Common ground may be harder to find, though, when General Islam meets with American officials, including David H. Petraeus, the Central Intelligence Agency director, at a time of American frustration and distrust toward the ISI.
Captain Yee was held in solitary confinement in a South Carolina Navy brig for nearly three months while he was under investigation, permitted only two 15-minute telephone calls a day after a month and, his lawyers said, barred from speaking Arabic to his wife, whom he met while studying Islam in Syria in 1997.
Faith and science, two marvelling perspectives on the world, coexist throughout the book in a fine, delicate balance, as when the two Mr Kumars, one Pi's atheist teacher and the other the baker who introduces him to Islam, meet at the zoo to "take the pulse of the universe" and wonder together, in opposing ways, at the sheer surprisingness of the zebra and its stripes.
"Tunisia is an exception in the Arab Spring and will remain the land where west and east meet democracy and Islam coexist," he replies.
John Walker Lindh, an American who converted to Islam, met Tablighi missionaries in California before joining the Taliban to fight U.S. forces in Afghanistan.
That didn't stop him from traveling tirelessly to promote Islam, meet with world leaders and champion legislation dubbed the Muhammad Ali Boxing Reform Act.
Media reports said Passoni was a convert to Islam, met a man online who persuaded her to marry and travel to Syria with her young child.
A delegation from the international criminal court has been detained by Libyan authorities on their way to meet Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, son of former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
"Before the trip when we thought we might be able to meet Saif al-Islam," Smith said.
One accusation against the South Koreans is that they wanted to meet with converts from Islam.
