Rating: 
Summary: Scandalous, and highly enlightening if not disturbing
Review: I bought this based solely on reading the author's credentials after picking it up in passing when browsing around Barnes&Noble. After several months of passively becoming more aware of the somewhat conflicting accounts of what Islam is, or is not, this book drives home the utter darkness and chaos that is masked by a "faith". Faith in what, I am not clear since if I were to guess at God's intention for mankind, it would not include taking His will into our own hands in acts of violence and hatred for one another. But at any rate, the author's credentials and circumstances present a clear and sober pretext for alarm to anyone outside of Islam who would otherwise view the events of 9/11 and other acts claimed by Islamist "extremists" as anomolies. Unfortunately, they were not. What is labelled in the west as Extremism, it turns out, is really fundamental to Islam; either you are Muslim, or you are an infidel that must be killed in Allah's name.After 3 years now of awareness of Islam on America's minds, and nearly a barrage of talk shows and documentaries on TV that seem to lean toward a dark picture but don't quite dare go there, this book is a confirming suspicion, and is hardly politically correct; but at some point, The Truth is such a burden to bear that even silence and politically correct behavior is an injustice. I would recommend this book to EVERYONE.
Rating:
Summary: This is a must for Christians & Churches to Read!
Review: I found this book to be very clear and easy to read. Dr. Gabriel held my attention throughout the book. It is a book that is hard to put down. The book is a real eye opener as to the real nature of Islam. Christian schools and churches would do well to have it as a reference work. This book should be required reading by every Christian in America.
Rating:
Summary: A Scathing if populist account
Review: This book helps us understand the true meaning of the Koran. it helps us naviagate the essential and mostly disturbing passages of the Koran and what they mean for the west, for Jews and Christians and for minorities in Muslim societies. The author explains in detail how the Koran is a profoundly intolerant and hatefull book that seeks to divide the world into the Islamic world(peace) and the Dar Al Harb(war) portion where Jihad is ever raging against the infidels(us). Its nice that we are taught to view Islam as a "peacefull" religion and encouraged to understand Islamic culture and its architecture and philosophy(oh and how can we forget lovely Islamic poetry). This book points out that not all is cute and loving on the other side of the border, behind the Mosques closed doors. This book explains the passage in the Koran "take not Jews or christians as friends". How the Koran encourages every member to fight at the frontier to become a martyr and take Jihad into the world of Dar al-Hard(where we live). So while today western governemnts in the search for secularism are finding the bible to be a 'hate speech' book then we must focus our attention on intolerant Islam. If you tried to find all the parts of the bible that sopposedly show hate towards Gays then you will find ten times the hate in the Koran, Gabriel shows us that the Koran includes literally hundreds of pages encoruaging the Muslim to murder us(non muslims) and to stone gays and oppress women. How can we tolerate these people and this religion in our midst? If Gabriel is to be understood, then the time is ripe to begin the new Crusade against this viscious insidous religion that enncoruages our death, how can we tolerate a people amonjg us who want everyday to kill us and rape our daughters(which was the fate of the Sihks and Coptic christians and Lebanese and Ethiopian christians and Armenians and Jewish tribes of Saudi and countless other minority groups in Islamic societies.??? An important landmark book.
Rating: 
Summary: Very poor understanding of the Quran
Review: I am surprised how misled the author is about the understanding of the Quran. Every verse in the Quran is explained in the context of the discussion. His statements about Muhammed creating financial empire are baseless, since it is a well-established fact that Muhammed lived a very modest life. How can one deny the countless scientific discoveries of astronomy, microbiology, embryology and geology in the Quran 1400 years ago, which were only proven by science less than 100 years ago? Not a single word has changed in the Quran over 1400 years, as can be shown by carbon dating. Believe it or not?
Rating:
Summary: learn tafsir first.
Review: what is tafsir? tafsir is the art of quranic interpretation. The quran is undoubtedly a unique book with a unique style. It is not written in page order like a normal textbook. The verses of the quran are classified into: abrogated, abrogating, decisive, ambiguous, general, specific, conditional and unconditional. This book like many anti isalmic texts does not give the classification of the verses. This can be very misleading.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent book
Review: After the attack of the World Trade Center, I couldn't imagine why someone would do this terrible thing. Now that I have read Dr. Gabriel's book I now understand why it happened. The book is very well written. Dr. Gabriel has first hand knowledge as he has lived in the Middle East and under Islamic law.
Rating:
Summary: Eye opening
Review: Dr. Gabriel portrays this half autobiographical, half history lesson in an eye-opening logical fashion. Although Dr. Gabriel professes his faith in Christianity (and in fact the publisher is a Christian Organization as well) it takes nothing from the hard fact that Dr. Gabriel delivers. Dr. Gabriel was a devout Muslim educated at Al-Azhar and lived in Egypt much of his life. He even recalls his accomplishment of memorizing the Qur'an by age twelve. His story is nothing less than shocking leaving the reader with a sense naievety of much of Islam's past and present. The author backs his clear point-of-view with scriptures from the Qur'an and other well known academic works authored by specialists in the field. I would definitely recommend having a copy of the Qur'an handy when reading "Islam and Terrorism" so that you may read Dr. Gabriel's accusations in context. While reading passages from the Qur'an pointed out by Dr. Gabriel, be prepared to become completely shocked at many of its mandates. I would definitely advise anyone who does not understand radical Islam to pick up this book. It is a blood-stained history lesson mixed with personal experiences as the author lived it.
Rating: 
Summary: Preaching to the Choir
Review: Having returned from Egypt where books like this are unavailable, I saw this on a shelf at B&N and fascinated by the idea of a Azhari convert to Christianity writing a tell all book about Islam and terrorism. I could tell by the details in the book that this guy was indeed legit. He's not a liar, and he is indeed who he says he is. The book, unfortunately, is a poor guide for thinking about Islam and terrorism. The writers Azhari education reveals little about his knowledge of Islam and much about the sub-par level of education in the Islamic in general even at the levels of high education. I am a Christian who reads Arabic and have dealt extensively with the texts involved. I know that he doesn't fabricate information at any point, but the key is in the presentation. This can be shown in any Jew-bashing portrayal of the genocide-endorsing, mysoginist Old Testament that neglects the jurisprudential and theological matrix within which these verses fit. Muslims will be repulsed by this book and outsiders with malicious intent towards Islam will find plenty of fuel for the fire of their hate.
Rating:
Summary: Hardly an "unbiased view"
Review: For those who wish to learn what the Quran is really all about, I suggest reading it in it's original form, just as I suggest reading the Bible (that too it it's orginal form, or if you don't read the language, then at least the closest form possible (and no, this doesn't mean the King James version, as it had CLEAR bias - especially against women!), the Dead Sea Scrolls, and similar text, to discover what Christianity is all about. If you are looking for the unbiased "truth" in ANY situation, you are most unlikely to find it from someone who did not fit in, was tortured, and so on... It seems to me this book is more about a personal hate for Islam by the author rather than a so-called "unbiased view." Although I am an avid news watcher, I also watch news from all over the world to obtain different viewpoints. I saw this book I believe on C-SPAN, but came away somewhat angry that it was not what it was proposed to be. If you are looking for the bad side of anything, you can find it by someone who was hurt by what they percieved to be the source. That seems to be the case here. One could take the Bible as well and justify all kinds of horrible acts in the "name of God," but that still doesn't make it right! Just the fact that the author went from a radical branch of so-called Islam to Babtism tells me something about the author in and of itself - that he is not in any way a reliable source of information, and is still searching for answers which he simply does not have. To take his experience and explode it to say that all of Islam is a certain way is absolutely ridiculous! If one of my students in comparative religion wrote a paper using this book as an "unbiased source," they'd have a VERY hard time passing my class!
Rating:
Summary: An excellent account from an unbiased source
Review: This book doesn't do the thing that most "middle eastern" book does which is to white wash the ideology that is called Islam and fill the minds of people who don't know Arabic with inaccurate presentations of the 1,400 years old Arabian faith. Arabic is my mother tongue and I come from the Middle East. I was searching for someone who can write about the facts that people wish not to talk about. I am so glad Mr. Gabriel who teached in the most prestigious Islamic university in world managed to provide a critical account of islam. I am also glad because no one can deny what he is saying because he follows the rules and present all his facts and arguments. Please remember that Mr. Gabriel at the beginning didn't leave Islam just to become Christian. But he left it because his mind dared to think about what others do not want to think about.
| 
