That’s really not what that sentence means. It wasn’t that that some people viewed the crusade as a means to gain wealth from the enemy, rather they believed they simply being a soldier as part of an army was an improvement. Considering people had gathered resources to make the trip it was arguably a accurate assessment though they eventually got slaughtered.

The context was: “Calling for a crusade at the Council of Clermont in 1095, Pope Urban II planned the departure of the crusade for 15 August 1096. Nevertheless, a number of unexpected bands of peasants and low-ranking knights organized and set off for Jerusalem on their own.”

Of course this is based on history books written about the time period I haven’t read the associated primary sources. Also, there where a lot of crusades with something of a sliding scale for religious involvement vs other motivations.

> To try to blame Religion over the enormous death total is as silly as blaming "Car-Based Transportation", "Football" and "Biology".

Again human sacrifice, you can exclude plenty of deaths as ethic / religious conflict, but you can’t hit zero. Millions have been sacrificed due to religion not just ethnic conflict. Death or conversion is another thing that shows up regularly.