Pope Urban II's speech in 1095 sets off a chain of wars that lands European knights outside Jerusalem within four years, and this four-part Al Jazeera series retells that two-century conflict through Arab sources and Arab historians rather than the usual Western chronicles. Episode one traces the economic desperation behind the First Crusade, with historians like Antoine Domit and Jan Vandeburie describing a Europe of drought, feudal poverty, and land held by a small aristocracy while the Muslim world, from Spain to the eastern Mediterranean, lived in relative prosperity. Later episodes follow the Muslim recovery after 1099, Saladin's victory at the Battle of Hattin and recapture of Jerusalem, and Richard the Lionheart's Third Crusade, which ends in a treaty splitting control of the holy city. Reenactments carry the battle scenes while academics from institutions including the Lebanese University and Ain Shams University supply analysis between them. The final episode carries the story past 1291 into the 20th century, connecting the Crusades' legacy to the 1948 founding of Israel.