Jessica Stern

It's been puzzling to me forr a while as to how ISIS appeals to recruits from around the world. How does their brutality, beheadings of foreign nationals, executions of Iraqi soldiers and civilians, fellow Muslims, and the horrific burning alive of a captured Jordanian pilot, etc., translate into something Western muslims, men and women, want to be a part of? How can that be justified to anyone, much less be appealing to others? I couldn't rationalize it at all, try as I might.

I've tried reading other books about ISIS, Al Qaeda, radical jihadists, militant Islam, etc., including Joby Warrick's "Black Flags"; Geert Wilders "Marked for Death: Islam's War Against the West and Me"; Ali Soufan's "The Black Banners"; Glen Beck's "It IS About Islam"; Mark Steyn's "America Alone"; Ayaan Hirsi Ali's "Heretic"; Yaroslav Trofimov's "The Seige of Mecca"; Kenneth Timmerman's "Preachers of Hate"; Bernard Lewis' "The Crisis of Islam"; Brigitte Gabriel's "They Must be Stopped"; Kirk Lippold's "Front Burner"; George Friedman's "America's Secret War"; etc., and they all provided insights, but none truly helped me understand the draw of ISIS to outsiders.

While I expect I'll never fully have my questions answered, this book about ISIS by Jessica Stern and J. M. Berger probably provides the best explanation of how and why ISIS is able to draw people to its ranks. I won't try to paraphrase the author's explanations, because it's complex, broad, and I couldn't do it justice. Other books describe how ISIS was formed, and talk about the significant leaders of ISIS, but this book, while being somewhat dry in parts, still provides the best explanation of how it's able to draw recruits and to expand its influence in Syria, Iraq, and now in other regions as well.
… (mer)

Incredible book. This is a disturbing look inside of an individual that has suffered the unthinkable and lived with it for a lifetime. The violent rape of her and her little sister has haunted Jessica her entire life and left her with questions that she is determined to find out - despite the terror and fear that tries to keep her away. The words contained in this book truly open your eyes to a world that many of us have never experienced or even think about. Pain. Shame. Hurt. Embarrassment. Fear. Terror.
It was particularly interesting to me how she shows time and again how trauma is a chain reaction...how what happens to us as individuals will affect how we behave and treat others - with or without intention. You see this with her interview with her father and also with the stories told about the rapist. You see that the way we are treated - especially as children - mold our lives. Our experiences make us who we are and how we treat others has more effect than we might think.
You find yourself looking into your own mind and questioning your own fears and hang-ups.
A truly eye opening book that should be read by all.… (mer)

She was raped as a young girl but grew up to be a writer and expert on terrorism. She interviewed terrorists in war zones and willingly put herself in dangerous situations. She began to realize that her emotionless reaction to danger and stress and calmness in such situations was unusual. She resisted the idea that she might have PTSD but decided to research her own rape, hoping to interview her rapist. She was able to work with one of the detectives and get records about her case, but it turned out that he was dead. But there had been at least 44 other victims. She made it a project to interview some of them, the rapist's family and people who'd known him, and her family members.

Her father was a Holocaust survivor who had similar reactions to stress, and there had been a lot of secrets and stress in her family. Her mother died when she was very young, of cancer probably caused by radiation treatments her own doctor father gave her for overactive thyroid. But her mother was never spoken of in the family.

She's honest and ruthless about examining her feelings: how one of her PTSD symptoms is the feeling of being hyper aware and in control during dangerous situations, which she likes. The complicated feelings about being a "victim" vs. a "survivor" and her dislike of people who seem to remain in victimhood. Her father dismissed her feelings as "candy-assed" and "navel-gazing" but I found them fascinating.… (mer)