My Year Inside Radical Islam: A Memoir
by Daveed Gartenstein-Ross
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Book Summary Information
Author: Daveed Gartenstein-RossEdition: Hardcover
Format: Bargain Price
Published: 2007-02-01
ISBN: N/A
Number of pages: 304
Publisher: Tarcher
Book Reviews of My Year Inside Radical Islam: A Memoir
Book Review: A Disservice
Summary: 2 Stars
After having painfully made my way through this book, I'd like to share a few thoughts on it. First of all, I don't understand at all the other reviews here that claim this is a "must read", or that it's a great book. The author, Mr. Ross, was clearly confused about his faith (whatever it happens to be at any given point in time), and about Islam in general, and that confusion shows in his writing. This book is certainly not any type of objective essay on Islam, in America or otherwise. It's more of a diary of his miscommunication and misconception of the people and events that he experienced during those years he writes about. If the dear reader wants a truly fair, objective, and accurate portrait of Islam and Muslims in this country, I suggest that they read "American Islam" by Paul M. Barrett. It baffles me, and many other readers, how Mr. Ross could have come to Islam via a Sufi organization, the Naqshbandi's, who's interpretation and practice of Islam is the pole opposite of that of the fundamentalist Wahabis, and yet end up in the radical "gutter" of Islam. I think that says something about him and his intentions. As to his style of writing, mediocre at best.
Summary of My Year Inside Radical Islam: A Memoir
My Year Inside Radical Islam is a memoir of first a spiritual and then a political seduction. Raised in liberal Ashland, Oregon, by parents who were Jewish by birth but dismissive of strict dogma, Daveed Gartenstein-Ross yearned for a religion that would suit all his ideals. At college in the late nineties he met a charismatic Muslim student who grounded his political activism with thoughtful religious conviction. Gartenstein-Ross reflects on his experience of converting to Islam-a process that began with a desire to connect with both a religious community and a spiritual practice, and eventually led him to sympathize with the most extreme interpretations of the faith, with the most radical political implications.In the year following graduation, Gartenstein-Ross went to work for the al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, a charity dedicated to fostering Wahhabism, Saudi Arabia's austere form of Islam-a theological inspiration for many terrorist groups, including al-Qaeda. Shortly after he left al-Haramain-when his own fan-aticism had waned-the foundation was charged by the U.S. government as being a source of funds for terrorist organizations. Gartenstein-Ross, by this time a lawyer at a prominent firm, volunteered to be questioned by the FBI. They already knew who he was.
The story of how a good faith can be distorted and a decent soul can be seduced away from its principles, My Year Inside Radical Islam provides a rare glimpse into the personal interface between religion and politics.
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