The Brotherhood: America's Next Great Enemy (5 page)

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Authors: Erick Stakelbeck

Tags: #Political Science / Political Ideologies / Conservatism & Liberalism

BOOK: The Brotherhood: America's Next Great Enemy
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For the Muslim Brothers, the glorification of holy war and martyrdom found in their official creed is more than just words. For close to a century, the Brotherhood and its affiliates—which include Hamas—have engaged in terrorism and assassinations. Al-Banna’s followers even collaborated with the Nazis in an effort to exterminate the Jews of the Middle East during World War II. A few years later, in 1948, the Brotherhood sent battalions to fight alongside Arab armies in their invasion of Israel.
Today, the Brotherhood refuses to recognize Israel’s right to exist and propagates the kind of outlandish, anti-Jewish conspiracy theories that were commonplace in the infamous Nazi propaganda rag,
Der Sturmer
. It’s no surprise, then, that the Brotherhood spawned one of Israel’s fiercest enemies, the terrorist group Hamas. It is also no surprise that in October 2012, during a visit to an Egyptian mosque, Mohammed Morsi himself took part in prayers that called for Israel’s destruction, mouthing “amen” as a cleric railed: “Oh Allah, absolve us of our sins, strengthen us, and grant us victory over the infidels. Oh Allah, destroy the Jews and their supporters. Oh Allah, disperse them, rend them asunder.”
33
Also in October 2012, Mohammed Badie, the Brotherhood’s Cairo-based Supreme Guide and overall global leader, declared:
The time has come for the Islamic nation to unite around one man for the sake of Jerusalem and Palestine. The Jews have dominated the land, spread corruption on earth, spilled the blood of believers and in their actions profaned holy places, including their own.
Zionists only understand the language of force and will not relent without duress. This will only happen through holy Jihad, high sacrifices and all forms of resistance. The day they realize we will march this path and raise the banner of Jihad for the sake of God, is the day they will relent and stop their tyranny.
34
 
Badie’s jihadist bile isn’t reserved solely for the Jews, mind you. After all, a proper Islamist can’t take a swipe at the Little Satan, Israel, without also hitting the Great Satan for good measure. In an October 2010 speech that amounted to a virtual declaration of war against the United States, Badie railed against “Zionist-American tyranny” and predicted triumphantly that the United States was “heading towards its demise.” Two months later, the so-called Arab Spring began, with the U.S. government enthusiastically backing—you guessed it—none other than Mohammed Badie’s Muslim Brotherhood and its satellites across the Middle East and North Africa.
Understand that Badie’s statements about America and Israel are not the ravings of a low-level, fringe cleric in some back-alley Suez mosque. He and Morsi are arguably the two most influential and powerful Muslim Brothers
in the world
. Their influence may only be topped by that of the movement’s Spiritual Guide, Yusuf al-Qaradawi—the third person in what is essentially an Ikhwan Unholy Trinity.
In 1999, al-Qaradawi, an Egyptian native now based in Qatar, was banned from entering the United States because of his terror ties.
35
Nevertheless, the octogenarian preacher remains the equivalent of a jihadi rock star in the Muslim world. He hosts a top-rated weekly television show, called
Sharia and Life
, on Al-Jazeera television that is seen by tens of millions of Muslims across the Middle East. He also runs a heavily trafficked website called IslamOnline.
Islam may not have the equivalent of a pope, but al-Qaradawi, whom the Anti-Defamation League calls a “Theologian of Terror,”
36
is just about the closest thing to a galvanizing religious authority in the Sunni Muslim world. And he’s Brotherhood, through and through. Indeed, he has been offered the position of MB Supreme Guide (the overall global leadership role Badie currently fills) on at least two occasions, but turned it down because he felt he could have more impact for the movement in other capacities.
37
Given his massive, multi-media global presence, it’s hard to argue with al-Qaradawi’s decision.
“Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi is more than just an ideologue,” Middle East expert Walid Phares told me in a 2012 interview. “He is also a strategist. We’re talking about a Lenin here—a jihadi Lenin who controls the flow of the ideology but also gives the nod with regards to general strategic direction. He’s the mentor today for the Muslim Brotherhood.”
38
Al-Qaradawi has used his position as the Brotherhood’s chief Islamic jurist to sanction suicide bombings against American troops, as well as against Israeli women and children, and to praise Hitler as a divine instrument of Allah who put the Jews “in their place.”
39
Yet in late 2011, reports surfaced that the Obama administration was using him as a key mediator in peace talks with the Taliban.
40
During a 2009 speech on Al-Jazeera, al-Qaradawi openly fantasized about doing some Jew-killing of his own:
I’d like to say that the only thing I hope for is that as my life approaches its end, Allah will give me an opportunity to go to the land of Jihad and resistance, even if in a wheelchair. I will shoot Allah’s enemies, the Jews, and they will throw a bomb at me, and thus, I will seal my life with martyrdom. Praise be to Allah, Lord of the Worlds.
41
 
This is nothing less than incitement to genocide, broadcast far and wide across the Muslim world via satellite. Yet every Muslim Brotherhood–linked figure I’ve interviewed can agree on one thing: they absolutely revere Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi. Indeed, his views on Jews and Israel are par for the course within the Ikhwan movement. The destruction of Israel is a key, foundational principle for the Brotherhood on which the movement will never compromise, no matter how much extortion money the U.S. government coughs up.
Thanks to Mohammed Morsi’s rise, Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel, forged in 1979, will eventually be history. It’s not a matter of if, but when. In their guts, Israeli leaders know this. They also know that what was almost unthinkable as recently as 2010—a military confrontation of some kind with their populous, heavily-armed southern neighbor and historical nemesis—is a distinct possibility sometime in the next few years.
The Muslim Brotherhood’s hatred of the Jews is implacable, and fighting a war against Israel would help Morsi deflect public attention from food shortages, high levels of unemployment, and sectarian strife at home.
A 2012 poll by The Israel Project, a Washington, D.C.–based advocacy group, found that 77 percent of Egyptians agreed that, “The peace treaty with Israel is no longer useful and should be dissolved.”
42
Already, in the wake of Mubarak’s ouster, Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula has become a launching pad for terror attacks and rockets against Israeli soldiers and civilians.
When I arrived in Israel in August 2011 to co-host some of Glenn Beck’s “Restoring Courage” live events, I was greeted with news of one such attack that had occurred only minutes before. Jihadists striking out of Sinai had fired on tour buses near the Israeli resort town of Eilat, killing eight Israeli civilians and wounding several more. Returning fire on the terrorists, Israel Defense Forces unintentionally killed six Egyptian soldiers.
Despite an immediate Israeli apology, Egypt’s Brotherhood pounced, blaming the incident on Israel. One top MB leader hinted at military retaliation for the Egyptian soldiers’ accidental deaths, warning that, “Zionists should realize that Egyptian blood now has a price, and it’s a very high price after the success of our blessed revolution.”
43
A year later, the Brotherhood—always game to market wild anti-Semitic conspiracy theories—publicly accused Israel’s Mossad intelligence service of orchestrating yet another Sinai flare-up that saw jihadists storm an Egyptian police compound and kill sixteen policemen.
44
Yes, the “blessed revolution” has done wonders for Egypt, Sinai in particular. The area has always been a sort of lawless zone where thieves, bandits, smugglers, and traffickers have plied their various illegal trades. Today, however, Sinai is taking on a much more sinister shape. Under Morsi’s stewardship, it has become an Islamic terror base—including for al-Qaeda—and a front in the global jihad on Israel’s southern border.
“What we see [in Sinai] today is a kind of coalition between the Salafis, some of them coming from Yemen, from Saudi Arabia, Palestinians and Bedouins,” Israeli terrorism expert Dr. Ely Karmon told me in late 2012.
45
Incidentally, Israel controlled Sinai from 1967 until it withdrew from the area altogether in 1982 as part of the Camp David Accords. Ah, the endless benefits of “land for peace.”
In the end, Sinai could prove to be the flashpoint that sparks a future war between Egypt and Israel. In that next engagement, whenever it comes (and it’s coming), the Israelis will surely be comforted to know that Egypt’s army will be fighting with high-tech American weaponry. As of this writing, the Obama administration was on schedule to deliver to Egypt in 2013 no less than twenty F-16 fighter jets and two hundred Abrams tanks.
46
The shipments are part of a billion dollar deal struck with the government of Hosni Mubarak—a longtime U.S. ally, remember—in 2010, before the onset of the so-called Arab Spring that brought Morsi to power.
47
Instead of canceling the deal and telling Morsi and the Brotherhood to go pound Sahara sand, the Obama administration is helping to arm an avowed enemy of the United States and Israel.
Mind you, President Obama had already pledged a staggering $1 billion in aid back in May 2011 to support Egypt’s revolution (what’s a record-setting deficit when you can help fund hostile Egyptian Islamists?). A dogged, pro-Obama optimist might point out that this hefty aid package was necessary to ensure that the revolution worked out in America’s best interests and solidified Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel, except the exact opposite has happened on both counts, and in humiliating fashion. So how to explain the Obama administration’s ongoing weapons shipments to the Morsi regime? And what about the reported delivery of 140,000 teargas canisters from the U.S. government to Egypt’s Interior Ministry in April 2013?
48
What kind of message does that send from the Obama administration to the Brotherhood’s secular, domestic opposition—the obvious target of said teargas?
It was the same kind of message Secretary of State John Kerry’s March 2013 announcement—complete with Cairo photo-op alongside Morsi—of an additional $250 million in U.S. aid to Egypt sent to the Brotherhood and the world:
come hell or high water, we’re with the Ikhwan
.
The State Department, by the way, had been pushing to provide hundreds of millions of dollars in additional funds to Morsi’s government but was blocked from doing so by Congress.
49
The F-16s. The Abrams tanks. The teargas. The $250 million. All of it came
after
the Islamist die had already been cast in Egypt. By then, the Obama administration knew full well what it was dealing with in the form of Morsi and the Brotherhood. Video had emerged of Morsi calling Jews “blood-suckers” and “the descendants of apes and pigs,” railing against “American enemies,” and calling for a Muslim boycott of U.S. goods.
50
Any illusion of a moderate Brotherhood should have long since vanished.
So why does the Obama administration continue to embrace and empower the Brothers? As we’ll see, the hard-left, morally relativist ideology of President Obama and his team is certainly one major factor. Another is ignorance about the nature of the enemy. Here’s an analysis from a November 2012 piece in Britain’s
Daily Telegraph
:
Western governments have been pleasantly surprised by what they have seen from the Muslim Brotherhood.... The relationships are not yet deep, but the first impression of many Westerners is that the articulate, suited and often US-educated businessmen they meet are easier to talk to than many expected. This honeymoon has been sweetened by the discovery that the leaders of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood seem largely centre-Right on the economy. While they have a different religious and political worldview, they want Western investment, trade and expertise; they don’t want to become isolated like post-revolution Iran.
51
 

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