Usama used frequently to visit Fulk I of Jerusalem, during Fulk's truce with Jamal al-Din Muhammad, the Atabeg of Damascus. There was a family connection, because Fulk's father-in-law, Baldwin II, had an obligation towards Usama's father Murshid. Sometimes Usama was accompanied by Mu'in al-Din Anar, vizier of Damascus. Usama and Anar once saw a Genoese man at Acre with a falcon and a bitch newly brought from the west, for hunting cranes. Anar asked Fulk for the pair as a present, and Fulk complied, but the falcon died shortly afterwards without hunting again. Another time Usama was offered a leopard for sale at Haifa: he refused it, but was impressed with the way its Frankish owner had trained it. In Jerusalem, whenever he entered the al-Aqsa Mosque, the Templars there, who were his friends, evacuated the adjoining little mosque, which had been turned into a church, to let him pray. On one visit he was repeatedly interrupted in the little mosque by a very rude Frank, who tried to persuade him to pray facing the east. Anar, in the Dome of the Rock, was asked by a Frank whether he wanted to see God as a child; when he answered in the affirmative, he was shown a picture of the Virgin and Child. Rainier of Brus, the lord of Banyas, had stolen flocks of sheep from the Arabs in a time of truce. At Usama's request, Fulk had Rainier tried before six or seven knights of his court. He was fined for the offence. On visits to Acre, Usama would often ransom prisoners, and once he wanted to ransom many from William Jiba (?). As he did not have enough money with him, he went back to Damascus for more, then returned, only to find that the captives had escaped. He could only ransom one female prisoner. Usama once was in Tiberias during a Frankish feast and saw a race between two old women with a pig for a prize. He once saw a Frankish woman in a bathhouse (for men) at Tyre; her father had brought her with him to wash her hair