politalX Politics Store - God's Terrorists: The Wahhabi Cult and the Hidden Roots of Modern Jihad
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List Price: £9.99
Our Price: £6.99
Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours
Manufacturer: Abacus
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Average Customer Rating:   
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Binding: Paperback
EAN: 9780349118796
ISBN: 0349118795
Label: Abacus
Manufacturer: Abacus
Number Of Pages: 368
Publication Date: 2007-01-18
Publisher: Abacus
Studio: Abacus
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Interesting Context for current Troubles
Comment: Charles Allen's book offers helpful insight into the historic roots of the Wahhabi sect, and the relationship between the Wahhabists of Arabia and those of the Indian Sub Continent. His discussion of the early Raj's attempts to deal with the so called Fanatic camp, the relationship between the Wahhabis and the Indian Uprising, together with the contribution of Wahhabi thinking to the Deoband movement and the influence of Deoband Madrassahs is very helpful. An excellent book for those with an interest in Islamic history, and those seeking to give a wide historical context for many of the issues in the news today.
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Summary: Misrepresentation of facts!!
Comment: I bought this book after having been informed about Charles Allen's idea that the Indian Mutiny has its link with al-Qaeda. Upon reading relevant sections on Indian revivalism, it becomes more than apparent the book is clearly a hype and mis-representation of many facts. The Author tends to lean more on his imagination and inituitive than historical facts and fails to cite sources for numerous suppositions. His superficial knowledge of many core religious issues leads him to commit grave blunders that primary students would laugh at. All in all, the book is a good read and provides a thought-provoking perspective on how history can be misinterpreted. Read and judge for yourselves...
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Summary: Another piece of the puzzle
Comment: If, like me, you hadn't thought at all about Islam before 9/11, it has been a long and mostly boring task to read up on it. Most books about Islam seem to fall into one of two categories: flaccid encomiums of various aspects of Islam by Moslems, and ignorant rants against Islam by people incensed by Islamic terrorism. Neither is particularly useful to those with an interest in the historical roots of Islamic terrorism. This book goes some way towards filling that gap. As other reviewers have noted, it deals mostly with the Wahhabist plots in India and Arabia in the nineteenth century. There is some information beyond that, but another book like this is necessary about the twentieth century and specifically the use and abuse of Wahhabism by the House of Saud. The books of Efraim Karsh are superb on the middle east in the early twentieth century- maybe he could write it.
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Summary: Putting Today's Headlines into Historical Context
Comment: This is a fascinating read. In a world dominated by sound-bites of a few seconds, it's easy to fall into the trap of thinking that every new event must have its root causes in the recent past. Nowhere is this assumption more prevalent than when that epitome of 21st century phenomena - Islamic terrorism - is discussed. There seems a consensus among commentators that the actions of al Qaeda and their ilk today are the consequences of recent foreign policy decisions in London and Washington, and by extension that decisions made today can have an immediate impact on such organisations' future plans.
What Charles Allen reminds us is that exponents of Wahhabism, indistinguishable from their modern counterparts in al Qaeda, have been taking up arms against "the West" since the early nineteenth century and that their reasons remain unchanged and, according to their philosophy, both moral and logical.
The author puts today's activities into context, though it is difficult to reach anything but a dark conclusion about what our immediate future holds as a result.
I don't share other reviewers' disappointment at the lack of intricate detail about Wahabbism's local origins, or the concentration on historic rather than current events. Both these aspects are beyond the scope of a book which does exactly what I hoped it would - it explains how we arrived at this point and highlights the naivity of approaching the fight against al Qaeda as a sort of PR-driven election campaign in which the enemy would surrender if only we could get the correct leaflet in front of bin Laden.
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Summary: Detailed
Comment: Charles Allen's book is very well written and provides very detailed information for people interested in the historical roots of contemporary fundamentalist Islam (Wahhabism) and how its history has been from the death of Muhammad to the present.
When I bought this book I was expecting more on todays situation, so I was a little disappointed, but I guess that was my mistake.
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