The golden age for Jews in Spain is considered to be under the relative lax rule of the Muslim Caliphates in al-Andalus. It was generally a time when Jews were free to conduct business, participate in government, and practice their religion without fear of persecution. However, to say that Al-Andalus was a time when Jews were never persecution would certainly be an oversimplification. The Almohads were an Islamic Caliphate that persecuted those who did not share their religious beliefs. During their rule of the southern half of Iberia, Jews and Christians both were subjected to religious and political persecution. Since their rise to prominence on Iberia in the eleventh century to their fall in the twelfth, they brought religious extremism that made it difficult for anyone who was not a fundamentalist Muslim to achieve any sort of success. The preceding Almoravid dynasty, while more repressive than some governments in Al-Andalus, was not violently repressive. These sentiments of acceptance did not at all carry over with the change in regime. The Almohads' religious fundamentalism caused a massive emigration of Jews and Christians from southern Iberia to the Christian north and North Africa, specifically Egypt. Traditionally we choose to look mostly at the golden age of cultural interaction when talking about Al-Andalus, however the period of the Almoravids and especially Almohads also needs to be mentioned in any history of the peninsula. They did not have the glory of the Golden Age of Jews in Spain, but this does not change their importance. The religious climate before they came to power, their rise to power, the changes they instituted, how those changes affected Spain, and how they affected their eventual fall from power are all important aspects of interactions between the Almohads and different cultures.