| My Year Inside Radical Islam | | Print | |
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Page 2 of 2 Fortunately for Gartenstein-Ross – if unfortunately for the book’s sales prospects – these steps of personal piety were as far as Gartenstein-Ross’ radicalism went. “I was never a card-carrying Al-Qaeda member,” he said in an interview. By the time Pete Seda asked him to pick up an Al Haramain director at the airport – who turned out later to be carrying money for terrorist purposes – Gartenstein-Ross was already estranged from his radical faith, and he declined to pick up the man. Praying for mujahideen, while shocking in the context of Gartenstein-Ross’ life, was almost routine in pre-9/11 Muslim circles; it would have been hard to find a mosque at that time where prayers for mujahideen were not a regular part of Ramadan’s qunoot al-witr prayers. Gartenstein-Ross never approached the premeditated violent radicalism of Gadahn or Walker Lindh. He can offer only so much insight into the paths of the disturbed men who would fight against their own country, or, like the London bombers, end their lives while blowing up the humanity around them. But Gartenstein-Ross’ book, though less sensational than some might like, offers a window into a more commonplace but no less important experience: that of conversion to Islam today. He reveals how ideologically vulnerable a convert can be; in that first flush of excitement and devotion, almost anyone claiming Islamic authority can dramatically imprint the convert’s faith. What, then, does this book say about Muslim leadership in the United States, that an intelligent, well-meaning convert could be led so far astray so quickly? Gartenstein-Ross is amazingly quiet on this issue. He blames no one. He said in an interview his memoir is “a chronicle of errors” – his own. But American Muslims may well ask: Why is it a norm, rather than an exception, that converts are bombarded by conservative messages the moment they walk into a mosque? Of course there is a dividing line, if not always clear, between harmless conservatism and violent radicalism, but the question is nonetheless troubling. While mosques trumpet the number of converts walking through their front doors, they rarely keep tabs on the many leaving through back doors. Progressive young Muslims today have formed social and religious networks that exist almost completely independent of mosques, leaving those institutions to revert to what my friend Salma Kazmi calls “the most conservative common denominator.” And yet where else is a new convert to go in search of the brotherhood and sisterhood they so eagerly seek? Gartenstein-Ross’ book, if anything, should prod progressive-minded Muslims to think twice about abandoning their local mosques. For those concerned with the drama of Islam in America, the end of the book may prove disappointing. Because Gartenstein-Ross converts to Christianity shortly after his departure from the Oregon Islamic center, he removes himself from the Muslim conversion in an important way. The reader is left with many questions: Is there a version of Islam that is intellectually sound, religiously authentic, and able to satisfy that inner desire for clarity? Was Gartenstein-Ross’ initial happiness in the religion sustainable? Gartenstein-Ross does not answer these questions, but his book has opened a door for conversation inside the Muslim communities in America. Hopefully, some of the many Muslims who have dallied with Wahhabism and lived to tell about it will step forward with their stories, as Gartenstein-Ross has been brave enough to do with his own.
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