I went to K's leaving work party. There was the usual discussion about anything and everything and T brought up Arabs and Jews. He said, that two other groups are enemies like Arabs and Jews. I corrected him, saying that we weren't always enemies. It's a recent thing, since Israel (I know it's partly Israel but it started a bit earlier than that with British colonialism of the region but anyway...).
He went into a long explanation about why we're enemies from the beginning of Islam. I said it wasn't true. We used to be like cousins (the Golden Age in Spain, etc). He is Benglai Muslim and it reminded me that people are being taught a history that is different from the history I was taught... and it's funny, it's not like my school taught me to love Islam (it was a Jewish school with a Zionist leaning, afterall) - but it did teach that under Muslim rule Jews fared much better - peacefully in fact - than under Christian rule throughtout the centuries in Europe and the Middle East. And it's what I believe.