ABSTRACT
To most in the West, the attacks on the United States by the Islamist militant group al-Qaeda on September 11, 2001 were an enormous shock. Not since the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor had an enemy mounted an attack on US soil. But this enemy was very different: it fought not in the name of a sovereign state that had declared war on the United States, but in the name of (a particular interpretation of ) Islam. The fighters, members of no national army, claimed to fight for Muslims worldwide.
