Note: The following is a book review of The 21: A Journey into the Land of Coptic Martyrs by Martin Mosebach. A shorter version was first published by the Middle East Quarterly (Fall 2019, Vol. 26, No. 4). To learn as much as possible of the 21 Coptic Christians martyred for refusing to recant their […]
Piracy and Law in the Ottoman Mediterranean
Piracy and Law in the Ottoman Mediterranean by Joshua M. WhiteStanford: Stanford University Press, 2017. 376 pp. Reviewed by Raymond IbrahimAuthor of Sword and Scimitar Middle East Quarterly, Summer 2019 In the late sixteenth century, the Ottoman Empire and its European opponents increasingly withdrew from the Mediterranean, their primary theater of war, leaving it to privateer […]
Juan Cole’s Imaginary Muhammad
Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires by Juan ColeNew York: Nation Books, 2018. 336 pp. Reviewed by Raymond IbrahimAuthor of Sword and Scimitar Middle East QuarterlySummer 2019 (view PDF) Note: Cole’s ludicrous pro-Islamic revisionist history, which I review below, is representative of the only sort of history that CAIR and its Islamist allies insist […]
Reversing the Roles of Crusade and Jihad
Editor’s note: The following book review by Raymond Ibrahim of William R. Polk’s book, Crusade and Jihad: The Thousand-Year War between the Muslim World and the Global North (Yale University press, Jan. 2018) first appeared in the Christian Research Journal. ——– From beginning to end, Crusade and Jihad: The Thousand-Year War between the Muslim World and the […]
Christian Martyrs under Islam: Religious Violence and the Making of the Muslim World
Christian Martyrs under Islam: Religious Violence and the Making of the Muslim World By Christian C. Sahner Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018. 360 pp. $39.95. Reviewed by Raymond Ibrahim Middle East QuarterlySpring 2019 Sahner, associate professor of Islamic history at Oxford University, informs the reader that Christian Martyrs under Islam“seeks to explain the earliest stages of a […]
Crusade and Jihad
Crusade and Jihad: The Thousand-Year War between the Muslim World and the Global North By William R. PolkNew Haven: Yale University Press, 2018. 550 pp. $37.50 Reviewed by Raymond Ibrahim Middle East QuarterlyWinter 2019 Crusade and Jihad is characteristic of the many misrepresentations of history that emanate from the Middle East studies establishment. Despite the title, the […]
Shariah Law: What Everyone Needs to Know
by John L. Esposito and Natana J. Delong-Bas Reviewed by Raymond Ibrahim Middle East QuarterlyFall 2018 Shariah Law: What Everyone Needs to Know. By John L. Esposito and Natana J. Delong-Bas. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. 352 pp. $74 ($16.95, paper). The overarching theme of Esposito and Delong-Bas’s book is that the sacred law of Islam […]
“Eternal Jihad: Islam Will Never, Ever Stop”
Editor’s note: Andrew E. Harrod, PhD, JD, Esq, recently reviewed my book, Sword and Scimitar on American Thinker. Titled, “Eternal Jihad: Islam Will Never, Ever Stop,” it follows: The “West and Islam have been mortal enemies since the latter’s birth some fourteen centuries ago,” warns Islam scholar Raymond Ibrahim in his recent book Sword and Scimitar: Fourteen Centuries of War between […]
Fr. James V. Schall: Sword and Scimitar Is “a Detailed, Well-Researched” and “Most Welcome” Book
James V. Schall, S.J. — a longtime professor of political philosophy at Georgetown University and author of On Islam — recently reviewed my book, Sword and Scimitar. First published in the Catholic World Report, and titled, “On the Purpose of Islam: A Review of Raymond Ibrahim’s Sword and Scimitar,” it follows: “Unlike most military histories—which no matter how […]
Andrew G. Bostom/PJ Media on “Raymond Ibrahim’s Historical Reconquista”
Editor’s note: Over at PJ Media, Dr. Andrew G. Bostom, author of the indispensable Legacy of Jihad, reviews my book, Sword and Scimitar. Titled, “Ibrahim’s Historical Reconquista: New Book Reveals Christendom’s 1400-Year Struggle Against Jihad,” a portion of the review follows: […] Like John Quincy Adams’ 1830 essay, Raymond Ibrahim’s new Sword and Scimitar should be requisite reading […]