


The Crusades are traditionally defined as the series of western expeditions against the Muslim lands of Palestine and the Levant which begun with Pope Urban’s call to arms at Clermont in 1095AD, and all but ended with the Muslim liberation of Acre in 1291.
The writer, V S Naipaul, like the apostate Salman Rushdie, is much revered in the west. Both are of Indian origin although Naipaul was born in Trinidad where his forefathers were taken as indentured labourers.