Editing Persecution of Christians (section)

=== Ottoman Empire ===
{{Main|Christianity in the Ottoman Empire}}
Historian Warren Treadgold gives a summary on the historical background highlighting the cumulative effects of the relentless Turkish Muslim depredations against the Byzantine Empire in its Anatolian heartland by the late 14th century:<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nYbnr5XVbzUC|title=A History of the Byzantine State and Society|pages=813–814|isbn=9780804726306 |last1=Treadgold |first1=Warren T. |date=October 1997 |publisher=Stanford University Press }}</ref>
{{blockquote|As the Turks raided and conquered, they enslaved many Christians, selling some in other Muslim regions and hindering the rest from practicing their faith. Conversions [to islam], Turkish migration, and Greek outmigration increasingly endangered the Greek minority in central Asia Minor. When the Turks overran Western Anatolia, they occupied the countryside first, driving the Greeks into the cities, or away to Europe, or the islands. By the time the Anatolian cities fell, the land around them was already largely Turkish [and Islamic].}}

In accordance with the traditional custom which was practiced at the time, Sultan [[Mehmed II]] allowed his troops and his entourage to engage in unbridled pillaging and looting in the city of [[Constantinople]] for three full days shortly after [[Fall of Constantinople|it was captured]]. Once the three days passed, he claimed its remaining contents for himself.<ref name="Runciman 1965">{{Cite book|last=Runciman|first=Steven|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BAzntP0lg58C|title=The Fall of Constantinople 1453|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=1965|isbn=978-0-521-39832-9|pages=145–148|language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Nicol|first=Donald MacGillivray|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LpBsQgAACAAJ|title=The End of the Byzantine Empire|publisher=Edward Arnold|year=1979|isbn=978-0-7131-6250-9|location=London|page=88|language=en|author-link=Donald Nicol}}</ref> However, at the end of the first day, he proclaimed that the looting should cease because he felt profound sadness when he toured the looted and enslaved city.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Inalcik|first=Halil|year=1969|title=The Policy of Mehmed II toward the Greek Population of Istanbul and the Byzantine Buildings of the City|journal=Dumbarton Oaks Papers|volume=23/24|pages=229–249|doi=10.2307/1291293|jstor=1291293|issn=0070-7546}}</ref><ref name="Runciman 1965" /> Hagia Sophia was not exempted from the pillage and looting and specifically became its focal point as the invaders believed it to contain the greatest treasures and valuables of the city.<ref name="Nicol_a_2">Nicol. ''The End of the Byzantine Empire'', p. 90.</ref> Shortly after the defence<!--Br. Eng spllg--> of the [[Walls of Constantinople]] collapsed and the Ottoman troops entered the city victoriously, the pillagers and looters made their way to the Hagia Sophia and battered down its doors before storming in.<ref name="Runciman 1965" />

Throughout the period of the [[siege of Constantinople]], the worshippers who were trapped in the city participated in the [[Divine Liturgy]] and they also recited the Prayer of the Hours at the [[Hagia Sophia]] and the church formed a safe-haven and a refuge for many of those worshippers who were unable to contribute to the city's defence<!--Br. Eng spllg-->, which comprised women, children, elderly, the sick and the wounded.<ref name="Runciman_2.5">Runciman. ''The Fall of Constantinople'', pp. 133–34.</ref><ref name="Nicol_b_1">{{ cite book | isbn =9780521439916 | last= Nicol | first=Donald M. | title=The Last Centuries of Byzantium 1261–1453| place= Cambridge | publisher=Cambridge University Press| date= 1972 | page= 389}}</ref> Being trapped in the church, the many congregants and yet more refugees inside became spoils-of-war to be divided amongst the triumphant invaders. The building was desecrated and looted, with the helpless occupants who sought shelter within the church being enslaved.<ref name="Nicol_a_2" /> While most of the elderly and the infirm/wounded and sick were killed, and the remainder (mainly teenage males and young boys) were chained up and sold into slavery.<ref name="Runciman 1965" />

The women of Constantinople also suffered from rape at the hands of Ottoman forces.<ref name="hRhtW">{{Cite magazine |last=Smith |first=Cyril J. |year=1974 |title=History of Rape and Rape Laws |url=https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/wolj60&div=31&id=&page= |magazine=Women Law Journal |issue=60 |page=188 |access-date=12 October 2020 |archive-date=26 April 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200426103547/https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals%2Fwolj60&div=31&id=&page= |url-status=live }}</ref> According to Barbaro, "all through the day the Turks made a great slaughter of Christians through the city". According to historian [[Philip Mansel]], widespread persecution of the city's civilian inhabitants took place, resulting in thousands of murders and rapes, and 30,000 civilians being enslaved or forcibly deported.<ref name="iK51W">{{cite book |last1=Mansel |first1=Philip |title=Constantinople: City of the World's Desire 1453–1924 |chapter-url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/longterm/books/chap1/constantinople.htm |date= 1995 | publisher= St. Martin's Press | via=The Washington Post |access-date=7 August 2020 |archive-date=24 July 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190724153239/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/longterm/books/chap1/constantinople.htm |url-status=live |chapter=One: The Conqueror}}</ref><ref name="Crowley2009">{{cite book |author=Roger Crowley|title=Constantinople: The Last Great Siege, 1453|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ftOp1cR7VK8C&pg=PT226|date=6 August 2009|publisher=Faber & Faber|isbn=978-0-571-25079-0|page=226|quote=The vast majority of the ordinary citizens - about 30,000 - were marched off to the slave markets of Edirne, Bursa and Ankara.}}</ref><ref name="Akbar2002">{{cite book |author=M.J Akbar|title=The Shade of Swords: Jihad and the Conflict Between Islam and Christianity |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=d_iBAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA86|date=3 May 2002|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-134-45259-0|page=86|quote=Some 30,000 Christians were either enslaved or sold.}}</ref><ref name="Bradbury1992">{{cite book|author=Jim Bradbury|title=The Medieval Siege|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xVCRpsfwkiUC&pg=PA322|year=1992|publisher=Boydell & Brewer|isbn=978-0-85115-312-4|page=322}}</ref> [[George Sphrantzes]] says that people of both genders were raped inside [[Hagia Sophia]].<ref>Preface to the ''Chronicle''; translated by [[Marios Philippides]], ''The Fall of the Byzantine Empire: A Chronicle by George Sphrantzes, 1401–1477'' (Amherst: University of Massachusetts, 1980), p. 21</ref>

Since the time of the [[Great Turkish War|Austro-Turkish war (1683–1699)]], relations between Muslims and Christians who lived in the European provinces of the Ottoman Empire gradually deteriorated {{vague|date=January 2018}} and this deterioration in interfaith relations occasionally resulted in calls for the expulsion or extermination of local Christian communities by some Muslim religious leaders. As a result of Ottoman [[oppression]], the destruction of Churches and Monasteries, and violence against the non-Muslim civilian population, [[Serbs|Serbian]] Christians and their church leaders, headed by Serbian Patriarch [[Arsenije III Čarnojević|Arsenije III]], sided with the Austrians in 1689 and again in 1737 under Serbian Patriarch [[Arsenije IV Jovanović Šakabenta|Arsenije IV]]. In the following punitive campaigns, Ottoman forces conducted systematic atrocities against the Christian population in the Serbian regions, resulted in the [[Great Migrations of the Serbs]].{{sfn|Pavlowitch|2002|pp=19–20}}

==== Ottoman Albania and Kosovo ====
{{main|Islamization of Albania}}

Before the late 16th century, Albania's population remained overwhelmingly [[Christianity in Albania|Christian]], despite the fact that it was under Ottoman rule, unlike the more diverse populations of other regions of the [[Ottoman Empire]], such as Bosnia, Bulgaria and [[Northern Greece]],<ref name="MinkovDemographics">{{cite book|author=Anton Minkov|title=Conversion to Islam in the Balkans: ''Kisve Bahası'' Petitions and Ottoman Social Life, 1670–1730|publisher= Brill |series=The Ottoman Empire and its Heritage, Volume: 30 | date= 2004 | isbn = 978-90-47-40277-0 |pages=41–42 | doi =10.1163/9789047402770_008 |s2cid=243354675 }}</ref> the mountainous Albania was a frequent site of revolts against Ottoman rule, often at an enormous human cost, such as the destruction of entire villages.<ref>Zhelyazkova, Antonina. ‘'Albanian Identities'’. pp. 15–16, 19.</ref> In response, the Ottomans abandoned their usual policy of tolerating Christians in favor of a policy which was aimed at reducing the size of Albania's Christian population through [[Islamization]], beginning in the restive Christian regions of Reka and Elbasan in 1570.<ref>Zhelyazkova, Antonina. ‘'Albanian Identities'’. Sofia, 2000: International Center for Minority Studies and Intercultural Relations. pp. 15–16</ref>

The pressures which resulted from this campaign included particularly harsh economic conditions which were imposed on Albania's Christian population; while earlier taxes on the Christians were around 45 ''[[akçe]]s'' a year, by the middle of the 17th century the rate had been multiplied by 27 to 780 ''akçes'' a year. Albanian elders often opted to save their clans and villages from hunger and economic ruin by advocating village-wide and region-wide conversions to Islam, with many individuals frequently continuing to practice Christianity in private.<ref>{{cite web |last= Zhelyazkova |first = Antonina |url=http://pdc.ceu.hu/archive/00003852/01/Albanian_Identities.pdf | title= Albanian Identities| date= 2000 | publisher=International Centre for Minority Studies and Intercultural Relation| quote=If the tax levied on the Christians in the Albanian communities in the 16th century amounted to about 45 akçes, in the middle of the 17th century it ran up to 780 akçes a year. In order to save the clans from hunger and ruin, the Albanian elders advised the people in the villages to adopt Islam...Nevertheless, the willingness of the Gegs to support the campaigns of the Catholic West against the Empire, did not abate.... men in Albania, Christians, but also Muslims, were ready to take up arms, given the smallest help from the Catholic West.... the complex dual religious identity of the Albanians become clear. Emblematic is the case of the Crypto-Christians inhabiting the inaccessible geographical area...}}</ref>

A failed Catholic rebellion in 1596 and the Albanian population's support of Austro-Hungary during the [[Great Turkish War]],<ref name="PahumiKosovoIslamization">{{ cite thesis | degree = Bachelor of Arts | work = Department of History| url= https://hdl.handle.net/2027.42/55462 | first=Nevila | last= Pahumi | publisher= University of Michigan | date= 2007 | title= The Consolidation of Albanian Nationalism | page= 18 | hdl = 2027.42/55462| quote=The pasha of Ipek forcibly moved the Catholic inhabitants of northern Albania into the plains of southern Serbia after a failed Serb revolt forced many Serbs to flee to the Habsburg Empire in 1689. The transferred villagers were forced to convert to Islam.}}</ref> and its support of the Venetians in the 1644 Venetian-Ottoman War<ref name="Ramet210">{{harvnb|Ramet|1998|p=210}}: "Then, in 1644, war broke out between Venice and the Ottoman empire. At the urging of the clergy, many Albanian Catholics sided with Venice. The Ottomans responded to this by severely repressing them, which in turn drove many Catholics to embrace Islam (although a few of them elected to join the Orthodox Church)... Within the span of twenty-two years (1649–71) the number of Catholics in the diocese of Alessio fell by more than 50 percent, while in the diocese of Pulati (1634–71) the number of Catholics declined from more than 20,000 to just 4,045. In general, Albanian insurrections which occurred during the Ottoman-Venetian wars of 1644–69 resulted in stiff Ottoman reprisals against Catholics in northern Albania and significant acceleration of Islamization... In general, a pattern emerged. When the Ottoman empire was attacked by Catholic powers, local Catholics were pressured to convert, and when Orthodox Russia attacked the Ottoman empire, local Orthodox Christians were also pressured to change their faith. In some cases however, their Islamization was only superficial and as a result, many villages and some districts were still "crypto-Catholic" in the nineteenth century, despite their adoption of the externals of Islamic culture."</ref> as well as the [[Orlov Revolt]]<ref name="Ramet203">{{harvnb|Ramet|1998|p=203}}: "The Ottoman conquest between the end of the fourteenth century and the mid-fifteenth century introduced a third religion – Islam – but at first the Turks did not use force during their expansion, and it was only in the 1600s that large-scale conversion to Islam began – at first, it chiefly occurred among Albanian Catholics."; p.204. "The Orthodox community enjoyed broad toleration at the hands of the Sublime Porte until the late eighteenth century."; p. 204. "In the late eighteenth century Russian agents began stirring the Orthodox subjects of the Ottoman empire against the Sublime Porte. In the Russo-Turkish wars of 1768–74 and 1787–91, Orthodox Albanians rose up against the Turks. In the course of the second revolt, the "New Academy" in Voskopoje was destroyed (1789), and at the end of the second Russo-Turkish war, more than a thousand Orthodox fled to Russia on Russian warships. In the aftermath of these revolts, the Porte now applied pressure in order to Islamize the Albanian Orthodox population, adding economic incentives in order to stimulate this process. In 1798, Ali Pasha of Janina led Ottoman forces against Christian believers who were assembled in their churches in order to celebrate Easter in the villages of Shen Vasil and Nivica e Bubarit. The bloodbath which was unleashed against these believers frightened Albanian Christians who lived in other districts and inspired a new wave of mass conversions to Islam."</ref><ref name="Skendi1013">{{harvnb|Skendi|1967a|pp=10–13}}.</ref><ref name="Skendi1956321323">{{harvnb|Skendi|1956|pp=321–323}}.</ref><ref name="Vickers16">{{harvnb|Vickers|2011|p=16}}.</ref><ref name="Koti1617">{{harvnb|Koti|2010|pp=16–17}}.</ref> were all factors which led to punitive measures in which outright force was accompanied by economic incentives depending on the region, and ended up forcing the conversion of large Christian populations to Islam in Albania. In the aftermath of the Great Turkish War, massive punitive measures were imposed on Kosovo's Catholic Albanian population and as a result of them, most members of it fled to Hungary and settled around [[Buda]], where most of them died of disease and starvation.<ref name="PahumiKosovoIslamization" /><ref name="MalcolmRaspasani">{{cite book|last=Malcolm|first=Noel|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GGQ_AQAAIAAJ&q=Toma+Raspasani|title=Kosovo: a short history|publisher=Macmillan|year=1998|isbn=978-0-333-66612-8|page=162}}</ref>

After the Orthodox Serbian population's subsequent flight from Kosovo, the pasha of Ipek (Peja/Pec) forced Albanian Catholic mountaineers to repopulate Kosovo by deporting them to Kosovo, and also forced them adopt Islam.<ref name="PahumiKosovoIslamization" /><ref name="Koti1617" /> In the 17th and 18th centuries, South Albania also saw numerous instances of violence which was directed against those who remained Christian by local newly converted Muslims, ultimately resulting in many more conversions out of fear as well as flight to faraway lands by the Christian population.<ref name="Kallivretakis233">{{harvnb|Kallivretakis|2003|p=233}}.</ref><ref name="Hammond30">{{harvnb|Hammond|1967|p=30}}.</ref><ref name="Ramet203" /><ref name="Hammond197662">{{harvnb|Hammond|1976|p=62}}.</ref><ref name="Koukoudis2003">{{harvnb|Koukoudis|2003|pp=321–322}}. "Particularly interesting is the case of Vithkuq, south of Moschopolis... It may well have had Vlach inhabitants before 1769, though the Arvanites were certainly far more numerous, if not the largest population group. This is further supported by the linguistic identity of the refugees who fled Vithkuq and accompanied the waves of departing Vlachs..." p. 339. "As the same time as, or possibly shortly before or after, these events in Moschopolis, unruly Arnauts also attacked the smaller Vlach and Arvanitic communities round about. The Vlach inhabitants of Llengë, Niçë, Grabovë, Shipckë, and the Vlach villages on Grammos, such as Nikolicë, Linotopi, and Grammousta, and the inhabitants of Vithkuq and even the last Albanian speaking Christian villages on Opar found themselves at the mercy of the predatory Arnauts, whom no-one could withstand. For them too, the only solution was to flee... During this period, Vlach and Arvanite families from the surrounding ruined market towns and villages settled alongside the few Moscopolitans who had returned. Refugee families came from Dushar and other villages in Opar, from Vithkuq, Grabovë, Nikolicë, Niçë, and Llengë and from Kolonjë..."</ref>