The reflections on modern Islam give a chance to remember Ottavia Schmidt di Friedberg and can offer new insight about her work in this field of research. Islam has received recently a new attention in Italy and the debate has been engaging a wider number of scholars. I take this opportunity to compare this new historical perspective with the classical Italian historiography of the colonial period. Following the Second World War, a phase of silence and no debate on Islam has characterized this area of studies. My note concerns the debate on modern Islam in an effort to rereading Italian politics towards Islam in Eritrea, Somalia and Libya. Islam has been an underestimated topic of discussion, if we consider the narrow space it has been given in the international conferences on the Horn of Africa. Only in the last decades a new generation of scholars has emerged, even in Italy, proposing new research topics.