White House Label of Brotherhood as Non-Violent Patently False
Christian Copts protest the killing of their brethren by Muslim Brotherhood supporters after former President Mohammed Morsi took over office in Egypt. Morsi represented the Brotherhood's "Freedom and Justice" party. (Photo: © Reuters)
The White House statement came in response to a petition with 200,000 signatures citing the Brotherhood’s history of violence and how its preachers, particularly Sayyid Qutb, have bred multitudes of terrorists. Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates recently banned the Brotherhood as a terrorist group.
“We have not seen credible evidence that the Muslim Brotherhood has renounced its decades-long commitment to non-violence,” the White House said.
Yet, on July 8, 2013, the White House Press Secretary Jay Carneysaid, “We also condemn the explicit calls to violence made by the Muslim Brotherhood.”
The Alleged Brotherhood Rejection of Violence
Firstly, the White House and many Western officials are misinterpreting an alleged repudiation of violence by the Muslim Brotherhood after the execution of Brotherhood ideologue Sayyid Qutb in 1966.
The reason for the use of the word “alleged” is because there is no Muslim Brotherhood manifesto of unequivocal non-violence anywhere to be found. For all the talk of this momentous change, the Brotherhood has never produced an authoritative declaration explaining this supposed ideological moderation.
The only cited text is a book with a translated title of “Preachers, Not Judges” or “Missionaries, Not Judges.” Sources differ as to whether it was published in 1969 or 1977, and it is said to have been written by the Muslim Brotherhood’s General Guide, Hasan al-Hudaybi, as he sat in an Egyptian prison.
The book is marked as the “moment” the Brotherhood transformed from a militant group to a non-violent educational group. It is often described as a formal rebuttal to the teachings of Sayyid Qutb.
However, top experts have concluded that the text was not even written by Al-Hudaybi, nor is there any evidence that it was written or endorsed by the Brotherhood.
One such expert is Dr. Barbara Zollner, Director of Islamic Studies at Birbeck College, University of London. Zollner wrote her doctoral thesis on the text; she also wrote a book about Al-Hudaybi.
“Overall, my argument is that Preachers, Not Judges was not written by Hassan al-Hudaybi, and secondly, it is not written as a response to Sayyid Qutb,” she says.
Zollner theorizes that the book is a product of the Egyptian government and Al-Azhar University based on the accounts of Egyptian officials and Brotherhood leaders at the time.
In fact, the book doesn’t even mention Qutb or call on Muslims to discard his preaching. Far from casting Qutb aside, the Brotherhood still exalts him and hasn’t lifted a finger to promote this alleged Al-Hudaybi text. Al-Hudaybi himself never promoted it.
On the contrary. “Qutb’s Signposts remains a standard part of the organization’s introductory membership curriculum … whilePreachers, Not Judges has not been reprinted in Egypt for more than three decades and hasn’t appeared in print anywhere in the Arabic world since 1985,” explains Patrick Poole.
If this book were so seminal, the Brotherhood would at least have translated it into English and disseminated it. But, it has not, even though the Brotherhood has a frequently updated English-language website and Twitter handle.
One thing the book does is to rebut the Muslim doctrine oftakfirism, a practice where Muslims declare another Muslim as an apostate without a trial or proof of treason. As can be seen historically and today, Takfirism leads to Muslim-on-Muslim violence because it enables Muslim extremists to unilaterally judge a co-religionist’s faith and essentially sentence him or her to death.
The Brotherhood and its apologists will counter that this analysis is proof that the Brotherhood proclaims non-violence today.
“The Muslim Brotherhood is committed to peaceful opposition action. It rejects all forms of violence,” it said in September.
The context of this quote is important. It was said by the Foreign Affairs Secretary of the Brotherhood’s political wing in Egypt, the Freedom and Justice Party, about Egypt and only about Egypt.
A “Non-Violent” Group That Supports Violence Outside of Egypt
Western governments fail to understand that this stance is limited only to Egypt and is in accordance with the Brotherhood doctrine of "gradualism;" a pragmatic strategy of incremental change during periods of weakness.
Contrary to the White House’s statement, the Brotherhood does notrule out violence or terrorism entirely. In fact, it actively encourages violence in places outside of Egypt.
Tellingly, the Brotherhood’s Palestinian wing, Hamas, is officially designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization by the United States.
Hamas’ charter states in Part 1, Article 2 that it is “one of the wings of the Muslim Brothers in Palestine. The Muslim Brotherhood Movement is a world organization, the largest Islamic Movement in the modern era.”
In 2006, senior Brotherhood leader Essam El-Erian said, “Hamas is part of the Muslim Brotherhood.”
In 2011, Hamas officially changed its name to include, “a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood—Palestine.” The following year, a videoappeared showing Hamas leaders, including Gaza Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, declaring allegiance to the Brotherhood and specifically to its jihad.
Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood have never denied their affiliation, nor have they ever condemned each other or severed ties. It is an indisputable affiliation. Former Egyptian President Morsi was actually the main liaison between Hamas and the Egyptian Brotherhood before getting into power.
The Muslim Brotherhood overtly endorses the violent destruction of Israel, suicide bombings and terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians. This fact also has never been disputed by the Brotherhood.
These facts not only discredit the White House’s position that the Brotherhood is non-violent, they discredits the White House’s position that the Brotherhood is not a terrorist group.
Brotherhood apologists argue that the group does not provide material support to Hamas. Moreover, ideological support does not qualify one as a terrorist. These arguments are false on two accounts:
Firstly, the Brotherhood and Hamas are one, by their own admissions. This isn’t a discussion about two separate entities. Secondly, material support has occurred.
In November 2008, the U.S. Treasury Department designated a network of charities called the Union of Good because they were “created by Hamas leadership to transfer funds to the terrorist organization.”
The board of directors has dozens of prestigious Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas members. According to the Israeli intelligence officials, the Union of Good is “the umbrella organization for Hamas and Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated Islamic charity funds.”
The Union of Good is led by Sheikh Yousef al-Qaradawi, the Muslim Brotherhood’s extremist spiritual leader. He was twice asked to serve as the Brotherhood’s Supreme Guide, once in 1976 and again in 2004.
Qaradawi said he had to decline because it “might constrain my actions, even if this is the Muslim Brotherhood under whose umbrella I grew and which I so defended." The Brotherhood, in return, hailed him as “one of the Muslim Brotherhood’s spiritual leaders in the world.”
The Muslim Brotherhood’s American branch also materially supported Hamas. The U.S. government successfully prosecuted a Brotherhood front in Texas named the Holy Land Foundation for financing Hamas.
The Justice Department proved that the Holy Land Foundation was an entity of the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee. The leader of the Palestine Committee until 1992, Mousa Abu Marzouk, is now the Deputy Chairman of Hamas’ Political Bureau.
(use link to access the rest): http://www.clarionproject.org/analysis/white-house-label-brotherhood-non-violent-patently-false
INCLUDING:
A “Non-Violent” Group with Declared Violent Intentions
Muslim Brotherhood: “Moderate” Because It Only Supports Al-Qaeda Sometimes
Muslim Brotherhood’s Deception About Violence...
Possible MB Violence Inside Egypt...
Conclusion
The Muslim Brotherhood’s support for violence is a fact that is very easy to establish. There is no nuanced grey area where the White House can defend its statement. It’s patently false.
Either the White House made a conscious decision to deceive the public (even though it knew it’d get caught) or the decision-making process in the federal government is so dysfunctional that policy-makers are left ignorant of basic facts.
Neither scenario paints an encouraging picture. Our top officials are in dire need of briefings about the Muslim Brotherhood and its Islamist ideology and strategies.
Ryan Mauro is ClarionProject.org’s national security analyst, a fellow with Clarion Project and an adjunct professor of homeland security. Mauro is frequently interviewed on top-tier television and radio.
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