Vendor
	Liepman Literary Agency Marc Koralnik
Original language
English
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http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catal …

ISLAM AND NAZI GERMANY'S WAR

David Motadel

Drawing on archival research in three continents, David Motadel explains how German officials tried to promote the Third Reich as a patron of Islam.

In the most crucial phase of the Second World War, German troops, fighting in regions as far apart as the Sahara and the Caucasus, confronted the Allies across lands largely populated by Muslims. Nazi officials saw Islam as a powerful force with the same enemies as Germany: the British Empire, the Soviet Union, and the Jews. Islam and Nazi Germany's War is the first comprehensive account of Berlin's remarkably ambitious attempts to build an alliance with the Islamic world. He explores Berlin's policies and propaganda in the Muslim war zones, and the extensive work that authorities undertook for the recruitment, spiritual care, and ideological indoctrination of tens of thousands of Muslim volunteers who fought in the Wehrmacht and the SS. Islam and Nazi Germany's War reveals how German troops on the ground in North Africa, the Balkans, and the Eastern front engaged with diverse Muslim populations, including Muslim Roma and Jewish converts to Islam. Combining measured argument with a masterly handling of detail, it illuminates the profound impact of the Second World War on Muslims around the world and provides a new understanding of the politics of religion in the bloodiest conflict of the twentieth century. David Motadel is Research Fellow in History at Gonville and Caius College, University of Cambridge.

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Book Published 2014-11-01 by Harvard University Press

Comments

Islam and Nazi Germany's War will surely become one of the most important books on international history as well as global intellectual history, demonstrating the sophistication and theoretical rigor of both fields. It not only provides the most comprehensive account of Nazi Germany's engagement with Islam but also fascinating insights into the nature of modern Europe's complex relationship with Muslim societies. It will reorient the way we think about the geopolitics of European Orientalism and will be compulsory reading for everyone interested in debates on Islam and the West.'Cemil Aydin, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

David Motadel presents a deeply researched, finely written, and fascinating account of how the Nazis understood Islam and how they sought to mobilize, manipulate, and utilize it. There is no study quite like it, and it has much to teach not only to students of German history and Islamic studies, but also to those of international relations and geopolitics more broadly.Michael A. Reynolds, Princeton University

An original contribution to the modern history of Islam, David Motadel's book is a powerful and timely reminder of Western colonial efforts to manipulate and mobilize jihadist rhetoric in the service of empire.Robert Crews, Stanford University