Antoine Sfeir

This volume features more than two thousand entries on the history of Islamism and Islamic countries. It provides a balanced account of events and organizations, as well as philosophers, activists, militants, and other prominent figures, and offers a window into a movement that has irrevocably changed both Muslim and Western societies.The Columbia World Dictionary of Islamism includes entries on the roots of Islamism and jihad in Africa, Afghanistan, Chechnya, Egypt, India, Iran, Iraq, Morocco, the Balkans, and the United States, among many other countries and locations. It profiles such key individuals as Louis Farrakhan; Tariq Ramadan; Algeria's Hassan Hattab, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood; Egypt's Hassan Al-Banna; and the leader of the Afghan Jombesh-i Melli Islami movement, Abdul Rashid Dostum. The dictionary uniquely examines this antimodern incarnation of Islam and its efforts to claim (or reclaim) Muslim society, families, and professional environments. It considers such questions as whether activist Islam is "terrorist" and if it can coexist with Western societies; whether terrorism can be justified by the Quran; and what are the components of an international Islam. Widely celebrated for his scholarship and expertise, Antoine Sfeir remains sensitive to the differences between Islam and Islamism and approaches the ideology from geopolitical, sociological, and historical perspectives.