On December 11, 629, the Prophet of Allah and founder of the Muslim religion, Muhammad, led an army of 10,000 converts to Islam into Mecca and conquered the city with minimal casualties.
Digging Deeper
As often takes place today when Islamists take over an area previously shared by other faiths, the Muslims destroyed all traces of Arabian, Jewish, and Christian statuary, paintings, and other objects of non-Islamic religious significance, although some accounts claim Muhammad spared depictions of Jesus and Mary.
The land we now know as Saudi Arabia, or the Arabian Peninsula, was peopled by followers of a variety of religions at this time. Jews were common inhabitants of Arabia and had an on again, off again, tradition of competition and conflict with followers of Arabian traditional religion and later with Muslims. (Initially, Muhammad was surprisingly tolerant of Jews.)
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