"Bin Qasim arrives at the port of Debal. The supplies sent by sea arrive the same day. But Hajjaj doesn’t give the order to engage in battle until the eighth day. At the end of that day a Brahmin comes out of the town. He tells the Arabs that the town is guarded by a talisman: the four long flags of green silk that hang down from the arms of the flagstaff on the dome of the great temple of Debal. While the flagstaff stands, the Brahmin says, the people of Debal will fight. It is the first of the betrayals that will assist the Arab conquest. But they are not betrayals, really. They are no more than the actions of people who understand only that power is power, and believe they are only changing rulers; they cannot conceive that a new way is about to come."
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Naipaul, V.S. - Among the Believers (Vintage, 1982)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Debal
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Debal
Debal (Urdu, Arabic, Sindhi: ديبل) was an ancient port located near modern Karachi, Pakistan. It is adjacent to the nearby Manora Island and was administered by Mansura, and later Thatta.
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