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Published Apr 2010
220 pages
Genre: History, Current Affairs and Religion
Publication Information
It created a worldwide furor when Tariq Ramadan was barred from US entry to accept a prestigious appointment at Notre Dame University. After all, as a major profile in The New York Times Magazine observed, Ramadan is one of the Muslim world's most charismatic and influential figures, with a long career at prominent European universities advocating peaceful coexistence with the West.
But in a gripping portrait, Paul Berman - "one of America's leading public intellectuals" (Foreign Affairs) - details Ramadan's disturbing ties to radical Islam, especially through his grandfather, the founder of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, the founding ideology behind al-Qaeda. And Berman notes a troubling tendency among Western liberals - and many Western journalists - to overlook Ramadan's questionable tenets in the rush to embrace a moderate.
By comparing Ramadan's own writing with his coverage in the press, Berman touches on many of today's most important issues - the debate over the veil in French schools, contemporary anti-Semitism, anti-feminism, and the presence of homegrown Islamic fundamentalism in the West - and presents a stunning commentary about the media's inability to detect dangerous ideas in contemporary society.
"Despite the complexity, history and nuance of these subjects, the author probes each issue with elegant, incisive language. A stunning, riveting commentary." - Kirkus Reviews
"An intellectual thriller in the form of a polemic, with Inspector Berman hunting for clues... Maybe Berman's book will start intellectuals talking, and not just about each other. Maybe some of the previously silent will begin to speak out against the death squads rather than snark about their victims and targets." - Ron Rosenbaum, Slate
This information about The Flight of the Intellectuals was first featured
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Paul Berman is the author of A Tale of Two Utopias, Terror and Liberalism, and Power and the Idealists. He writes for The New Republic and The New York Times Magazine.
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