One needs to also keep in mind that the idea of anthropological thinking along the lines of cultural and ethnic nationalism and nation state status didn't come into being again until the middle to late 19th century (prior to that the only thing close for most Europeans was the power of the Romans).

The very same thing where a particular lord held his people in less than perfect conditions occurred pretty much uniformly throughout the known world to one extent or another and greed often played the biggest part when it often crossed the so called territorial boundaries. It was quite common for one lord to attack another on a local level if he saw any advantage too it. Irish Lords would like anyone else during the time periods predating nationalism's rise be inclined to raid their closest neighbors as well as make incursions into the nearer islands. Just as it was common for the Irish and Welsh and Scots to raid the Saxons (the later had themselves invaded from Europe) who were all in turn invaded by the Danes, etc etc.

All of which doesn't change a thing about how one groups bad guy can be another's good guy etc.

One nationalized state's cultural perceptions and preconceptions concerning any particular group (as evidenced not only by very one sided takes on history by some of the participants in this thread but also by the relationship between Arab and Jew or Irish and English etc) can take much longer than one human lifespan to change if at all.

But to think that the British Empire (or its English forebears like the Normans and Saxons etc) went blithely tromping around peacefully (while they invaded all these different peoples lands) making everyone's lives they touched the better and should instead of resisting be thanking them for it imho is almost tantamount to saying that the Jews should thank the Nazis for the Holocaust (yes I am perhaps killing the thread by including the Nazis lol) or that the American Indians should be thanking Columbus, the Colonists and all their decedents who followed.

This still doesn't mean that intelligent people shouldn't be able to see the other sides point of view as seemingly valid at least in their respected perspectives imho.

For instance...do I think the Arab people did wrong by my mother's people when they basically started a war and all but kicked us out of Lebanon where our ancestors had lived pretty much since before the Roman's destroyed the Temple of Solomon?

Why yes I do see them as in the wrong.

But I also understand that they will see it quite differently.