Hizbu'Llah: Politics and Religion [Anglais] [Broché]

Until the emergence of bin Laden's al-Qaeda network, Hizbu'llah was probably the most reviled Islamic organization in the world, blamed for everything from kidnapping Americans in the 1980s to the bombing of the Israeli embassy in Argentina. This, the first book-length treatment of Hizbu'llah, tells a somewhat different story of the radical political party. It is something of an against-all-odds tale: a radical political group comprising a religious minority (Shi'a Muslims) manages to drive an occupying force of overwhelming military superiority (the Israelis) out of southern Lebanon. It's the story you are not likely to hear in the West, and Ghorayeb's analysis of Hizbu'llah's political and religious development, and its current structure, is often fascinating. The book was developed from Ghorayeb's doctoral thesis, and unfortunately, with dry writing and the presumption that the reader has a working knowledge of the contemporary Islamic world, it reads like one. Still, more readers are likely to wade into such daunting prose since September 11, making this an appropriate choice for larger collections. John Green
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Hizbu'llah is the largest and most prominent political party in Lebanon, and one of the most renowned Islamist movements in the world. In this volume, Amal Saad-Ghorayeb examines the organisation's understanding of jihad and how this, together with its belief in martyrdom, brought about the withdrawal of Israeli occupation forces from Lebanese territory in May 2000. Saad-Ghorayeb explores the nature of the party's struggle against the West by studying, among other issues, its views on the use of violence against Westerners. Crucially, she also addresses the question of whether Hizbu'llah depicts this struggle in purely political or civilisational terms. The existential nature of the movement's conflict with Israel is analysed and the Islamic roots of its anti-Judaism is unearthed. The author explores the mechanics and rationale behind the party's integration into the Lebanese political system, and sheds light on how it has reconciled its national idenitity with its solidarity with the Muslim umma.

Amal Saad-Ghorayeb is Assistant Professor at the Lebanese American University. She is currently involved in a three part documentary on Hizbu'llah to be broadcast in the US by NPR, WYNC and BBC radio, amongst others, as part of a series on Living Islam funded by the Ford Foundation and the US National Endowment for the Humanities.