Violence and Islam

Violence and Islam are inseparable from each other in post-9/11 western art and literature, with Islam being portrayed as a religion which preaches hatred, animosity and violence. Adonis’s work Violence and Islam endeavours to discuss the subject of ‘religion and violence’, which for him exists in Islam’s texts and traditions as well as in the culture of Arabs, and this is what has eventually failed the Arab spring and led to the rise of Daesh (ISIS). Adonis is very critical of religion due to its role in curtailing critical thinking and making revolution impossible in the Arab world. The work under review is a conversation between Houria Abdelouahed, a psychoanalyst and Adonis, both of whom have an earnest desire to discover the causes for the rise of Daesh mentality and the failure of any revolution in the Arab and Muslim world. Structurally, the book has no introduction and very few references. The first chapter “A spring without swallows” is a critique of the Arab Spring because the ‘society which is not based on secular principles can’t be revolutionized’ (p. 4) and Adonis finds no change in the status of women, who, for him, are still ‘the prisoners of Shari[ah law’ (p. 5).