ABSTRACT
The sympathetic policy towards Islam was likely to have offered political advantage to Qaidu, particularly in the years 1279/80-1287 when Qubilai adopted an anti-Islamic policy, expressed chiefly in the banning of Muslim ritual slaughter. 175 There is, however, no evidence of a change in Qaidu's treatment of the Muslims after the conversion to Islam of Uriik Temiir, who fought Qaidu because he saw him as an infidel, or after the conversion of the Mongols in Persia to Islam in Ghazan's time. 176 Qaidu's attitude towards Islam, or to religion in general, seems to have derived primarily from the religious tolerance customary among the Mongols177 rather than from any immediate political goal.
