The Muslim Brotherhood

by Alison Pargeter

  27 ‘A Cure for Sick Brothers‘, in Time Magazine, 1 May 1964.

  28 Eddine, Mesirat Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen fi Suria.

  29 ‘Ali al-Bayanouni: The Muslim Brothers in Syria. Part I. Special Visit’, Al-Jazeera, 26 November 2005. Available in Arabic on http://www.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/B990668B-5CA6-4DC9-B16A-6828149AE0EA.htm

  30 Taken from e-mail correspondence with Obeida Nahas in December 2007.

  31 ‘Ali Al-Bayanouni: The Muslim Brothers in Syria. Part I. Special Visit’

  32 Interview with Ali Saddredine Al-Bayanouni, London, 2006.

  33 ‘The Battle within Syria: An Interview with Muslim Brotherhood Leader Ali Al-Bayanouni’, in Terrorism Monitor, Volume 3, No. 16, 11 August 2005.

  34 Interview with Adnan Saad Eddine, Amman, February 2007.

  35 Eddine, Mesirat Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen fi Suria.

  36 Interview with Mohamed Hasnawi, Amman, February 2007.

  37 Eddine, Mesirat Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen fi Suria.

  38 Interview with Mohamed Hasnawi, Amman, February 2007.

  39 Eddine, Mesirat Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen fi Suria.

  40 Barot, Alharakat alislamia alrahna.

  41 Interview with Adnan Saad Eddine, Amman, February 2007.

  42 Interview with Mohamed Hasnawi, Amman, February 2007.

  43 Eddine, Mesirat Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen fi Suria.

  44 Interview with Mohamed Hasnawi, Amman, February 2007.

  45 Eddine, Mesirat Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen fi Suria.

  46 Ibid.

  47 Robert Fisk, Pity the Nation, Oxford, 1990, p. 181.

  48 Abd-Allah, The Islamic Struggle in Syria, p. 117.

  49 Quoted in Batatu, ‘Syria’s Muslim Brethren’.

  50 ‘Ali Al-Bayanouni: The Muslim Brothers in Syria. Part I. Special Visit’, Al-Jazeera, 24 November 2005.

  51 Interview with Obeida Nahas, London, December 2007.

  52 Ibid.

  53 Interview with Mohamed Hasnawi, Amman, February 2007.

  54 Ibid.

  55 Interview with Obeida Nahas, London, December 2007.

  56 Barot, Yathrab al-Jadida, p. 171.

  57 Alasdair Drysdale, ‘The Asad Regime and its Troubles’, in Merip Reports, November/December 1982.

  58 Quoted in http://globaljihad.net/view_page.asp?id=237

  59 ‘The Battle within Syria: An Interview with Muslim Brotherhood Leader Ali Al-Bayanouni’.

  60 ‘Ali Al-Bayanouni: The Muslim Brothers in Syria. Part I. Special Visit’.

  61 Dr Hassan al-Huwaidi, naib al-musrhid al-am yekshif al-mujtamaa: Kusat al-Ikhwan al-muslimeen fi Suria … min an-nasha hata al-manfa.

  62 Interview with Adnan Saad Eddine, Amman, February 2007.

  63 Eddine, Mesirat Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen fi Suria.

  64 Author attempted on several occasions to see a copy of this report but was denied this request.

  65 Eddine, Mesirat Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen fi Suria.

  66 Ibid.

  67 Ibid.

  68 Ibid. In the same book Eddine also claimed that a number of those who perpetuated the violence were from Homs and that they were influenced and financed by another brother who lived in the Gulf who used to send him letters advocating the killing of specific people in Syria and warning him against Adnan Aqla. He claimed too that this same brother used to declare in his writings that jihad is nasty work but in fact he ‘pushed the whole group to their deaths’.

  69 The Political Project for the Future: Syria. A Vision of the Muslim Brotherhood Group in Syria. 425 ah–2004 ad. Copy given to author in 2007.

  70 Ibid.

  71 Ibid.

  72 Ibid.

  73 Ibid.

  74 Ibid.

  75 ‘Syrian Muslim Brotherhood Discusses Call for Leadership Change,’ BBC Monitoring International Reports, 19 August 2005. Available on http://faculty-staff.ou.edu/L/Joshua.M.Landis-1/syriablog/2006/03/Al-Bayanouni-khaddam-link-up-114264946582158617.htm

  76 Michael Jacobson, ‘An Islamist Syria is Not Very Probable’, in The Daily Star (Beirut), 29 April 2005, http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/templateC06.php?CID=823

  77 ‘Muslim Brotherhood Leader Offers Support to Syrian Defector’, Financial Times, 6 January 2006.

  78 Quoted in Gary Gambill, ‘The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood’, in Mideast Mirror, Vol. 1, No. 2, April/May 2006.

  79 Interview with Abdel Khalim Khaddam, Paris, December 2007.

  80 Interview with Obeida Nahas, London, December 2007.

  81 ‘Former Political Enemies Join in Exile to Push for Change in Syrian Leadership’, New York Times, 23 May 2006.

  82 ‘Interview with Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood Leader’, Ikhwanweb, 16 February 2006 http://www.ikhwanweb.com/Article.asp?ID=4799&SectionID=0

  83 Al-Diyar, 4 June 2006.

  84 For the full list of founding members see: http://www.savesyria.org/english/structure.htm

  85 ‘Syrian Muslim Brotherhood Withdraws from Opposition Group’, in Al-Sharq al-Awsat, English edition, 6 April 2009.

  86 Given its inability to champion the Palestinian cause in a way that can match the efforts of the Syrian state, the Syrian Ikhwan has taken to slinging cheap shots at the Ba’athist regime in a bid to inflame sectarian tensions. Following the sensitivities over Shi’ism that have developed across the Arab world in the aftermath of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the Syrian brothers have tried to portray the Alawite regime’s growing closeness to Tehran as proof of its being a puppet in the hands of the Iranian regime. In 2007 al-Bayanouni declared that the Syrian regime had ‘become an instrument in the hand of Iranian politics’. Similarly, Mohamed Tayfour asserted, ‘Syria is being flooded with Shi’ite religious propaganda; secondly, the Iranians are in control of the Syrian economy – so much so that Syrian institutions, government ministries, and industries have all passed into Iranian hands … Syria has fallen under Iranian occupation.’

  87 ‘Syrian Muslim Brotherhood Withdraws from Opposition Group’.

  88 Ibid.

  89 Al-Bayanouni, ‘Syria is Just an Instrument in Iran’s Hand’, on Ikhwanweb, 2 December 2007.

  90 ‘Mistrust of Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood Lingers,’ Reuters, 12 November 2012.

  91 ‘Syrian Muslim Brotherhood: Pledge and Charter on Syria’, available on http://carnegie-mec.org/publications/?fa=48390

  92 Ibid.

  93 ‘Syrian Muslim Brotherhood Leader: Christian or a Woman Can Be President; Alexandretta Is Not Syrian’, Dubai TV. 11 June 2012. Clip available on You Tube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MuhtL6wc3wU

  94 ‘Mistrust of Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood Lingers’, Reuters. 12 November.

  Chapter 3

  1 Interviews with Dr Kamal Helbawy during 2006 and 2007.

  2 Interview with Dr Hassan al-Huwaidi, Amman, February 2007.

  3 ‘Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood leader on relations with regime, Hamas’, on BBC Monitoring Middle East, 14 March 2006.

  4 Interview with Abdul Moneim Aboul Fotouh, Cairo, April 2007.

  5 E-mail correspondence with Youssef Nada, October 2007.

  6 See Patrick Poole, ‘The Muslim Brotherhood Project’, Front Page Magazine, 11 May 2006.

  7 From a report in Khaleej Times, 26 January 1996. Quoted in Strategic Analysis, Vol. 22, No. 8, November 1998

  8 Robert S. Leiken and Steven Brooke, ‘The Moderate Muslim Brotherhood’, Foreign Affairs, March/April 2007.

  9 Xavier Ternisien, Les Frères Musulmans, Paris 2005, p. 127.

  10 Interview with Dr Mohamed Habib, Cairo, May 2007.

  11 Interview with Adnan Saad Eddine, Amman, February 2007.

  12 Interview with Issam al-Attar, Aachen, December 2006.

  13 Interview with Dr Ibeahim Gharaiba, Amman, February 2007.

  14 Hassan al-Turabi, ‘Al-Bud Alami Lil-Haraka Al-Islamia: Al-Tijerba Al-Sudania’ (‘The International Dimension of the Islamic Movement’), in Dr Abdullah Nafisi (ed.), Haraka Alislamia:
Ruiat Mustakablia, Iwarq fi Alnaqd Althati (The Islamic Movement: Future Vision. A Working Paper in Self-Criticism), Kuwait, 1989. Available in Arabic on www.alnefisi.com.

  15 Ibid.

  16 Interview with Ibrahim Ghuraiba, Amman, February 2007.

  17 Interview with Dr Issam al-Attar, Aachen, December 2006.

  18 Adnan Saad Eddine, Mesirat Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen fi Suria (The Journey of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood), private publisher, 1998, p. 18.

  19 Interview with Dr Issam al-Attar, Aachen, December 2006.

  20 Ternisien, Les Frères Musulmans.

  21 Hossam Tammam, Al-Tanzeem Al-Dawli lil Ikhwan: Al-Wa’ad, Wal Misira, Wal Ma’al? (The International Tanzeem: The Promise, the Path and its Future?), 20 September 2004. Available in Arabic on http://www.ahewar.org/debat/show.art.asp?aid=23729

  22 The Ikhwan’s former Supreme Guide, Maimoun Al-Hudaibi, worked as a personal consultant to Prince Nayef Abdul Aziz. King Fahd’s personal physician was also a Muslim Brother. Sayyid Qutb’s brother Mohammed worked as an academic in the Saudi Kingdom and wrote a number of texts for the school curriculum there.

  23 ‘Al-Mushid alam al Ikhwan al-muslimeen: nouayid tershia Mubarak wa atammana al-jillous mahahoo’, (The Supreme Guide of the Muslim Brothers: I Support the Candidacy of Mubarak and I Wish I Could Sit with Him), Akhbar el-Yom, 20 July 2005. http://www.akhbarelyom.org.eg/akhersaa/issues/3691/0501.html

  24 Interview with Dr Alamin Osman, London, 2006.

  25 Interview with Dr Issam al-Attar, Aachen, December 2006.

  26 Interview with Dr Kamal Helbawy, London, May 2005.

  27 Interview with Abu Ala Madhi, Cairo, May 2007.

  28 Interview with Dr Rifat Said, Cairo, May 2007.

  29 Nafisi (ed.), Haraka Alislamia: Ruiat Mustakablia, Iwarq fi Alnaqd Althati

  30 Ibid.

  31 Ibid.

  32 Interview with Ibrahim Ghuraiba, Amman, February 2007.

  33 Interview with Dr Alamin Osman, London, 2006.

  34 Ibid.

  35 Tammam, Al-Tanzeem Al-Dawli lil Ikhwan: Al-Wa’ad, Wal Misira, Wal Ma’al?

  36 Nada has been somewhat of a controversial figure, as whilst he describes himself as the Brotherhood’s Commissioner for International Political Relations, the Ikhwan does not publicly recognise him as such. Following an interview he conducted with the Al-Jazeera channel, the Ikhwan issued a number of statements denying that any such post existed. Egyptian member of the Guidance Office Abdul Moneim Aboul Fotouh is alleged to have said: ‘I appreciate Youssef Nada but there is no administrative post called the Commissioner of International Political Relations.’ (Hossam Tammam, Tahawilat Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimoun (The Transformation of the Muslim Brotherhood), Cairo, 2006, p. 103). Rather his role is informal and his influence appears to arise from his close links to successive Murshids. As he explained, ‘I come with an idea and I consult with the Murshid or the Murshid approaches me to do something for the Brotherhood.’ (Interview with Youssef Nada, Campione, March 2007). Former Deputy to the Murshid Mohamed Habib explains that Nada is entrusted with jobs because of his ‘capacity, contacts and ability’. (Interview with Mohamed Habib, Cairo, April 2007.)

  37 Youssef Nada, interview with Al-Jazeera, ‘Al-Ilakat Al-Dowlia Kama Yaraha Al-Ikhwan’ (‘International Relations as Seen by the Ikhwan’), Episode 1, 2002. Available in Arabic on http://www.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/56CCF13A-B3AB-4398-83E4-1A9C40AB5B42.htm

  38 ‘Cleric Held Shares in Bank with Terror Links’, The Observer, 11 July 2004.

  39 Youssef Nada, interview with Al-Jazeera, Al-Ilakat Al-Dowlia Kama Yaraha Al-Ikhwan.

  40 See, for example, Sylvain Besson, La Conquête de L’Occident: le projet secret des Islamistes, Paris, 2005.

  41 English translation available in Patrick Poole ‘The Muslim Brotherhood Project’, Front Page Magazine, 11 May 2006.

  42 Interview with Youssef Nada, Campione, March 2007.

  43 ‘Awraq Urdania fi Assoulia wa Siasa’ (‘Jordanian Files on Fundamentalism and Politics’), in Al-Sharq al-Awsat, 11 October 2005. Available in Arabic on http://www.aawsat.com/details.asp?issueno=9814&article=327764

  44 Statement of Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen, Majallat Liwa, August 1990.

  45 ‘Ali Al-Bayanouni: Negotiation between the Ikhwan and the Authorities’, interview II, Al-Jazeera, 3 December 2005.

  46 Statement of Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen, Majallat Liwa, 2 August 1990.

  47 Ibid.

  48 Martin Kramer, ‘Islam vs. Democracy, in Commentary, January, 1993. Available on http://www.geocities.com/martinkramerorg/IslamvsDemocracy.htm

  49 Interview with Dr Kamal Helbawy, London, May 2005.

  50 Interview with Adnan Saad Eddine, Amman, February 2007.

  51 Awraq Urdania fi Assoulia wa Siasa.

  52 Statement of Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen, Majallat Liwa, 5 August 1990.

  53 Awraq Urdania fi Assoulia wa Siasa, [see fn 2, p.120].

  54 Statement of Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen, Majallat Liwa, 6 August 1990.

  55 Awraq Urdania fi Assoulia wa Siasa, [see fn 2, p. 120].

  56 Statement of Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen, Majallat Liwa, 15 September 1990.

  57 Ibid.

  58 Ibid.

  59 Letter from Mustafa Mashour to the Kuwaiti people, Majallat Liwar, No. 9, November 1990.

  60 Wendy Kristianasen, ‘Kuwait’s Islamists, Officially Unofficial’, in Le Monde Diplomatique, June 2002.

  61 Awraq Urdania fi Assoulia wa Siasa, [see fn 2, p. 120].

  62 Interview with Dr Kamal Helbawy, London, May 2005. NB Helbawy worked at the Institute of Policy Studies in Islamabad.

  63 Itha’at: Sheikh Saud Al-Nasser Al-Sabah (Spotlight: Sheikh Saud Al-Nasser Al-Sabah), on Al-Arabiya, 5 January 2005. Available in Arabic on http://www.alarabiya.net/programs/2005/01/07/9353.html.

  64 Awraq Urdania fi Assoulia wa Siasa, [see fn 2, p. 120].

  65 Itha’at: Sheikh Saud Al-Nasser Al-Sabah, [see fn 2, p. 123].

  66 Busuleimani and Nahnah were happy to become part of this international movement whilst others within their group rejected the idea of being tied so formally to Cairo. However, it wasn’t long before Nahnah had competition from another well-known Islamist, Abdallah Djaballah, who considered that he should represent the Algerian Ikhwan instead of Nahnah. Djaballah appealed to Cairo to review the situation. However, the international organisation had the final say and gave the leadership position to Nahnah, who promptly gave al-baya to Omar al-Tilimsani. Nahnah then began using the formal slogans of the Ikhwan and called on his followers to give their allegiance to Cairo.

  67 Al-Amoush al-Ikhwan al-Muslimoun bi haja ila perestroika (Al-Amoush: The Muslim Brotherhood are in a need of a perestroika), in Al-Ghad newspaper, 9 July 2007. Available in Arabic on http://www.alghad.jo/?news=186069.

  68 Wendy Kristiansen, ‘A Row in the Family’, in Le Monde Diplomatique, April 2000. Available on http://mondediplo.com/2000/04/03tanzim

  69 The Al-Wasat affair was when a group of Egyptian Ikhwan split from the Brotherhood to form their own political party. See Kristiansen, ‘A Row in the Family’.

  70 Ibid.

  71 Interview with Dr Kamal Helbawy, London, June 2007.

  72 Mohammed Al Shafey, ‘Have the Muslim Brotherhood Gone Global?’, in Asharq Al-Awsat, 12 May 2007.

  73 Interview with Dr Hassan al-Huwaidi, Amman, February 2007.

  74 Interview with Ali Saddredine Bayanouni, London, May 2006.

  75 Ibid.

  76 Interview with Mohamed Habib, Cairo, May 2007.

  77 Al-Amoush al-Ikhwan al-Muslimoun bi haja ila perestroika, [see fn 2, p. 125].

  78 Interview with Fareed Sabri, London, May 2006.

  79 Interview with Mehdi Akef, Cairo, May 2007.

  80 Ibid.

  81 Interview with Fareed Sabri, London, May 2006.

  82 Ibid.

  83 Interview with Mehdi Akef, Cairo, May 2007.

  84 Ibid.

  85 Interview w
ith Mohamed Habib, Cairo, April 2007.

  86 See http://yhoo.it/SgnDQ2 13 July 2012 and also see http://www.aawsat.com/leader.asp?section=3&article=686218&issueno=12281

  87 See for example, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xS36Ueyji_0&feature=relmfu

  Chapter 4

  1 Interview with Dr Kamal Helbawy, London, January 2008.

  2 Lorenzo Vidino has stated, ‘Unlike the larger Islamic community, the Muslim Brotherhood’s ultimate goal may not be simply “to help Muslims be the best citizens they can be”, but rather to extend Islamic law throughout Europe and the United States.’ See Lorenzo Vidino, ‘The Muslim Brotherhood’s Conquest of Europe’, in Middle East Quarterly, Winter 2005. See also Sylvain Besson, La conquête de l’Occident: Le projet secret des Islamistes, Paris, 2005.

  3 The MTI’s agenda was not only to reassert the Islamic and Arab way of life, but it also rejected Tunisia’s Francophile elite, which it condemned for being Westernised.

  4 Gilles Kepel, Les banlieues de l’Islam, Paris, 1991, p. 265.

  5 Ibid. pp. 259–60.

  6 Ibid. p. 272.

  7 Following this letter, and in response to growing sensitivities over the issue, in 1990 Interior Minister Pierre Joxe set up a Conseil de reflexion sur l’Islam de France (CORIF). This was designed as a consultative group that would enable the French state to open channels with representatives of the Muslim community. Although the council achieved little and was soon suspended on account of internal differences, for the UOIF being in this body was crucial, as it had at last given them an opening into the very heart of the French establishment.

  8 Amghar, ‘Les mutations de l’Islamisme en France’.

  9 W. A. R. Shadid and P. S. Van Koningsveld, Political Participation and Identities of Muslims in Non-Muslim States, Leuven, 1996, p. 98.

  10 Ternisien, La France des mosques, p. 191.

  11 Kepel, Allah in the West, p. 199.

  12 Ternisien, La France des mosques, p. 151.

  13 Interview with Mohsen N’Gazou, Marseille, July 2006.

  14 Interview with Bernard Goddard, Paris, June 2006.