Now They Call Me Infidel: Why I Renounced Jihad for America, Israel, and the War on Terror

by Nonie Darwish

Book Overview

One woman’s story of why she left the culture of Islamic Jihad to support American liberty and tolerance Why are so many Muslims embracing jihad and cheering for al-Qaeda and Hamas? Why are even the modern, secularized Arab states such as Egypt producing a generation of angry young extremists?Nonie Darwish knows why. When she was eight, her father died while leading Fedayeen raids into Israel. Her family moved from Gaza back to Cairo, where they were...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1595230319
• ISBN13: 9781595230317
• Release Date: November 2006
• Publisher: Sentinel
• Length: 258 Pages
• Weight: 1.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.3" x 9.3"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Great book

I can't praise this book highly enough! It is written in a personal style, so it is very readable - I finished it quite quickly. She relates her life story from living in the Middle East to now, an American citizen. She describes life in aa Muslim state, the pain of polygamy, the repression of women's rights in the Middle East and why "moderate" Muslims do not speak out against radical, violent Islamist leaders. She explains why there is no Palestinian state yet (no, it's not because Israel stole the land) and why there is so much rhetoric toward Israel, why Arab states say one thing to the West and something else to their own people. She also chronicles something of her journey in America and what I particularly loved is that - she LOVES America! & she is grateful to live in a free country. That alone enhanced my pleasure in reading the book. I highly recommend this book.

Essential Reading for an Enlightened World

This is a compelling story of one women's life journey from Gaza as the daughter of a high ranking Egyptian military officer, to Cairo, after his death as a martyr for Islamic jihad. Nonie Darwish tells of her life from the age of eight, through her adolescent years growing up in a Muslim society while attending a Catholic School in Cairo. She covers her childhood in the 50's to the present day in her adopted country the United States of America. She describes how at young age she began questioning what she was told about Israelis and Americans as it conflicted with what she experienced first hand. Ms. Darwish tells about the harsh and hate filled culture that she had grown up in, and how life for women in a Muslim society is isolating, fearful, and constrained. She describes how Muslim society even hurts men as the fear of polygamy prevents the kind of intimacy that husbands and wives enjoy in the West. She is critical of the Muslim practice of blaming everything that is bad on the Israelis and Muslim refusal to take responsibility for their own country. She blames the constant wars brought on by Arabs for the terrible conditions in the Middle East. This is a penetrating look into Muslim Culture that should awaken the West as to Islam's intentions. Ms. Darwish is to be admired for her courage to speak the truth, and for her work to bring understanding of the danger the world faces from Islamic jihad. This is rare and wonderful story of courage, enlightenment, love and determination to work toward understanding and peace in a world filled with misinformation and hate. I highly recommend this book. You will not be able to put it down.

ALL Non Believers in Radical Islam are Infidels

The war currently waged by radical Islam on the rest of the world is very nearly unique in the history of warfare in that the victims of this war are doing their level best to deny the war even exists. In NOW THEY CALL ME INFIDEL, Nonie Darwish explains how the west has decided to play the political ostrich and what can be done to drag those collective heads out of the cultural sand to confront the most ruthless foe of humanism since the demise of Nazism. Darwish wishes to confront not only the Islamic population of the world to convince them that their current approach for world dominion is debasing the very religion that it espouses as the reason for lopping off the heads of nonbelievers on Al-Jazeera. She also wants to shake the political correctness cobwebs out of the naive brains of the political left that insists Islam has every right to use our legal system while at the same time undermining this nation's security. Darwish finds it difficult to comprehend how the west simply refuses to acknowledge a danger that she has seen with crystal clarity since she was eight years old. Her book is her attempt to answer her own question. Darwish's father was a shaheed, or martyr for radical Islam. When he died, his name became hallowed and enshrined in the pantheon of Islamic demi-gods who died while spitting in the face of the demon Jew. But to her, he was simply Daddy and his loss was the first step in her evolution as a rational creature who dared to question the Way of Things. As she grew older, her questioning expanded to encompass the entire spectrum of Islamic givens: the natural inferiority of women, the absolute necessity for the destruction of Israel, the demonization of the Jew, and the inner meaning of Islamic honor. When she was old enough, she managed to emigrate to the United States where, to her horror, she saw the same vile and bile pour forth from the transplanted mosques that she thought she had forever left behind in Egypt. Each time Darwish saw and heard young American-born Moslem women in college wear the hajib and demand that the United States convert to Sharia, she tells them that if they truly get their wish, the first thing that these women will learn is that they will no longer be permitted to attend school. The second is that they will quickly find themselves married off to strangers whom their parents will choose for them. NOW THEY CALL ME INFIDEL is one of several recent books that warn the west that the "moderate" image of Islam as a religion of tolerance seen on the major media and in liberal bastions of higher education like Columbia University is a carefully crafted attempt by Islamic Imams funded by the petrodollars of our "friends" in Saudi Arabia to softpedal the true intent of radical Islam. Darwish has done her very best to counter this propaganda. Now it is time for us to heed her words. PS: As I write this, I hear on Fox News that President Aminidinijab of Iran has called for a conference to que

Deeply Insightful and Painfully Honest

Through her own remarkable life journey Ms.Darwish offers a deeply insightful and commendably honest view of her own culture of origin. Her personal life story opens for the western reader a clear window into the puzzling and little known world of Middle Eastern Arab life and the radical Islam that endangers the world. I salute her bravery in bringing her experience as an Egyptian Moslem into the eye of the American public when such honesty endangers her own life. I hail her rejection of the institutionalized hatred, bigotry and oppression in her culture of origin that is poison to the human soul. I commend her courage in opening our eyes to the fact that the adherants of radical Islam are not a fringe minority in the Middle East, as Americans would very much like to beleive, and to the fact that the seeds of this very same blind hatred are being sown right here on American soil as we sleep. Everyone on my Christmas list will receive a copy of "Now They Call Me Infidel".

Call Her Courageous

"Now They Call Me Infidel - Why I Renounced Jihad for America, Israel and the War on Terror" by Nonie Darwish, A Muslim Shahid's Daughter Nonie Darwish's entrancing and frightening account of her childhood and upbringing in the 50's, 60's and 70's Middle East gives the reader an opportunity to see the build up of jihad and the perpetuation of hatred towards Israel and America at a very personal level. Her status as a Shahid's (Martyr's) daughter and being of the upper class in Egyptian Society allowed her access to the media and therefore information from the outside world that most did not share. Her early years were spent in Gaza where her father was a high ranking member of Nasser's Egyptian Army. She was taught hatred and prejudice towards the Jews and Israel and the passion for jihad as early as elementary school. She was told not to accept candy from strangers on the street because it could be a Jew who wants to poison Arab children. She was told that Jews love to kill Arab children and use their blood in their cookies. Nonie did not buy in to the hate speech and ugliness of the propaganda that is spread throughout Muslim countries. After her father was killed by a package bomb from Israel, her mother, Nonie and four siblings moved to Egypt. She couldn't understand, even at a young age, why President Nasser asked of her and her siblings, "Which of you will kill Jews in retaliation of your father's death?" She did not want to kill Jews. She speaks of Egypt, her country of origin, as being more westernized than other countries in the Middle East. When she was growing up, most women did not wear the veil. There was still polygamy and she had heard tales of female circumcision. But, her mother sent them to private, Christian schools to get the best education and she was able to purchase a car and obtain a driver's license to get them to school. Ms. Darwish's education at the American University of Cairo introduced her to diversity and open discussion. She was amazed that the average Egyptian thought that Egypt had always been Muslim, even when the pyramids were built. They never knew that Israel was inhabited by Jews for centuries before Muhammad was born. The Arab media and Dictators had been lying to their people for generations now. She was able to "escape" to the U.S. where her personality finally found a home. She took several years to raise a family and settle in Los Angeles. Nonie tells of a time she took a visiting family friend to a mosque in her neighborhood. She was embarrassed by the hate speech in the mosques even then. According to Ms. Darwish many Muslims in America do not attend mosques because the local Imams are spreading anti-American propaganda and encourage jihad. She felt the Jihad was coming to America. Most of the Mosques in America are built and supported by Saudi Arabia. When the Jihadists flew into the World Trade Center and into the Pentagon and that field in Pennsylvania Nonie called her