A Muslim Convert Once Before

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ   Stephen Schwartz is an author and journalist.  He wrote “The Two Faces of Islam: The House of Sa’ud from Tradition to Terror.”  He is a vociferous critic of Wahhabism.  Stephen Schwartz was Washington bureau chief for the “Jewish Forward” and an editorial writer for the “Voice of America”.  Prior to that. he was an interfaith activist in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo.  His previous books include studies of the Spanish Civil War, the radical culture of California, and the Kosovo War.   The following is the transcript of an interview by Kathryn Jean Lopez, on the 18 th November 2002, and published in “The National Review” as “The Good & the Bad: Stephen Schwartz on Islam and Wahhabism.”   Kathryn Jean Lopez: What is Wahhabism?   Stephen Schwartz: Wahhabism is an extremist, puritanical, and violent movement that emerged, with the pretension of “reforming” Islam, in the central area of Arabia...