Natana J. DeLong-Bas

Natana J. DeLong-Bas is a scholar and the author of three books on Islam, as well as "numerous book chapters and encyclopedia articles" on the subject of "Saudi Arabia, Wahhabism, Islamic thought and history, Islam and politics, and contemporary jihadism". As of 2014 she was working with working with the King Abdul Aziz Foundation for Research and Archives in Saudi Arabia on publishing parts of the Foundation's "historical manuscript holdings".

DeLong-Bas was born in Pennsylvania to the family of a Christian Lutheran pastor. She graduated from Middlebury College in Vermont, and went on to Georgetown University where she earned both a Master’s degree and a Ph.D. In 2007 she taught at Brandeis University and Boston College She is a former student and co-author of John Esposito.

Views

DeLong-Bas has expressed the view that there is too much negatively towards Wahhabism in the West, and in her writings has argued that Ibn Abd al-Wahhab was "not the godfather of contemporary terrorist movements", but a voice of reform as well as a reflection of mainstream eighteenth-century Islamic thought.

DeLong-Bas believes that extremism in Saudi Arabia "does not stem from" Islam, but from issues such as oppression of the Palestinian people, "Iraq, and the American government's tying [the hands of] the U.N. [and preventing it] from adopting any resolution against Israel, have definitely added to the Muslim youth's state of frustration."

In an December 21, 2006 interview in the London daily Asharq Al-Awsat, DeLong-Bas was quoted as stating that she did "...not find any evidence that would make me agree that Osama bin Laden was behind the Attack on the Twin Towers". A month later in The Justice—the student newspaper of Brandeis University (where she was teaching at the time) -- she disputed the quote, stating: "Of course he did. He's the CEO of Al-Qaeda and the leader of their political agenda. All I claimed was that he didn't have anything to do with the logistics or the planning of the attacks themselves."

Her book Wahhabi Islam: From Revival and Reform to Global Jihad several positive reviews in the press and journals, and was listed by Examiner.com as "one of the best five books of Islam" in 2011. It was also criticized by some, including Khaled Abou El Fadl, Professor of law at UCLA, as well as Professor Michael Sells of the University of Chicago. Neoconservative Sufi author Steven Schwartz questioned her connections with Saudi Arabia, while the Novelist Michael J. Ybarra complained that DeLong-Bas "doesn't say ... where on earth" the tolerant form of Wahhabism described by DeLong-Bas ever existed".

Bibliography

• Wahhabi Islam: From Revival and Reform to Global Jihad (rev. ed., Oxford University Press, 2008)
• Notable Muslims: Muslim Builders of World Civilization and Culture (OneWorld, 2006)
• Women in Muslim Family Law (co-author with John L. Esposito, rev. ed., Syracuse University Press, 2001)

See also

• Wahhabi Islam: From Revival and Reform to Global Jihad