Children of Jihad, Jared Cohen
Children of Jihad, Jared Cohen
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Children of Jihad
A Young American’s Travels among the Youth of the Middle East

Author: Jared Cohen

Narrator: Jason Collins

Unabridged: 9 hr 38 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 09/29/2007


Synopsis

Defying foreign government orders and interviewing terrorists face-to-face, a young American tours hostile lands to learn about Middle Eastern youth—and uncovers a subculture that defies every stereotype.Classrooms were never sufficient for Jared Cohen; he wanted to learn about global affairs by witnessing them firsthand. While studying on a Rhodes Scholarship at Oxford, he took a crash course in Arabic, read voraciously on the history and culture of the Middle East, and in 2004 he embarked on the first of a series of incredible journeys to the Middle East. In an effort to try to understand the spread of radical Islamist violence, he focused his research on Muslim youth. The result is Children of Jihad, a portrait of paradox that probes much deeper than any journalist or pundit ever could.Written with candor and featuring dozens of eye-opening anecdotes, Cohen’s account begins in Lebanon, where he interviews Hezbollah members at, of all places, a McDonald’s. In Iran, he defies government threats and sneaks into underground parties, where bootleg liquor, Western music, and the Internet are all easy to access. His risky itinerary also takes him to a Palestinian refugee camp in southern Lebanon, borderlands in Syria, the insurgency hotbed of Mosul, and other frontline locales. At each turn, he observes a culture at an uncanny crossroads: Bedouin shepherds with satellite dishes to provide Western TV shows, young women wearing garish makeup despite religious mandates, teenagers sending secret text messages and arranging illicit trysts. Gripping and daring, Children of Jihad shows us the future through the eyes of those who are shaping it.

About Jared Cohen

Jared Cohen is a New York Times bestselling author of five books, including Accidental Presidents: Eight Men Who Changed America. He has been named to the “Time 100” list, Foreign Policy’s “Top 100 Global Thinkers,” and Fortune’s “40 Under 40.” He is the president of global affairs and cohead of applied innovation at Goldman Sachs, where he joined as a partner and member of the firm’s management committee in 2022.

About Jason Collins

Jason Collins   Over the past twenty-one years, Mr. Collins has been seen on Northwest Stages including The Group Theatre, TAG, Village Theatre, Seattle Shakespeare Company, Seattle Children’s Theatre, A Contemporary Theatre and The Seattle Repertory Theatre. Favorite roles include Seymour in Little Shop Of Horrors, (Village Theatre) and Matt in The Fantasticks, (ACT). Mr. Collins has had the good fortune and distinct pleasure to be involved with two collaborations with Speeltheatre, Holland at the Seattle Children’s Theatre; Nicky Somewhere Else and more recently Glittra’s Mission. Mr. Collins has received three prestigious Footlight Awards for his work as Huck Finn in Big River and Valentine LaMar in Babes In Arms, (both with Village Theatre) and Finn in Into The West (for Seattle Children’s Theatre). In addition to Live Theatre, Mr. Collins can be heard on the original cast recordings of David Austin’s A Christmas Carol and Bucket Of Blood.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Trish on December 08, 2009

Jared Cohen was young when he wrote this, and so can be forgiven some of his more obnoxious asides, but I grew to appreciate his relentless inquisitiveness on political issues, and to appreciate the almost verbatim conversations. Obviously he took the time to make notes shortly after his encounters,......more

Goodreads review by Kyledrahl on April 15, 2010

In Jared Cohen’s “Children of Jihad,” Cohen goes out on an adventure to the Middle East in order to delve into the political and eventually social networks of the region. At the time of writing this book, Jared Cohen had recently graduated from Stanford and Oxford and was trying to find a way to bet......more

Goodreads review by Ray on November 01, 2008

An unusual look at life and young adults in the Middle East, written by a twenty-something year old american Jew. The auther shares his experiences travelling and meeting with students and young Muslim men and women from Lebanon, Iran, Syria, and Iraq in 2004. Your assumption might be that a young A......more

Goodreads review by Robert on January 21, 2015

Fascinating look, good sophistication, credit is due Jared Cohen just for having the guts to go again, and again, and again. He was not to be denied his research. Hear, hear. Well worth the read. In fact, since we as a nation choose to involve ourselves over and over in the Middle East, it would be w......more

Goodreads review by Suri on February 15, 2010

A 'scratch the surface' effort to understand the struggle/conflict. Underneath it all- we all need the same things- a safe place to live, a government that cares about its people, the ability to earn a living, individual freedom... basic human rights... We could try to understand, but the power of th......more


Quotes

“This young gutsy writer knows that the East-West struggle is being fought over the café tables of the Near and Middle East. Do the youth of the Islamic world dream of an engineering degree from Michigan State or a martyr’s death? This young American has had the moxie to sit and listen for hours at those tables. In the words of the poet, Jared Cohen has taken the road ‘less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.’”

Chris Matthews, host of MSNBC’s Hardball and NBC’s The Chris Matthews Show. 

“Cohen’s chronicle is fine fieldwork for students of the Middle East.”

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