fellow muslims, but your people, too. Our people.
And here, I state for the record, that I forgive them, the crusaders that raped my home. I am a Muslim, and due to this, I see great knowledge in the teachings of Judaism and Christianity. They are the others that Allah revealed himself to, Jesus was a prophet like Muhammad.  We believe in the same God, and in the same things.
Teintil and Amity had a common verse they use to always use when any of us were upset with each other, and here, I pass it onto you:

"Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you." Colossians 3:13