ABSTRACT
The age-old quarrel between Islam and Christianity or, to be more precise, between their followers is sometimes compared to the rivalry of two siblings competing for an inheritance. The inheritance is, in this case, Abrahamic monotheism, which each of the two religions claims to represent in its original purity. In a paradoxical way, Judaism, the forebear of the two rival siblings was, until recently, relegated to the periphery of this Muslim-Christian conflict, 1 and, on occasion, suffered blows from both of its descendants. This curious historical phenomenon can be explained by the fact that, by a quirk of historical fate, Judaism’s monotheistic heirs managed to create and sustain powerful states that had the resources to field large armies. Followers of Judaism, on the other hand, were unable to reestablish their own polity until the mid-twentieth century. The Roman occupation and subsequent suppression of the Jewish state in Palestine in the first century left the Jews dispersed across the breadth and width of Africa and Eurasia, depriving them of any significant role in the military and political competition for the control of the Mediterranean basin and the lands adjacent to it.
