The new frontiers of jihad: Radical Islam in Europe [Book review]

Abstract

Alison Pargeter has undertaken a magisterial study of Islamic militancy within the European context. Her thesis is that, in order to comprehend the roots of Islamist radicalism, it is necessary to place Islamism within its proper context of developments within the Islamic world. This well-researched and highly readable book is divided into three broad sections dealing, first, with the impact of religious revivalism across the Middle East in the wake of the 1979 Iranian revolution; then, second, with the outworking of Middle Eastern political dynamics when, having been expelled from their own countries, a variety of nationalist insurgent groups set up bases in Europe. Third, it examines and discusses the nature and motivation of the so-called ‘new breed of radical Islamists’ (p. x). The book thus offers both an historical overview of the emergence and rise of Islamism within Europe and an appropriate contextualizing and critical discussion of this phenomenon.