ABSTRACT

Political Islam is a transnational movement that cannot be well understood through the terms “extreme, extremist, extremism.” These terms with their negative connotations refer to a delinquent mindset and to behavior diverging from society’s mainstream. Political Islam is today the mainstream opposition in the world of Islam, particularly in the Middle East. Implicitly, the rejected terms imply a value-judgment because of their connotations and they do not reflect the existing political realities.