The Normans, in Naples and in England, were about to create the first genuine states. In this millennium, it seems peculiarly difficult to escape confinement by our own times. We did not anticipate the Iranian Revolution, nor do we foresee that anything unusual will happen to the Islamic regime, despite its failure and unpopularity. Perhaps it is because of our particular confinement in the present that when something very unexpected does happen, we tend to see it as an atavism, as the revival of something old. This was certainly the case with the sudden epidemic of ethnic cleansing in the former Soviet bloc.
History is full of ethnic oppression and ethnic massacres.
But ethnic oppression and ethnic cleansing are not the same. He wants to rule them and exploit them, and he is willing to use the most brutal means. Similarly, few of the ethnic massacres in the developing world have been attempts to get rid of an entire ethnic group. Rwanda and Burundi, I suspect, may be rare exceptions. Ethnic conflict provoked by discrimination forces on minorities a bad situation, but not usually an impossible situation.