On October 10th, 732, the Christian forces of Charles Martel defeated the Sunni Umayyad Muslim forces of Abdul Rahman al Ghafiqi in France at the Battle of Tours, ending Muslim attempts to conquer Europe.

Though some modern historians, such as Bernard Lewis, deny the significance of the battle and the defeat of the Muslims, this battle stands as one of the most important battles in the history of the Western world.  Edward Gibbon described the battle as "an encounter which would change the history of the whole world.”

An anonymous Arab historian described the battle:

The Moslems smote their enemies, and passed the river Garonne, and laid waste the country, and took captives without number. And that army went through all places like a desolating storm. Prosperity made those warriors insatiable. At the passage of the river, Abderrahman overthrew the count, and the count retired into his stronghold, but the Moslems fought against it, and entered it by force, and slew the count; for everything gave way to their scimitars, which were the robbers of lives. All the nations of the Franks trembled at that terrible army, and they betook them to their king Caldus [Charles Martel], and told him of the havoc made by the Moslem horsemen, and bow they rode at their will through all the land of Narbonne, Toulouse, and Bordeaux, and they told the king of the death of their count. Then the king bade them be of good cheer, and offered to aid them. . .

To repeat, Muslim invaders had conquered and destroyed the cities of Narbonne, Toulouse, and Bordeaux in France, in the 700's AD.  This was only decades after the death of Mohammad, and 360 years before the First Crusade.  Muslims fought an offensive war with the religious goal of overrunning the Christian stronghold of Europe.  In their wake, the Muslims killed as many kufirs as possible, burned the churches, and divided the plunder amongst themselves,in accordance with the teachings of the holy, holy Qur'an.  To continue the Muslim account of the battle:

[Charles Martel] came upon them at the great city of Tours. And Abderrahman and other prudent cavaliers saw the disorder of the Moslem troops, who were loaded with spoil; but they did not venture to displease the soldiers by ordering them to abandon everything except their arms and war-horses. And Abderrahman trusted in the valour of his soldiers, and in the good fortune which had ever attended him. But such defect of discipline always is fatal to armies. So Abderrabman and his host attacked Tours to gain still more spoil, and they fought against it so fiercely that they stormed the city almost before the eyes of the army that came to save it; and the fury and the cruelty of the Moslems towards the inhabitants of the city were like the fury and cruelty of raging tigers. [...]  The Moslem horsemen dashed fierce and frequent forward against the battalions of the Franks, who resisted manfully, and many fell dead on either side, until the going down of the sun. Night parted the two armies: but in the grey of the morning the Moslems returned to the battle. Their cavaliers had soon hewn their way into the center of the Christian host. But many of the Moslems were fearful for the safety of the spoil which they had stored in their tents, and a false cry arose in their ranks that some of the enemy were plundering the camp; whereupon several squadrons of the Moslem horsemen rode off to protect their tents. But it seemed as if they fled; and all the host was troubled. And while Abderrahman strove to check their tumult, and to lead them back to battle, the warriors of the Franks came around him, and he was pierced through with many spears, so that he died. Then all the host fled before the enemy, and many died in the flight. . . .

Charles got the nickname "Martel" (the hammer) for his victory over the Muslims at the Battle of Tours (also known as the Battle of Poitiers), and for his subsequent victories that expelled the Muslims from France.  The keys to his victory at Tours were:

• Waiting until his forces could be gathered and treaties made, uniting the French and the Germanic tribes against the Muslim invaders.  The delayed response caused the Muslims to become over-confident.
• By staying off the main roads, Martel was able to use stealth to move his forces into place.
• Martel carefully chose the time and place of battle, positioning his troops at the top of an incline, with trees providing cover from Muslim calvary charges.
• The Christian troops were well trained, well disciplined, and well equipped.  They were among the first infantry to be able to withstand a calvary charge.

In the days before we decided that "we are all the same," and "we all share the same universal [Judeo-Christian] values," and "all religions are the same,"  and before modern re-historians decided that an invasion of French Aquitaine by the Umayyad Muslims would have been preferable to being ruled by the Germanic Franks, in other words, before we went insane, this is what historians had to say about the Battle of Tours:

"[The Battle of Tours] must ever remain one of the great events in the history of the world, as upon its issue depended whether Christian Civilization should continue or Islam prevail throughout Europe." - Godefroid Kurth

 "[T]he arm of Charles Martel saved and delivered the Christian nations of the West from the deadly grasp of all-destroying Islam." - Friedrich Schlegel

"[I]t was a struggle between East and West, South and North, Asia and Europe, the Gospel and the Koran; and we now say, on a general  consideration of events, peoples, and ages, that the civilization of the world depended on it." - M. Guizot and Mme. Guizot de Witt

"[T]here was no more important battle in the history of the world." - Hans Delbruck

“[The Battle of Tours] decided that Christians, and not Muslims, should be the ruling power in Europe.” - John Henry Haaren

"The victory gained was decisive and final, The torrent of Arab conquest was rolled back and Europe was rescued from the threatened yoke of the Saracens." - Louis Gustave and Charles Strauss

Edward Gibbon, famous for his criticism of Christianity and Judaism in his work, "The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" in 1776,  famously wrote, that if not for the victory at Tours:

"Perhaps the interpretation of the Koran would now be taught in the schools of Oxford, and her pulpits might demonstrate to a circumcised people the sanctity and truth of the revelation of Mahomet."

Today, there are two large mosques in Oxford, and criticism of Mohammad and Islam are on the verge of being banned in our universities and in our societies in general.

Previous Days in the "Religion of Peace™":

Oct 9: Battle of Karbala (Death of Husayn)
Oct 8: "Palestinian" pro-Osama Bin Laden rally
Oct 6: Assassination of Anwar Sadat
Oct 3: Black Hawk Down in Mogadishu
Oct 1: Systemic mass murder in Indonesia