Customer Reviews

A Portrait of Egypt: A Journey Through the World of Militant Islam

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4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

After reading the first two thirds of Ms Weavers book I am confused: what's the point of chosing the title "A Portrait of Egypt" when writing a book about religious extremism?

Despite this (major) mislead, the book provides a) some good introduction into modern Egyptian history!; b) some good understanding of why certain things happened and still happen in Egypt; and c) some good information on the who is who in this mess of islamists & terrorists...

However, please... DO NOT read this book if you are looking for information about everyday Egypt;... DO NOT read this book if you are trying to understand more about Islam (not even militant Islam, despite the title).

I still haven't decided whether it's a good or a bad book, for sure it's an interesting read - but ONLY IF you have background/previous knowledge and can constantly double-check the information given in the book.

Footnote: In another comment Sharon argues that Mubarak is the third president of Egypt. To clear up the confusion, on this point Ms Wezver did her homework well - the first president, before Gamal Abdel Nasser was Mohamed Naguib, though only for limited time but still.

This is excellent reading for those of you who know little of modern Egyptian politics or the rise of the revolutionary Islam in the Middle East. This book shows exactly how the US military aid went awry in Afghanistan, it delineates the major extremist islamic organizations as well as key players involved. Throughout the years the author must have had incredible access to political leaders and oficials at all levels, including Mubarak, the current President in Egypt and Sheikh Abdel-Rahman, the mastermind of the first attack on the world trade center and the man believed to be behind the assassination of President Anwar Sadat. This book is not about Egypt, but the expansion of extremist Islam and the resultant struggle for power in it. Not only does this work show a connection between the Afghan war and the rise of Islamic extremism, but it also shows how Edyptian terrorists can be tied to Bin Ladin and how the US is drawn into the conflict beyond its support of Israel. Considering that this work was written well before the events of September 11, it is uncanny how accurate this book turned out to be with regards to its message of the dangers posed to the US by Islamic extremism.

Don't expect a history of Egypt or a travel guide in this book--you won't find that kind of information--but you will find a very credible political analysis of Egypt today. I thought I was savvy about mid-East politics, but this book taught me a lot. Mary Ann Weaver makes a convincing case for the belief that Egypt is a ticking bomb of political discontent. I appreciate her thoughtful reporting, since the press is so preoccupied with Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, that Egypt is almost never in the news. Mary Ann Weaver is also an excellent writer.

This is one of the best books I have read in a very long time. Mary Anne Weaver gave a very honest and true oponion of what goes on in Egypt. Her portrait of the Islamists and the rulers of Egypt is excellent. I just wish she could add her opinion on the horror of 9/11. Although I do not condone the treatment of the terrorists in Egypt, I strongly believe this was the only way to stop them. Those terrorists were brutal in their acts, and according to the Koran, they should be treated the same way they treated others. I applaud Ms. Weaver for her honesty and integrity and I highly recommend this book for all those who want to know about the mentality and the mind of the terrorists.

Mary Anne Weaver's account of life in modern Egypt leaves you wondering if the country will soon succumb to a fundamentalist revolution aka Iran. Interesting that this would be a concern at a time when Iran is trying to moderate the effects of its own revolution. This book is most valuable as a snaphot of Egypt that can be compared to life in the country thirty years ago before Islamic militancy began to take hold. It is also a good overview of political events in the country during the interveaning years. I found it well written and an informative journalistic account.

I came across this by accident during a conversation with an anthropologist friend who travels extensively. He had read it prior to visiting Egypt in 2004 for the first time and found it to be excellent for providing a historical framework.

Like the editorial review warns, the book reads more like a collection of essays. Jumping from time to time and place to place became distracting for me. Still, if I imagined a series of meetings with the author in which she shared stories of her time in Egypt, then presentation was acceptable. Do you remember Sadat's assisination and the pictures of our four presidents at the funeral? Weaver leads from there to a much more complete picture of who Sadat was.

Since beginning to study Islam following Sept 11, I've tried to investigate non-judgementally. This book also attempts to be impartial, but gives little hope that a Muslim Reformation might soon moderate the forces of evil hijacking that faith. Equally discouraging is the corruption and cruelty ascribed to Hosni Mubarek's government.

Weaver wrote the book prior to the atrocity in New York which makes the many references to Bin Laden and the U.S. and Saudi roles in creating him extremely interesting. The unintentional foreshadowing is creepy. Likewise, recent events in Egyptian politics would not suprise the author.

For one seeking a complete understanding about Islam and/or Egypt, this book alone is an excellent start to a collection. I hope to come across a retrospective of the years since publication by Weaver sometime soon to see if she is more or less optimistic about Egypt's prospects.

The best pre 9/11 book written on mind-set, practices, and goals of Islamists. Mary Anne Weaver masterfully interweaves Egyptian history, with interviews between, the Islamists, clerics, university students, government officials, political thinkers, writers, lawyers, and common people. She documents from taped interviews the moral and religious justification for the militant Islamists behavior (e.g., forcing Egyptian Copts to pay Jizyah "tribute", and kill "those who oppose Islam" to plunder their wealth to buy more arms for Jihad). In 1997, this book gave a chilling portent of the global network that was developing and their goals for global Sharia. If you want the true dope from the horse's mouth, this is the book.

About this work, Jonathan Schanzer wrote: Weaver, a staff writer for The New Yorker, has a credibility based on her near-decade in Egypt and her insightful and accurate observations. Weaver's portraits of the players and stories of the events that shaped the Egyptian regime's battle with Islamism are accurate and decidedly well done. Her descriptions of Upper Egyptian towns as bastions of Islamism are convincing. The account of those behind the Sadat assassination, the first World Trade Center terrorist incident, and the Luxor massacre are chilling.

Weaver writes with authority on the history of the Muslim Brethren and Al-Jama`a al-Islamiya. She understands that although seemingly strangled for the time being, the Islamist movement contains an underground movement that is bustling with activity. In other words, what the movement did not accomplish by violence, it continues to accomplish by stealth. As Weaver writes, "Egypt's Islamist militancy has always come in waves, and the decline of one generation has always produced the beginning of a new-and more violent-one." So, it is not a question of whether Islamism will resurface again after years of repression under the Mubarak regime; indeed, it is a question of when. Then, as Weaver puts it, there is "a growing concern that if Egypt `goes Islamic,' so could much of the Arab world."

To its detriment, the author's so persistently having sought out Islamist elements gives her book an air of alarmism. And she deals too much with Usama bin Ladin, neglecting developments in Egypt for sixty pages, or nearly one-fifth of the book. While it is hard to deny his connections to Al-Jama`a al-Islamiya, Weaver writes primarily of its activities outside Egypt.

There is little here for those already knowledgeable abouut the region; however, for those in need of a primer Weaver does an adequate job of portraying the complexities of the multi-layered politics of the region, such as the connections between the U.S., the Afghan rebels and the Egyptian militants. Unfortunately, her account is as much about her relationship to Egypt as it is about the rise of militantism. Her continuous laments over the diminishment of the elitist expat life she had briefly in the 1970's Cairo is insufferable. This tendency, along with her "New Yorkery" prose descriptions(she is a correspondent for the New Yorker) of Cairo's poor areas makes Weaver seem out of touch and parasitic - especially when she is comparing it to her own posh neighborhood and is trying to sound humble. She interviews some wonderful sources, a very nice variety - but here again, it seems that she can't help but sound like she is name dropping when discussing them. Though Weaver has precise control of the many ironies of third world and Middle Eastern politics she seems unaware of the ironic strands of her own situation - that the bygone Cairo she nostatalgically dreams of and the involvement of people like herself in sustaining it was itself a factor in the rise of militant Islam. Having lived in Cairo for much of the 90's, I have unfortunately seen and read too much from those in the media who are out of touch in this way. For a wondeful work on Cairo and Egypt read Max Rodenbeck's new book: Cairo the Victorious.

This is one of the best books I've read about the Middle East. Until I did, I had no idea how significant a figure Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman was. The chapter about the "Afghan Arabs" was superb.

The author's only mistake was not to interview a few of the people who have suffered because of the Islamic Group (like the Copts or perhaps even a survivor of the Luxor Massacre). As a result, she comes off as slightly one-sided.

Still, an excellent book.