Outremer
Nuradin and Amalric
The Franks knew what they had lost and tried to recover it quickly, before the Syrians should become too secure in Egypt. Amalric got Emperor Manuel to send a Byzantine fleet and army (in fact, this was the very assistance that Amalric had wanted to wait for in 1168). Together they attacked Damietta in late 1169, but the expedition was badly handled and the invaders had to withdraw in December after having accomplished nothing.
Amalric knew that he would need assistance to continue his offensives against the Muslims, and he knew that such offensives were necessary. He had already dispatched representatives to the West to plead for reinforcements, with little success. In 1171 he himself went to Constantinople, where he was well received by Emperor Manuel, but where he again got more promises than men and money.
Saladin's triumph in Egypt did have one beneficial effect for Outremer: it made Nuradin more than a little nervous. While the two Muslim leaders never openly broke, relations between them steadily worsened and neither made serious moves against Jerusalem because of fear of what the other might do while they were occupied.
The end of the Fatimid caliphate in 1171 had another effect. It meant the end of the Shi'ite dynasty, which gave a special urgency to the political programme of the Assassins. They now made alliance with the Franks and were somewhat unreliable partners over the next few decades.
In May of 1174, Nuradin was in Damascus, planning his invasion of Egypt to bring Saladin to heel. He fell ill while there and died on May 15. His son was still a child and the Muslim world fractured once again. Amalric immediately rode to Banyas where he met with Damascene representatives. They proposed an alliance against Saladin, which he accepted. But the King was already suffering from dysentery. He worsened on his journey back to Jerusalem and died there on July 11, 1174.