Customer Reviews

Anti-American Terrorism and the Middle East: A Documentary Reader

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This book was initially published in hardback in 2002. It very much has 9/11 in the background. It provides a great deal of documentation on the terror - programs and plans of various Middle East originated players, most notably Al- Quaeda. But it also provides a solid understanding of the ideological foundations of anti- American Terror. It has a number of selections from the thought of radical Shiite and Sunnite thinkers. Though the book does not include developments up to and through 2009, which would include analysis of what is happening in Afghanistan- Pakistan, Iraq it does provide a real understanding of the foundational- views of the anti- American middle eastern world.
Given the rapid changes in the world, including the Obama effort to move the Islamic world away from hostility to the United States the book could certainly gain from an update. And this however when it provides a real basis for understanding Middle-Eastern anti- Americanism.

I thought this book was going to provide more of an analysis of the middle east and terror groups. The book is organized in topics. Each topic begins with a brief analysis by the editor and then goes into pages of text from extremist leaders such as Osama bin Laden as well as other well known terrorists. The analysis that was done was very short and seemed to have little to do with the texts being displayed. However, the book was well worth reading as it provided a good array of speaches and articles given by middle east extremist leaders. The articles provided a look into the minds of the extremists as well as seeing the issues from their point of view. This is not to say that the editor, or I, agree with anything the extremists say, but it is valuable to know what the enemy thinks rather than relying on the worthless writing provided by our media. I would advise borrowing this book from the library rather than purchasing it, and I generally like to own any book I have read.