The Wars Within Islam Are Not Over

Earlier this year, the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks produced a flood of commentary, mostly focused on the United States, about the so-called global war on terror and its legacy. And, without a doubt, the two decades that followed 9/11 represent an important chapter in the history of the modern world. But it is a chapter that is not mainly about the United States. Since 1979, an often violent struggle about how to adapt to modernity has convulsed the Islamic world, from West Africa to Southeast Asia, and has engulfed expatriate Muslim communities, especially those in Europe. To see this as a "clash of civilizations" pitting Islam against the West would be a profound misjudgment.