Salafi Jihad

I've found Marc Sageman's Understanding Terror Networks to be very useful. Recently I've been reading Fawaz A. Gerges The Far Enemy. Its a vert good compliment to Sageman, since they cover the same material, but draw on different sources and vary a bit in their emphasis and interpretation. Sagemen asks, who are the terrorists, and after a history of the Salafi Jihad, considers their background, experiences, education, social class, and other factors which dispell myths about who the terrorists are. Gerges explains that among jihadists, the concern with the far enemy is unusual, and tries to explain why Al Qaeda made this move to internationalize jihad. Sageman discusses this, but not with the depth and sophistication of Gerges. Of course Sageman deals with some things better than Gerges as well.