The War for Muslim Minds
Three new books help explain the al Qaeda movement, before and after 9/11.
Reviewed by Bruce Hoffman
Sunday, December 18, 2005; Page BW05
THE FAR ENEMY
Why Jihad Went Global
  Propaganda poster found by Navy Seals at an al Qaeda classroom in Afghanistan in 2002 (Fltcombatcamgrupac) Kids' Stuff
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By Fawaz A. Gerges
Cambridge Univ. 345 pp. $27
THE GREAT THEFT
Wrestling Islam From the Extremists
By Khaled Abou El Fadl
HarperSanFrancisco. 308 pp. $21.95
100 MYTHS ABOUT THE MIDDLE EAST
By Fred Halliday
Univ. of California. 269 pp. Paperback, $12.95
"If you know the enemy and know yourself," the Chinese strategist Sun Tzu advised some 2,500 years ago, "you need not fear the results of a hundred battles." The war on terrorism has now lasted longer than America's involvement in World War II, but we still cannot claim to have fulfilled Sun Tzu's timeless admonition.