Textbooks of Hate

For God or for Fame? The Making of a Teenage Bomber | Culture | Religion Dispatches. Ironically, while Mohamud lamented how unrepresented he was by American Muslims and Somalis, his arrest has become fodder for speculations about what it tells us about the nature of these communities.

Islam and the Lagging Economies of the Arab World : The New Yorker. But, before consigning a fifth of humanity to the dustbin of economic history, one might consider, more broadly, whether it makes sense to place such an emphasis on religion in explaining the underdevelopment of so many Muslim countries. To start with, it’s worth noting—and Kuran and Lewis, to their credit, do note it—that Islam, at least in its original formulation, was far from hostile to business. As the centuries passed, many Muslim regions fell badly behind the West, but the most immediate explanation involves not Islam but…

For Muslim politicians, running for office is the American way – CNN.com. Across the country, dozens of Muslims have actively engaged in the American political process, running for — and winning — elected offices. From a mayor in New Jersey; to state representatives in North Carolina, New Hampshire, Iowa, Maryland and Missouri; to congressmen in Minnesota and Indiana, American politicians from the Muslim faith are increasingly in political positions.