It is difficult to be neutral about Egypt. For centuries it has been the citadel of Islamic learning and thought, and since the signing of the Egyptian-Israeli Peace Treaty, in 1979, it has been of immense strategic importance to American interests in the Middle East. But Egypt is also a country in crisis, as the 1997 massacre at Luxor made clear, torn between old worlds and new, unsettled religious revival and politics.
President Hosni Mubarak, a former jet fighter pilot sworn in after Anwar Sadat's brutal assassination, favors a secular society. But Mubarak's government faces constant conflict with militant clerics such as Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, recently sentenced to life in an American prison after his conviction for seditious conspiracy to wage "a war of urban terrorism against the United States." Mary Anne Weaver argues that an Islamist victory in Egypt is almost inevitable, and, unlike that of Shi'ite Iran, its impact on the Islamic world will be truly profound. Even among scholars, there is a growing concern that if Egypt "goes Islamic," so could much of the Arab world.
Based on interviews with militants and front men, prime ministers and presidents, Weaver's is a fascinating and brilliant account of the world of militant Islam.
