John Esposito, founding director of the Prince Alwaleed Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding and Georgetown based professor of International Affairs and Islamic Studies, is one of the world’s experts on Muslim Studies and Islam. His efforts for increased relations between Christians and Muslims being what he is probably best known for. Of his various works discussing and educating on Islam, his book “Unholy War: Terror in the Name of Islam”, published in 2002 is one that is relevant still 13 years after publication in discussing, from an academic viewpoint, modern terrorism, explaining 9/11 in a broader sense, Jihad, and how resentment of America has slowly built in the Muslim world, and serves as a neutral educated response to the 9/11…show more content… He addresses the rise of Osama bin Laden, calling him a “product of his upbringing and experiences in life, of the religious world he inherited and which he reinvents for his own purposes”(1) and while comparing the violent struggles of Islam, rightfully so, to the violent struggles of other world’s religions, he asks whether they have hijacked Islam or whether they are bringing Islam back to its authentic teachings? Bringing up Ayatollah Khomeini’s call for Islamic revolution and pointing out that most extremist movements, up to that point, had been local or regional, the author dubs Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda as the next step in extremism, or jihad international, making the West a target in war with Islam. (1) Further, the preface discusses the threat that is now facing the world, and brought to American shores, something that is seen as foreign considering the US hasn’t fought a war at home in the 20th century, discusses the 21st century being dominated by Christianity and Islam, and globalization and makes a call for coalitions be built between people and the understanding of Islam rather than a buildup of conflict ending in, what many believe to be inevitable,…show more content… Starting with his father feeling rather passionate about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and hoping to contribute fighters to the cause, Osama would be the only fighter born of the fifty-two children in his family. Explaining his upbringing as the son of a multibillionaire Saudi construction magnate, the shy, serious boy transforms into the face of evil that most know today, and while the author makes this a chronological retelling of sorts, with no effort to paint the head of Al-Qaeda in a sympathetic light, he does seem to humanize him to a degree, explaining how Wahhabi Islam and his education, especially in college, like so many people, helped transform him into the man he would eventually become. The Soviet occupation of Afghanistan is cited as a major turning point in his life, where he was a mujahid. The Iraq invasion of Kuwait is also mentioned as an important conflict which had an impact on bin Laden’s ideology. The chapter continues by discussing bin Laden’s disgust of a Saudi regime, which he considered to be corrupt and un-Islamic, that would restrict his movement prior to him fleeing to Afghanistan and Sudan and would eventually revoke his citizenship and try to freeze his assets, the formation of the Taliban and his support growing, eventually meeting his second in command, the Egyptian surgeon, Ayman al-Zawahiri. Briefly giving a
