ABSTRACT
Arab Muslims have a long and well-documented imperialist and colonialist past. Historical reality is unpleasant for the fantasy-addict. It is always so much less clear-cut and so much more varied. People previously thought of as heroes now are realized to be human beings, subject to fallacies, foibles, errors in judgement and lapses of all sorts. One of the major problems that the Muslim historian must overcome is to dilute the cheerleading nature of the sources with which he works. Muslims have yet to fully confront and acknowledge their imperialist history. One hears no calls for them to apologize to the world for their unprovoked invasions. It is rather ironic that the Pope and numerous Western political and religious leaders make haste to apologize for the Crusades and for various other Western-initiated excesses, yet these apologies are not echoed in the Muslim world.
