By Eric Vandenbroeck
and co-workers
The Beginning And End Of Al Qaeda
In both Egypt and Jordan,
the Muslim Brotherhood’s participation in electoral politics has not occasioned
any changes in its basic ideology or objectives. The MB remains committed to
the creation of an Islamic state. It should come as no surprise, therefore,
that the Egyptian MB's draft party program calls for a state ruled by sharia.
The novelty of the draft program lies in the way the MB seeks to
institutionalize that rule, namely through the assembly of jurists That
may help explain, incidentally, the Egyptian Brotherhood's professed solidarity
with Iran, which first implemented the concept of rule of the jurists during
its revolution in 1979, in addition to the Brotherhood's identifying with
Iran’s anti-American and anti-Israeli positions. From the MB’s point of view, Islamic
parties like Turkey’s AKP represent an adjustment to new global realities and a
desire to integrate into the global system whereas by contrast, the Iranian
regime, like the MB, rejects the current world order, and seeks to construct an
alternative, Islamic one..
The crisis in which
the MB organizations in both Egypt and Jordan find themselves is very much a
product of the MB being both a dawa movement,
committed to the creation of an Islamic order, and a political actor that is
forced to work within the existing framework of nation states and popular
politics. Despite the ideological incongruities and incoherence that these dual
approaches and roles produce, the MB has shown itself to be unwilling to alter
its basic ideological agenda or to modify its organizational structure. Some
point to a generation gap inside the Brotherhood and presume that a younger
generation is more pragmatic and political and less ideological than the old
guard. They argue that this younger generation will ultimately transform the MB
into a political organization, which will, in turn, moderate the Brotherhood’s
radical ideology. In fact, however, the generation gap does not correspond to
an ideological one. Although they may differ in their choice of tactics, the
“second generation” leaders in Egypt share the ideological commitments of their
elders regarding the Brotherhood's objectives.
Muhammad Abu Rumman, the Jordanian journalist and expert on the Islamist
movements, has suggested that Arab Islamists have tolerated and even justified
the ideological stagnation within their movements by the fact that their
adherents are too preoccupied with state repression to be able to develop and
change. But the Turkish Islamist movement, he remarks, was also besieged and
persecuted for decades, but its leaders nonetheless managed to develop,
innovate and thus lead the movement out of the constraints imposed on it by the
regime.[44] Neither can regime repression explain the modest electoral gains of
the Moroccan Brotherhood’s Justice and Development Party. According to the
Egyptian analyst Khalil Anani, those electoral gains
may indicate that Arab societies as a whole are not deeply convinced of the
effectiveness or desirability of "the Islamic solution” offered by the
Islamists.
The Muslim Brotherhood’s
generation-old project is being blocked, and the movement is being called on to
reexamine its objectives and strategies. So far the Brotherhood has not opted
to make any fundamental change. It survived major crises in the past by being
able to exploit opportunities and turn adversities to its advantage.
The influence of
conservative Islam in Egyptian public life was greatly abetted by the changing
orientation of state elites that began in the 1970's. By using Islam as a basis
of nationalist legitimacy, both Sadat and curent
Egyptian President Mubarak, abandoned the earlier eommitments
to seeular modernity that marked the Nasser era. It
also ereated an opportunity for conservative
activists to promote their vision of Islam in public life.
Following the murder
of President Anwar Sadat by Islamists, and in the early 1990's, the Egyptian
government launched a major offensive against Islamist opposition groups. By
1997, thousands of Islamic activists had been killed, imprisoned or driven
underground. Many had also escaped to join forces with AI-Qaeda in Afghanistan.
The government's tactics during this period were brutal. It made extensive use
of the security services to detain and kill suspected militants, and
relied upon the military court system to prosecute cases. Since then,
President Hosni Mubarak has taken a more moderate line, but Islamic groups have
continued their campaigns sporadically, being responsible for deadly attacks
that have often targeted tourists and resort areas.
The Mubaraf regime also took advantage ofthe state's control of the mass media and the official
religious establishment to discredit the Islamist opposition and to counter
their religious critique. The extreme measures that the regime employed
reflected their belief that the Islamists were an existential threat to their
continued role. Western govemments similarly feared
the repercussions that would attend a 'fundamentalist' takeover, and tumed a blind eye to the human rights abuses and other
'emergency' tactics which the govemment used to win
its war against Islamic extremism.Although the govemment' s offensive succeeded in removing the militants
as an immanent threat, it did little to lessen the
significance of religion in Egyptian public life.On
the contrary, a conservative interpretation of Islam became further entrenched
in Egypt's religious and political institutions during this period. This was
evident in a series of high profile assaults on minority populations and upon
intellectual and artisticfreedoms throughout the
1990's. Apostasy cases were brougt against secular
intellectuals, and books were banned even as the militant threat receced. The government's complicity in these attacks,
moreover, raised questions about the regime's commitment to a pluralist and
tolerant conception of social order. It also generated concern about Egypt's
future. While one would assume that the political victors would be able to
define the new "rules of the game, "in this instance, the Islamist
challenge-even in defeat-was able to reshape the vernacular of political
discourse.( Se Joel Migdal, Strong Societies and Weak States:
State-Society Relations and State Capabilities in the Third W orld, Princeton University Press, 1988).
Why Had This Occurred?
The explanation of
this anomalous dynamic can be found in the centrality of the state in Egyptian
politics, and its reliance upon Islam as a source of ideological legitimacy. A
legacy of the Nasser era, Egypt's centralized state dominates the political and
economic life of the country.
While the current
regime has sought to liberalize the economy, politically it continues to
dominate all facets of public life. Political opposition is tightly controlled,
and the use of extra-legal means to limit dissent is not uncommon.
Similarly, elections
are regularly manipulated, and elements of civil society that engage in
political activism run the risk of arrest and government harassments State
elites have also sought to control ideological dis course through censorship
and. control of the mass media. To this end, the Egyptian government has used
its control over religious institutions at all levels of society to promote
Islam as a means of cultivating political quiescence and obedience to
authority.
State actors in Egypt
appeal to Islam in order to situate their rule within a broader framework of
moral order, and to tie the Egyptian public to its political leaders in a web
of rights and duties defmed by religious obligation.
The significance, and viability, of this approach is based upon the majority
population's continuing identification with, and belief in, Islam. Despite the
perceived 'secular' quality of the Egyptian state and its leaders, it has
never, in fact, broken with its religious moorings, preferring instead a time
honored use of 'official Islam' to sanction political authority. Even during
Gamal Abd' al-Nasser's rule (case study above), the modernizing state never
sought to eradicate religious belief. Rather, the regime appealed to a more
modernist interpretation of Islam in order to challenge traditional elites and
to sanctify its socialist program of development.
The use of Islam for
political ends was even more important for Nasser's successors-Anwar Sadat and
Hosni Mubarek-who lacked bis charisma and the early
optimism of the post-independence era. The policies of the Sadat regime,
however, represented a significant break with his predecessor. Sadat embraced a
more conservative Islam in an effort to redefine the direction of Egyptian
politics. As part of this transformation, Sadat allied with the Muslim
Brotherhood, the Saudi Royal family and other traditional elites in opposition
to bis Communist and Nasserist rivals on the left.
For their part,
during the cold war the Muslim Brotherhood followed the general guidelines of
the Wahabis, but since it was not in control of a government (like it is now to
some degree in Egypt), it developed a different strategy. While the Saudis had
the luxury to use the powers of others, mainly the United States, the Ikhwan
preferred to use the powers of the community they wanted to mobilize. The
group's dense and complex writings over half a century focused on infiltrating
the group's home countries, starting with the Arab and Muslim societies, so
that they could be in full control of their destinies. The Brotherhood was
extremely careful so as not to engage the regimes before reaching full
capability. Their military and subversive doctrine was amazingly fluid and
adaptable to circumstances. Their ideal shortcut was to infiltrate the ranks of
the military and proceed with a coup d'etat against
the government. Their next choice was to "advise" the ruler and
influence him instead. This approach would start from the bottom-up and then
reverse into a top-down mechanism. Hence, the Brotherhood would be interested
in spreading through the elites, converting them patiently into the Salafi
doctrine, and only then enlisting them in the organization. The Muslim
Brotherhood often created front groups, both inside the Arab world and within
emigre communities. Known to be very patient, the members distinguished
themselves in smart deception.
In contrast to recent
more radical organizations such as al Qaeda and its allies, the Brotherhood has
made sure to camouflage its literature.The group
seldom called for a direct confrontation with the ruler (al haakem),
which was a recourse of last resort if he stopped abiding by the rule of Sharia
or if he became obstructionist. The Brotherhood wanted full legitimacy on its
side and projected an image of being the "aggressed," not the
aggressors. Members acted as hardworking militants transforming the society in
which they live into a gruyere. Their ideal plan is to make ideological
reversal impossible. Educational and media institutions are the ideal tools for
their campaigns. Their impact will be felt across the school system and in many
cases within the media web. This trait was omnipresent in the audiotapes I
examined as the government's expert in one particular terror case. The speaker,
a Salafi cleric from Egypt whose words reached as far as Detroit, said clearly:
"We need to preachjihad in schools; the culture
of jihad must become the first nature of our youth."
Indeed, the
Brotherhood's ideology is clear and self-explanatory. The path to power
resembles a pyramid, from the community up to the governing bodies. The
Ikhwan's jihad is more flexible politically than that of the Wahabis, although
they are equivalent ideologically. The Brotherhood has accepted, for example,
the need to participate in the political process, including legislative elections.
Although inconsistent with their Islamic fundamentalist vision, which does not
accept the concepts of republic, democracy, secularism, nonreligious courts,
and so on, the Brotherhood and related organizations practiced the
"political path." In Jordan, the group has an official presence in
parliament. It has accommodated to the political structure in the hope of
achieving further inroads. Will elections eliminate the struggle for the
caliphate? Many westerners thought they would, but they have not understood the
very long-term strategy of the Muslim Brotherhood. In 1991 the Front de Salut Islamique (FSI), an offshoot of the Ikhwan, ran for
election in Algeria and won more than 51 percent of the seats. Many citizens
frustrated with the previous totalitarian government voted for the FSI, despite
the fact that it signaled openly that it would transform the republic into an
"Islamist state" with all that entails: elimination of political
parties that disagree with a new constitution and ultimately elimination of
pluralism and the basic institutions of the republic.9 The Muslim Brotherhood
invented "political jihad," which means using democracy to come to
power so that one can destroy democracy. Most western analyses, particularly
academic research, overlooked this dimension of jihadism. American and European
scholars imagined that any step toward some democratic practices was a slow
concession toward liberalization. The western apologists could not comprehend
the overarching global goals of the modern jihadists; and they made the same
analytical mistake with regard to jihadi violence.
A general tactic in
their speeches are to make a distinction between the violent and the
nonviolent Islamists. But the ten years in Algeria were a hell waged by the
Muslim Brotherhood Salafis against seculars; more than 150,000 were killed for
example. Many scholars in the United States and western Europe seriously
misunderstood the Muslim Brotherhood jihadists. In fact there were and are
distinctions, but these are drawn by the fundamentalists themselves. They can
chose to be violent or nonviolent at their discretion-not at the discretion of
western experts.
Sadat used the
mechanisms of the state-particularly its control over education, media, and the
official religious institutions--to actively promote religion in the public
sphere, also supported Islamic student groups on Egypt's campuses, many of whom
would later form the basis of Egypt's militant groups.
While the current
regime has sought to libera1ize the economy, politically it continues to
dominate all facets of public life. Political opposition is tightly controlled,
and the use of extra-legal means to limit dissent is not uncommon.
Similarly, elections
are regularly manipulated, and elements of civil society that engage in
political activism run the risk of arrest and government harassments. State
elites have also sought to control ideological dis course through censorship
and. control of the mass media. To this end, the Egyptian government has used
its control over religious institutions at all levels of society to promote
Islam as a means of cultivating political quiescence and obedience to
authority.
Thus State actors in Egypt
often appeal to Islam in order to situate their rule within a broader
framework, and to tie the Egyptian public to its political leaders in a web of
rights and duties defined by religious obligation. The significance, and
viability, of this approach is based upon the majority population's continuing
identification with, and belief in, Islam. Despite the perceived 'secular'
quality of the Egyptian state and its leaders, it has never, in fact, broken
with its religious moorings, preferring instead a time honored use of 'official
Islam' to sanction political authority. Even during Gamal Abd' al-Nasser's rule
(case study above), the modernizing state never sought to eradicate religious
belief. Rather, the regime appealed to a more modernist interpretation of Islam
in order to challenge traditional elites and to sanctify its socialist program
of development.The use of Islam for political ends
was even more important for Nasser's successors-Anwar Sadat and Hosni Mubarek-who lacked bis charisma and the early optimism of
the post-independence era.
The policies of the
Sadat regime, however, represented a significant break with his predecessor.
Sadat embraced a more conservative Islam in an effort to redefine the direction
of Egyptian politics. As part of this transformation, Sadat allied with the
Muslim Brotherhood, the Saudi Royal family and other traditional elites in
opposition to bis Communist and Nasserist rivals on the left. He also used the
mechanisms of the state-particularly its control over education, media, and the
official religious institutions—to actively promote religion in the public
sphere. Sadat also supported Islamic student groups on Egypt's campuses, many
of whom wou1d later form the basis of Egypt's militant groups. Sadat' s
inability to rein in the more extreme members of the Islamist movement,
however, and bis ultimate assassination, demonstrated the failure of the regime
to control either the forces or ideas that it bad set in motion. (Nabil
Abdel-Fattah. Veiled Violence: Islamic Fundamentalism in Egyptian Polities in
the 1990’s, Cario, 1994, p. 19).
In fact the
relationship between religion and polities in Egypt
has a long history, though one that is neither as unified nor as unproblematie as many would argue. Religious and political
authorities developed quite distinetly from one
another within Sunni Islam, and generated a system of dual authority replicated
throughout the Islamic world. The two elements of this system tended to
cooperate because they needed each other: political rulers required legitimacy,
while religious leaders needed temporal authorities to uphold Islamic law. The
relationship between these two forms of authority, however, was not an easy
one.
Political leaders
actively sought to control the religious authorities-as well as the actual
doctrine of Sunni Islam-to more ably pursue their temporal ends. They were also
not above using force to attain such compliance.The
ulema, on the other band, struggled to maintain their independence, with many
recognizing the corrupting influence of political power both on themselves and
upon Islamic doctrine. Imam Abu Hamid al-Ghazali summed up his suspicion of
political rulers as such: "Three kinds of relations are possible with
princes, govemors, and oppressors. The tirst and worst is that you visit them. Somewhat better is
the second whereby they visit you; but best of all is the third in which you
keep your distance so that you neither see thein, nor they see you." (See
Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali, Ihya' 'Ulam
al-Din, Book 14: Kitab al-Halala wa al-Haram).
If the pre-modern era
was characterized by a system of dual authority-with each attempting to gain
the upper hand over the other-the early modem era is best characterized by the
emerging dominance of the political. With the French occupation in 1798, Egypt
was opened to the modernizing influences of European political, economic and
ideological thought. Tbe subsequent transformation of
Egypt's social and political life was undertaken in the 19th century by Muhamad
Ali (1805-1863) and, later, by his successor the Khedive Ismail (1863-79). A
key element of their program was the elimination of the previously dominant
Mamluk leadership, as well as the curtailment of the other major center ofpower: the traditional religious elite. Reining in the
ulema entailed, above all, separating them from their source of economic
livelihood [tax farms and 'religiously endowed properties' (awaqaj)],
as weIl as minimizing their control over education
and the law. The first of these two steps were designed to make the ulema dePendent upon the ruler, and paved the way for subsequent
step, the introduction of western-style education and legal codes. (See Nabil
Abdel Fatah, Quran and Sword: Stole-Religion Conflict in Egypt, Cairo, 1998).
In 1882, when Egypt
was on the verge of defaulting on its debt held largely by British investors,
the British took over the country and set up a mechanism for repayment. The
precipitating crisis was the Urabi revolt.
Egypt gained formal
independence from England in 1922, though was effectively controlled by British
influence until 1952. The British rote in Egypt, bowever,
dates back to the end ofthe Napoteonic
era, when they sunk mucb ofthe
Frencb fleet in Alexandria barbor.
Their infIuence was also feit
throughout the 1911. But the corresponding social revolution helped to
establish the dominance of a secular elite in areas traditionally controlled by
religious scholars, and left to the latter only a very limited (and
re-conceived) realm of religion.
The era of Mnhammad Ali, then, was a defining moment in the
modernization of Egypt, and was characterized by the diminished influence of
the ecclesiastic caste within Egyptian politica1 life. This program of secular
modernization was an integral part of the process of state formation, and was
driven by adesire to emulate European development.
The political and
social transformation of this era also set the stage for early nationalist
period, and the liberal experiment of 1922-52. The nationalist revolution of
1919-which led to the formal withdrawal ofBritish
colonial rule in 1922 - and the idea of a state based upon national, not
necessarily religious, loyalties defined the first half of the 20th century.
The constitution adopted in 1923 reflected the intellectuaI
ferment of this time, and embraced liberal secular principles that provided a
basis of common citizenship not premised upon religion. It also placed control
of education, law and justice in the bands of the secular and modernizing
state, a sharp departure from earlier practice.
This period also
marked the emergence of an Islamic reform movement led by Jamal al-Din
al-Afghani (1838-1897), and his disciples, Moh’ad
Abduh (18491905) and Rasbid Rida (1865-1935). A
Persian and thus not Sunni by birth Jamal al-Din sought to respond to European
dominance by reinterpreting Islam for the modem era.
His student Abduh
later served as Mufti of Egypt (Chief Judge of the Sharia Courts), and was a
leading reformer within al-Azhar, the pre-eminent university and mosque complex
in Egypt.
The reformers' approach
was both political as weIl as religious.
Theologically, they sought to reinterpret Islam within a modem context, and to
demonstrate that Islam could viably challenge Western modes of modemization. Underlying this was a recognition of the
importance of science and reason for material progress, and the corresponding
dangers of a religious tradition defmed by
'unquestioning imitation' (taqlid), yet would become a model for Islamic
activists in years to come.
Rashid Rida, Abduh's
disciple, took a more conservative interyretation of
Islamic tradition, despite his embrace of Abduh's general approach. He led what
was known as the Salafiyya movement, which
represented the primary opposition to the secularism of the 1920's and 30's.
Hasan al-Banna, who founded the Muslim Brotherhood in
1928, was deeply influenced by Rida and the Salafiyya
movement. While they both differed with Abduh on some issues, they shared with
the reformist movement an emphasis on religious reinterpretation and political
activism. They also shared a common animosity to Western dominance and
continued influence in Egypt. To this end, the early Islamists believed, as did
the ruling liberal parties, that Egypt was a unique nation-state, and deserved
independence. While all of these groups were committed to an amorphous Egyptian
nationalism, they differed greatly over what this entailed.
While the Muslim
Brotherhood and the Salafiyyas interpreted Egyptian
nationalism in Islamic terms, the liberal parties advocated a more secular and
cosmopolitan conception of the nation. This divide marked the contemporary
origins ofthe debate over Egypt's social order, as
well as the beginnings ofthe 're-traditionalization
of Islam.' (See Denis Sullivan and Sana Abed-Kotob,
Islam in Contemporary Egypt: CMI Society, 1999).
The early success ofliberal nationalism in Egypt, however, was short-lived
due to an absence of consensus about the basis of political life. Though the
liberal nationalists had emerged as politically dominant in the aftermath ofthe 1919 revolt-benefiting from the deep animosity to Britisb rule, and the fear that tbe
Western powers were undermining Islam-their ideas of liberal secularism
remained somewhat alien to the deeply religious population. Moreover, the
inability of the constitutional government to deal with such core issues as
socio-economic development, corruption and continuing British influence,
discredited what little faith there was in the idea of democratic
constitutionalism. Not surprisingly, alternative movements expanded to fiIl the ideological vacuum. These included the right wing
nationalist Misr al-Fatat
(Young Egypt) - modeled on the fascist parties of Italy and Germany - as weIl as the Muslim Brotherhood, and severalleft
wing parties including the Communists and socialists. The communalist
orientation of all these groups reflected the resurgence of such tendencies in
Europe during the same time period (1930's and 40's).
Although the
left-wing communalism of Nasser's Arab socialism and the right wing Islamic
communalism of the Muslim Brotherhood differed over the basis of society, they
shared a common rejection of the individualism inherent within the liberal
democratic idea.
In the post-1952
Egypt context then Gamal Abd al-Nasser and the ‚Free Officers’ then sought to
overthrow was dominated by a landed aristocracy, a corrupt monarch, and
continuing British influence.
The nationalist
movement that had grown up in the inter-war period-and which opposed both the
British and the Monarchy-reflected the diversity of Egyptian society at the
time: the Muslim Brotherhood on the right, the Communists on the left, and the
liberal party in the middle. All of these parties agreed on the twin goals of
economic development and independence from foreign rule, but differed over the
means of achieving them. Many in the military-the only stable institution in
Egyptian society-saw the politicians as unable to accomplish either of these
goals, and, in 1952, a small group of them overthrew the government of King
Farouk and sent him into exile.
The 1952 revolution,
was little more than a coup. (For details see). Nasser and the Free Officers did not lead a mass
movement, nor did they espouse a clear ideology. What did separate them from
their rival claimants was their control of the armed forces. This provided them
the ability to take power, and to institute some degree of order. The failings
of the ancien regime, moreover, and its inability to
improve life for ordinary Egyptians, disposed the population favorably toward
the young officers of modest origins. While there remained skepticism that the
new rulers would be any different from the old, there was some reason for hope.
The dissolution of the monarchy and the departure of British troops in 1954
marked the end of Ottoman and European control of Egyptian politics. As such,
it was "the fust time in over two thousand years . . . [that] Egypt was
ruled by Egyptians." (AI-Sayyid Marsot, A Short
History of Egypt, Cambridge University Press, 1998 )
Egypt's first
President, General Muhammed Naguib, was a leading advocate of the return to
parliamentary mle, but was deposed by Nasser and
placed under hause arrest in 1954. It was only after
the coup, then, that the struggle to define the revolution began in earnest. lnitially, this entailed a concerted effort to expand state
control of Egyptian society, and to restrncture
economic and social relations along socialist and secular lines.It
also entailed a concerted effort to build a populist-and nationalist-basis of
support.
These two features of
the Nasser period would come to define the post-1952 era: the emphasis on a
strong, centra1ized state, and the continuing struggle to cultivate popular
acceptance and support for military rule. We early on when this website started
already mentioned that, many German military officers and Nazi party officials
were granted sanctuary in Middle Eastern countries, most notably Egypt and
Syria, where they helped develop the militaries and intelligences agencies of
those countries.
Nasser and the Free
Officers saw the state as the vehicle for modernizing and transforming Egyptian
society. Basing its policies upon both the Nazi and the Soviet model, the
regime created a one-party state whose influence spread into all areas of
Egyptian life. While there was a split within the ruling elite over whether or
not to return to constitutional rule, this ended with the marginalization of
its advocates and the emerging dominance of Nasser. The core institutions of
the new state, then, remained the armed forces, the newly expanded security
services (the mukhabarat), and the single party. These were initially directed
by the Revolutionary Command Council (RCC), though later came under control ofthe office oftbe president. The
Nasser regime also sought to eliminate its potential rivals by banning tbe political parties that bad been controlled by tbe landed elite and which had dominated Egyptian politics
in the inter-war years. While the Muslim Brotberhood
was allowed to continue its activities in return for its support of the
revolution, this ended in 1954.
Economica1ly, tbe regime promoted major initiatives on land reform and
state-led development. This reflected a commitment to socio-economic reform and
a more equitable distribution of wealth. It was also indicative of Nasser's
political strategy. The land reform, in particular, was intended to dis-empower
traditional elites-both the landowners and religious leaders-who opposed the
regime's policies. It was also designed to generate support among the
peasantry. who were the major beneficiaries of the policy. State-promoted
industrialization was also intended 10 provide jobs 10 urban workers, a major
constituency of the new regime. Moreover. Nasser mobilized these
"subordinate classes against landed elites and private business
elites." (Maye Kassem, Egyptian Politics: The Dynamics of Authoritarian Rufe, 2004, p. 13).
By emphasizing the
class divisions of society. Nasser was able to cultivate popular support for
his policies. and to stigmatize the 'feudal elements' and 'reactionaries' who
opposed the regime. The rapid expansion of the public sector . and the
nationalization of various industries, also created a new class whose interests
were tied closely to those of the state.
These efforts to
centralize political and economic control of the country went hand in hand with
the effort to construct a new basis of state authority. In order to mobilize
popular support, the regime undertook a number of public speaking toms and used
the mass media to communicate directly to the masses, bypassing traditional
political channels. The dissolution of political parties and the subsequent
development of a single mass party was a central part ofthis
strategy. By removing the mechanisms by which alternative political interests
could be organized, the regime was better able to control opposition groups.
It also helped to
exclude supportive interests, such as students and unions, from real power. Aseries" of political organizations were subsequently
created, which included the Liberation Rally (1953), the National Union (1956),
and, finally, the Arab Socialist Union (1962). While the first two parties
floundered, either for organizational reasons or for lack of an agenda, the Arab
Socialist Union proved more effective.
Like we suggested in
the above Case Study P.2, it cannot be said that Islamists promoted a fascist concept
of state. However, especially after the visit by Baldur von Schirach
(as leader of German youth) to the Midlle-East in
1937, paramilitary youth organizations became a popular phenomenon.
These authoritarian structure, fascist slogans, and contacts with Germans and
Italians, and their presence in NSDAP rallies (together with politicians) in
Nuremberg were in fact a source of anxiety for the British and the French.
British government also sent a special commission headed by Earl Peel to
investigate the matter. In its report of 1937, the commission proposed
termination of the mandate and partition of Palestine (one-fifth of the land to
go as a Jewish state, an Arab state in the rest of the country, and minor areas
remaining under British mandate, in addition to Transjordan .
But as Jeffry Bale
recently formulated it for the Encyclopedia of World Fascism, “Nasir's Harakat
al-Dubbat al-Ahrar (Free
Officers' Movement] in Egypt ), is arguably more akin to the pan-European
("Nation Europa") notions promoted by many postwar neofascist
movements. Indeed, neofascist activists in Europe have periodically offered
support, and not only rhetorically, to their comrades." (World Fascism
Vol.1, ed.Blamires/Jackson, 2006, p. 84).
In fact Nasser's
approach to dealing with the Egyptian left also reflected that of the
Islamists, and fluctuated between repression and limited cooperation. After an
initial suppression of the communist party and the labor movement in the early
1950's, aperiod of rehabilition
and collaboration was begun in 1961, reflecting the regime's closer ties to the
Soviet Union. (Hamried Ansari, Egypt, The Stalled
Society, University of New York , 1986, p. 92).
What Nasser sought
from these various mass parties was not a vehicle for participation, but, rather,
a mechanism for building consent. In developing these new political
organizations, Nasser was able to expand the social base of the regime to the
lower classes who bad previously been excluded from politicallife. This marked a new era of politics, defined
by populist appeals and mass mobilization. It also reflected a new social
contract. The peasantry and the working c1asses accepted the authoritarianism
of a new 'military-bureaucratic elite' in exchange for the promise of higher
living standards and economic opportunity. Thus, "by destroying the party
system and replacing parliamentary democracy with the referendum, [Nasser]
brought the Egyptian (and Arab) masses into play [ushering in a new era ofEgyptian politics]." (Ibrahim Ibrahim,
"Religion and Polities under Nasser and Sadat," in Freyer Barbara Stowasser, ed.,
The Islamic Impulse,Washington: Center for
Contemporary Studies, 1987, p. 125).
Arab socialism one
should mention, was not intended to replicate the Soviet system-particularly
its hostility to religion-but, rather, to adapt it to an Arab context. The more
defming feature of Nasser era, though, was Arab
Nationalism, the basis of which was a belief that the Arab peopIes-defined
by language, history and culture-were a 'nation' and ought therefore to be
politically unified. This was an important element in developing an inclusive
Arab identity not based on religious affiliation.
Rather, it was a
secular ideology that embraced Arab Christians as well as Muslims, and placed
each on an equal footing. Plus there was a strong anti-imperialist sentiment to
Arab nationalism, which saw the European powers as a primary obstac1e to Arab
development. Despite a failed political union with Syria (1958-61), and
animosity from the Gulf monarchies, Nasser's continued advocacy of this ideal
emphasized the international focus of the regime and made him a hero among the
Arab masses.
The Suez crisis of
1956, the appeal of third world nationalism, and a failed attempt on Nassser's life all heightened the charismatic quality of
the new leader. The capacity of the state to monitor and control its perceived
enemies also grew in these early years with the expansion of the state security
forces. The adoption of a series of constitutions between 1956 and 1964
continued this trend.
These provided for
a greater concentration of power within the office of the presidency,
and, at least in the 1964 constitution, a new system of security courts to try
political cases. What ultimately emerged was a strong centralized state that
was able to mobilize popular sentiment behind the ideology of Arab nationalism.
As one commentator phrased it, "identification with the people in a
ritualized cult of symbolic relationships went hand in hand with the
development of the control funetion of the nation-sta1e,
the formation of an elite of army officers, and the use of rubber stamp
organizations and assemblies." (Michael Gilsenan,
''Popular Islam and the State in Contemporary Egypt," in Fred Halliday and
Hamza Alavi, eds., State and ldeology
in the Middle East and Pakistan, p. 171).
The primary
ideological challenge to the Nasser regime throughout its tenure however,
remained three residual elements ofthe old order: (1)
the loyalties ofthe establishment ulema (religious
scholars) to the landowning c1ass, (2) the popularity of the Muslim
Brotherhood, and (3) the grip of traditional Islam on the population.
Thus Nasser,
undertook a well-publicized pilgrimage (Haj) to Mecca in 1954, fulfilling one
of the primary commandments of Islam. Similarly, the government sought to gain
greater control over the mosques throughout the country (both public and
private) by placing them under the direct supervision of the Ministry of
Religious Endowments. Thus between 1952 and 1962, the govemment
built or helped fund upwards of 1500 mosques, and virtually doubled the personnellevels in government mosques. (Anwar Alam, Religion and State: Egypt, Iran and Saudi Arabia,
Delhi, 1998, p. 87).
But while the
previously mentioned ‚Muslim Brotherhood’ was initially supportive of the
Free Officers, their relationship was a complicated one. It had long standing
ties with many of the Free Officers, including relations with both Nasser and
Sadat who some believe had previously been members.( Hamid Ansari, Egypt, The
Stalled Society, American University in Cairo Press, 1986, p. 82).
Moreover, its initial
support of the revolution was important for the Free Officers in both
challenging the secular Wafd party and in providing a
religious sanction for the mili.tarY takeover (what
the Brotherhood referred to originally as the "Blessed Movement''). The
Brotherhood had been a major force in Egyptian politics throughout the 1930's
and 40's, and, despite repression under the old regime, it retained an
extensive grass roots network as well as a militant wing and
long-standing opposition to the Monarchy and the British also gave the
organization a great deal of legitimacy, which the Free Officers initially
sought to co-opt.(See Barry Rubin, Islamic Fundamentalism in Egyptian Politics,
1990).
Relations between the
two groups, however, broke down fairly quickly. This was due, to the fact
that the Brotherhood had hoped that their support for the new government would
translate into a genuine power sharing arrangement. This, however, did not materialize,
and instead a competition between both the Brotherhood and the Free Officers
over the same constituency (urban laborers, rural peasaIits
and the lower middle classes) ensuid.
The question of power
sharing was complicated by the fact that there were sharp divisions between the
Free Officers and the Brotherhood over Egypt's future. While the Free Officers,
and Nasser in particular, sought to modernize Egypt along secular and socialist
lines, the Brotherhood advocated a more central role of religion in public
life-defmed as areturn to
tradition-as apre-requisite for aresurgent
Egypt. In essence, the divide hinged upon the compatibility of Islam with the
secular mission of the modemizing state. While
members of the Muslim Brotherhood argued for a religious state as apre-requisite for an Islamic community, many of the Free
Officers did not believe that such an alternative was either necessary or
beneficial.
The debate over these
competing visions was reflected in two books that were published during this,period. The first of these was Khalid Muhammad
Khalid's Min Huna Nabda (From Here We Start,
published in 1950). It echoed that true Islam has little to say about the
nature of political or social order, and thus the type of State structure to
be adopted was entirely open. According to this interpretation, there was
nothing inconsistent between. Islam and a secular state, as long as certain
minimal prohibitions were upheld. Moreover, secularism would in fact be
preferable given the danger of linking religious and politica1 power too
closely. As Khalid argued in the book, a religious state would binder Egypt's
development since the unification of religious and politica1 authority would be
corrupting on both sides, and would more likely undermine the development of liberty
and justice than create it. What was truly needed, he argued, was a social
revolution, an alternative that would be hindered by a ''priesthood" that
"colluded with tyrants," and-in their pursuit of power-used religion
to "keep the people poor and ignorant."(Albert Hourani, Arabie Thoughl in the Liberal
Age: 1798-1938, Cambridge University Press, 1991, p. 353). The above debate is
also discussed in Nadav Saftan, Egypt in Seareh of Politieal Community: An
Analysis of The intelleetual anti Politieal
Evolution ofEgypt 1804-1952 (Boston: Harvard
University Press, 1961). See also Mullaney, The Role of Islam in the Hegemonie Strateg)' of Egypt's
Military Ru/ers, p. 160-1. For more background on
both Kalid and Abd al-Raziq
see also Leonard Binder, Islamic Liberalism: A Critique ofDevelopment
ldeologies (Chicago: University ofChicago
Press, 1988).
Shaykh Muhammad al-Ghazzali represented the Muslim Brotherhood's position in
this debate, and articulated it in a text written to rebut Khalid's book
entitled Min Huna Na'lam (Dur Beginning in Wisdom),
though more literally From Here We Learn, published in 1950. It argued that
Islam is a "comprehensive program" meant to regulate all facets ofhuman existence, not least ofwbich
the politica1 and social. To preclude Islam from a central role in goveming the state would, therefore, be a violation ofGod's revelation. In terms of the structure of an Islamic
state he was somewhat vague; al-Ghazali simply argued that ''the duties
of the state are clearly and precisely outlined in the Qur'an and the Sunna
(tradition)...'' (Saftan, Egypt in Search ofPolitical Community, p. 235).
The need for an
Islamic state, he argued, nonetheless remained c1ear. The retum
to Islam was a pre-requisite for a revived Muslim community, and this was all
the more important given the imminent threat to Islam posed by a 'hostile,
Christian West.'
In making his
arguments, al-Ghazzali appealed to the communal
sentiments of a religious population and called upon them to defend their
tradition. Not only was Islam ''threatened with extermination ''-- but those
such as Khalid who argued for a secular political authority were betraying
their faith and were, in bis words, "puppets of the enemies of
Islam." And those such as Khalid who argued for a secular political
authority were betraying their faith and were, in bis words, "puppets of
the enemies of Islam." (Cited in Saftan, Egypt
in Search of Political Community, pp. 236-37).
This conflict between
the Brotherhood and the Free Officers came to a head in 1954. The Brotherhood
bad been deeply divided over how to deal with Nasser' s intransigence on their
core issues of creating an Islamic state and sharing power. One faction, which
included Hasan al-Banna's successor, Hasan al-Hodeibi, sought to work with Nasser and "persuade
[him] to turn toward Islam." Another faction, led by Sayyid Qutb, pressed for a more forceful confrontatiOIi
that would entail Nasser's overthrow. Hodeibi was
arrested in the Fall of 1954, and shortly afterwards an assassination attempt
was made on Nasser's life, reputedly by a member of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Seven thousand members of the Brotherhood were subsequently arrested in a
concerted effort to eradicate their influence within the military, the police
and other areas of Egyptian society. A military tribunal subsequently convicted
800 members of the Brotherhood on charges of conspiring to overthrow the state,
and six of its leaders were executed.
The above
situations are discussed in Nadav Saftan,
Egypt in Seareh of Politieal
Community: An Analysis of The intelleetual anti Politieal Evolution of Egypt 1804-1952 (Boston: Harvard
University Press, 1961); Mullaney, The Role of Islam in the Hegemonie
Strateg)' of Egypt's Military Rulers, p. 160-1. For
more background on both Kalid and Abd al-Raziq see also Leonard Binder, Islamic Liberalism: A
Critique of Development ldeologies (University of
Chicago Press, 1988).
The detining issue was whether or not Islam is compatible with
secular principles, and whether the Egyptian state ought to be more explicitly
Islamic. But as in other places, these debates also have been influenced
by the struggle for political power.
But as the political
violence of the 1990' s escaIated-and the structuraI crises that facilitated this violence
worsened-the now, Mubarek regime became more
dependent upon a discourse of conservative Islam to sanction its continued
rule. This increased the government's reliance upon the official ulema
(religious scholars) of Al-Azhar (a mosque university complex headed by the
Sheikh of Al-Azhar).' the Dar al-Ifta (House of
Fatwas, headed by the Grand Mufti) and other elements of the official religious
establishment.
While the official
ulema may have opposed the militants' use of violence, they generally shared
the vision of society advocated by the Islamist movement. What subsequently
emerged in the earIy to mid-1990's, then, was adynamie whereby the struggle for political power between
the Islamist opposition groups and the ruling government was not defmed by competing visions of social order, but, rather,
by competing claims of religious authenticity. As a result, the regime ceded
much of the cultural and religious ground to the Islamist tendencies in an
effort to depict itself as the authentie defender of
Islam.
It also helped to ereate an environment where the persecution of religious
minorities (particularly Coptic Christians) and attacks upon secular
intellectuals occurred without official opposition, and often with its
complicity. Thus, even though the state was able to defeat the militants in the
field, its embrace of conservative Islam validated the Islamist critique and
helped to transform Egyptian publie life. The end
result was that the government's own efforts to co-opt conservative Islam
greatly undermined the development of an inclusive basis of national identity,
and the corresponding "rights [to] participation and equal eitizenship. (See Tamir Moustafa,
"Conflict and Cooperation between the State and Religious Institutions in
Contemporary Egypt," International Journal of Middle East Studies,
32, Feb. 2000).
Nasser earlier
however had already abolished the sharia courts which had operated as a
parallel court system since the 19th century, and merged them into the national
judiciary. While the stated goal was to unify a fragmented judiciary, it had
the effect ofbringing this alternate court system
under the direct control of the state. In 1961 also, Nasser passed a law
that re-organized AI-Azhar university, and
placed it under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Religious Endowments.This entailed the introduction or the first
time, of modem courses of learning into the university's curriculum, including
medicine and engineering. (Malika Zeghal,
"Religion and Politics in Egypt: The Ulama of aI-Azhar,
Radical Islam, and the State 1952-54," International Journal ofMiddle East Studies. 31, No. 3,August 1999, p. 314).
Previously, the court
and educational systems in Egypt had been divided between the private, Islamic
and national systems. Both the reform of the sharia courts and of AI-Azhar were designed to end this separation, and unify both
systems under the control of the state. (For more on this, see Jakob Skovgaaard-Peterson, Defining lslam
for the Egyptian State: Muftis and Fatwas ofthe Dar
al-Ifta, 1991, p. 184).
Nevertheless, while
the Nasserist state was defined by a program of modernization-and derived
much of its authority from the idea of Arab nationalism-it found ample
justification for its mission in the fatwas (religious rulings) of the
religious establishment. The regime also established the Supreme Council on
Islamic affairs whose primary purpose was to demonstrate a connection between
the state and Islam. (Moustafa, Conflict and
Cooperation between the State and Religions Institutions in Contmporary
Egypt, p. 7).
Not surprising, Saudi
Arabia innitially was deeply troubled by, the
populist rhetoric and policies of the Egyptian regime. Nasser, on the other
hand, perceived Saudi Arabia as a bastion of conservative reaction actively
working against his interests. Both the Saudis and the Egyptians subsequently
sought to offset the other's influence in the region by setting up competing
Islamic institutions to promote their respective agendas. The culmination of
this, was the outbreak of war with Yemen in 1962. (See Malcolm Kerr, The Arab
Cold War: Gamal Abd Al-Nosir and His Rivals.
1958-1970, Oxford University Press, 1971).
Not unlike the Nazi’s
before (or at least in contrast to the the Soviet system),
Nasser believed that creating a state-controlled monopoly on religion would be
useful in supporting his regime against both internal and external enemies.
Moreover, the strength and popularity of Islam throughout Egypt precluded the Nasserists from attempting to suppress it in the way that
Ataturk had done in Turkey thirty years before.
Cultivating a
modernist Islam, while suppressing the more radical interpretations, was thus
an essential element of Nasser's mass politics. Far from being hostile to
religion, Islam became integrated into the state apparatus in order to provide
it with ideological support."Islam became, in
effect, a creature of the regime. "(Katerina Dalacoura,
Islam, liberalism and human rights, 1998, p. 119).Thus although channeled
and controlled by the state, the use of religion within a nationalist discourse
remained a key link between the modemizing state and
its traditional population.
This however
came to an end with Egypt's defeat by Israel in the six day war of June
1967. As Fouad Ajami notes, among those who wanted to
get to the deep structure behind the defeat there was a consensus that the
heroes of yesterday had made too many compromises, "The Arabs had tumed away from God, and God bad turned away from
them." (Ajami, The Arab Predicament: Arab
Political Thought and Practice Since 1967, Cambridge University Press 1992, p.
74).
Then Nasser died in
September, 1970, and was succeeded by his vice President Anwar Sadat. Sadat's
efforts were encouraged by members of the military and by influential people
within the state ministries, all of whom shared a common distrust and antipathy
for the Socialist party. The conflict between the two came to a head in May of
1971, when Socialist supporters were accused of conspiring to overthrow the govemment. This led to the arrest of ninety members of the
Socialist party, and their removal from positions in the govemment.
In the aftermath, Sadat undertook a major restructuring of the state that
eliminated the 'alternate power centers.' This series of events came to be
known as the 'Corrective Revolution.'
While the basic
contours of the system remained the same-in terms of the centrality of a strong
state, and the cultivation of a populist nationalism a socialist but also the
secular vision of development, were abandoned.
Sadat's new direction
also included a new set of alliances with economic and religious elites as a
bulwark against the left, and a rapprochement with Saudi Arabia. And although
also Nasser had used religion to provide legitimacy to his rule, Sadat embraced
Islam with much greater fervor. His main concern was to provide a counterweight
to the socialist ideas that continued to dominate Egyptian public life. In his
speeches, Sadat emphasized (and often conflated) the ideas of religious
morality and Egyptian nationalism in order to reinforce traditional patterns of
authority and social order. For example he told the National Assembly; '' I
want us to return to the village source, to our origin. .. I want tbe constitution to take this into account, not only for
the sake orthe villages. but so that the whole of
Egypt should take shape in the way and become a single village. " Aulas,
"State and Ideology in Republican Egypt: 1952, p. 82).
Sadat's
alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood thus was part of an effort to provide a
grass roots basis to his rule, and to help him contain the left. According to
several reports, the Brotherhood agreed to renounce the use of violence and
promised not to engage in anti-regime activities in exchange for their fteedom and the right to continue their peaceful advocacy
of Islam. (See AIi Eshmawy,
The Secret History ofthe Muslim Brotherhood Movement,
Cairo, 1993).
Leaders of the
Brotherhood were also involved in drafting sections of the 1971 constitution,
and were allowed to participate in parliamentary elections, although not as a
registered party. During the period of Sadat's rule, the number of government
controlled mosques more than doubled from 3000 to 7,000, while the total
number of mosques grew from roughly 15,000 mosques in the mid-1960's to 27,000
mosques in 1980. (See Carrie Rosefsky Wickharn, Mobilizing Islam: Religion, Activism and Politica/ Change in Egypt, Columbia University Press,
2003).
Mohamed Heikal in addition reported that ,"Knowing they had
the support of higher [government] authority, Islamic students began to
behave as if it was they who were running the universities. They decided what
subjects were suitable to be taught, [Moreover] it was clear that the religious
students were not simply tolerated by the authorities but actively encouraged
by them." (Heika, Autumn of Fury: The Assassination of Sadat , London,
1983, pp. 133-4).
The extent of the
government's support however, remains a point of dispute. Muslim Brothers deny
any overt support from the government, and leftist activists, recall that the
security services actively supported the election of Islamic candidates to
student union offices. There were also claims that security forces used to arm
Islamists, and that the number of [Islamist] groups mushroomed runder the umbrella of state security (see Heikal, Atumn of Fury, on these
issues).
Save is to say that historicly during periods of good relations with Soviets,
the Leftists were treated better, while during periods of Saudi influence, the
Islamists were treated better. The repression which each leader visited on
these groups was often a signal that their external relations were in trouble.
Also, the liberalization of economic policies certainly allowed for a greater
flow of funds from abroad, many of which benefited from the oil boom, and
helped finance the Muslim Brotherhood during the earIy
1970's.The adoption of a new Constitution in 1971 was similarly meant to
reflect a greater role of Islam in Egyptian politics. It designated Islam
the official state religion, and the Sharia as "a principle source of
legislation."
But while the Muslim
Brotherhood and the Islamic student groups were initially supportive of Sadat,
these organizations proved to be unreliable allies. Particularly the
Brotherhood was rebuilding its network and relied upon the goodwill of
the regime to continue its work. (See also Patrick Gaffuey,
The Prophet's Pulpit: lslamic Preaching in
Contemporary Egypt, 1994).
The deference to the
government ended with Sadat's trip to Israel, and Sadat's relations with
the United States. The regime's reluctance to completely implement Islamic law
remained another point of contention. The subsequent re-emergence of Islamic
violence indicated that the state had set in motion something that it was not
able to control.
While the ruling
party-the National Democratie Party-advocates a
modernist ideology of development, both the Mubarak and Sadat regimes
consistently sought to situate their authority within a framework linked to Islamie tradition. More importantly, the active promotion
of Islam through state-run media and the official religious establishment has
been a key factor in explaining the resurgence of eonservative
Islamic polities. Not only did this contribute to the re-emergence of the
long-standing debates over the nature of Egypt's social order, but it helps to
explain the partieular outcome. By attempting to
appear more culturally authentie than its religious
opposition, state actors contributed greatly to the construetion
of an Islamie social order defined by exclusive eonceptions of national identity and conservative
interpretations of religion. (See also Fouad Ajami,
"The Sorrows of Egypt," Foreign Affairs, September/October, 1995).
This role of state
actors in promoting eonservative Islam helps to
explain, then, two key anomalies in contemporary Egyptian polities. The first
was the emerging dominance of Islamist polities in the aftermath of the
government's victory over its militant opposition in the 1990's. While the
militants failed to dislodge the regime, the Islamist critique had nonetheless
taken hold and the vernacular of political discourse was fundamentally
transformed. This raised the inevitable question: ''why had this
occurred?" Why weren't the victors able to defme
the new 'rules of the game'?
Related to this was a
second anomaly: why did the regime tolerate a religious establishment that was,
outspoken and moving "closer to the Islamists ideas and further away from
the official line?" (Dalacoura, Islam, Liberalism
anti Human Rights, p. 126-7).
While conventional
wisdom tends to attribute the resurgence of Islam to popular unrest or an
inherent religiosity among the population, the approach defined here emphasizes
the important role of the state in creating an environment where Islamist
politics tlourished. The state politicized not just
the ulema, but the discourse of conservative Islam. It even went so far as to
support some of the groups that would later emerge as its prlmary
opponents. In this way, the government' s politicization of religion helped to
validate the ideas and organizations associated with the Islamist movement, and
ushered in a new era of religious politics.
The implications of
this instrumental manipulation of religion have been significant.
Not only has it contributed to greater communalization of the polity, but it
has helped to create an environment where the persecution of Coptic Christians,
secular intellectuals and those with dissenting religious opinions has occurred
with regularity (and often with state complicity). The most significant victim ofthe ideological battles of the last thirty years, then,
has been the conception of Egypt as a plural society. The right to differ,
either intellectually or politically, has been stigmatized and often equated
with either heresy or treason. But by relying upon coercive state structures to
constrain dissent, and by using Islam to promote political quiescence, the
state continues to exclude large segments of the population from public life,
and undercuts the possibility of developing a truly open society. Minority
rights, political development, civil society and regional stability will all
remain problematic issues for the near future.
The Islamic discourse
that now dominates in Egypt has demonstrated intolerant and exclusive
tendencies, and as such does not provide the kind of pluralist basis for a what
is in fact a diverse society. How this affects Egypt's future remains to be
seen, though it is likely that the two opposing elements of Egyptian culture-the
secular intellectual and conservative Islamic-will continue to clash. If the
state is able to improve economic well-being, increase political participation
or otherwise generate alternative sources of legitimacy, its dependency upon
religious politics may diminish, and the influence of conservative Islam may
lessen. The irony, of course, is that any effort to genuinely open the
political arena will seriously threaten the existence of the regime, since free
elections would likely benefit the Islamist opposition. In other words, the
state has limited its options by embracing conservative Islam as a source of
legitimacy.
Increased radicalism
of the Islamic networks, led Sadat to give a speech in 1979 where he denounced
the student groups by name, and argued that „those who wish to practice
Islam can go to the mosques, and those who wish to engage in politics may do so
through legal institutions." (Hopwood, Egypt: State and Society, p. 117).
Sadat next, reversed
his steps toward political liberalization in order to reign in the Islamic
movement which he had helped create. (David Sagiv,
Fundamentalism and Intellectuals in Egypt, 1973-1993, London, 1994, p. 60).
But by then,
religious politics had taken on a life of their own. Islamist groups had
emerged as the dominant opposition to the state, a movement ironically
facilitated by Sadat's own policies and Saudi money. And with his assassination
in 1981 by members of al-Jihad, "the genie bad struck him down."
(Fouad Ajami, The Dream Palaces of the Arabs: A Generation's
Odyssey, 1998, p. 206).
Interresting, the message of both establishment Islam and the
Islamist opposition was becoming increasingly similar throughout this period.
Moreover, they all sought a common goal of "bring[ing]
Egyptian society back to Islam." (Zeghal,
"AI-Azhar and Radical Islam," p. 382).
Unlike Ataturk's
Turkey by then (1970), Sadat's Egypt now had become firmly rooted in its
Islamic heritage. In fact the assassination of Anwar Sadat, was meant to spark
a popular rebellion coordinated by the militant group al-Jihad, but a breakdown
in communication prevented many ofthe cells around
the eountry from being activated. Members of al-Jihad
planned to eapture the radio and television building
in eentral Cairo, and begin broadcasting news of the
uprising. This would give other members of the organization a signal that the
plan was in effect. The failure, however, to capture the building kept many of
the cell leaders in the dark, and out of the fight. The government responded by
rounding up thousands of suspeeted militants and
supporters, 300 of whom were eharged with murder and
conspiracy to overthrow the government.
Sentences ranged from
3 years to life (plus more than eighty were excecuted),
but those that were acquitted left the courthouse chanting "the Islamic
Revolution is coming," a clear indication of conflict to come (SulIivan and Abed-Kotob, Islam in
Contemporary Egypt, p. 81.).
The Mubarak regime's
policies reflected those ofthe Sadat era: tolerating
(though constraining) the Muslim Brotherhood, while using the official
religious establishment to promote a more obedient Islam. Unlike Sadat,
however, Mubarak would rely to a much greater degree upon the security services
to deal with the militants, which, in the 1980's and 90's, mounted a
significant challenge to the regime.
Influenced by both
the Iranian revolution in 1979, and the Afghan war against the Soviets,
political Islam emerged as an ideology capable of challenging existing patterns
of domination. Political tracts by writers such as al-Banna,
Qutb, and Mawlana Mawdudi
found a new generation receptive to their message. The subsequent resurgence of
a politicized Islam combined the rejectionist ideas of these early writers with
the anti Western sentiments that bad informed
Nasser's Arab Nationalism. Along with their political and economic critique of
the status quo, the Islamists offered a positive message that drew from the
cultural and religious tradition of the people. This alternative was detined by a fear that Islam was under attack from the West
(and Westemized elites), and that the vulnerability
of the umma (community) to such an assault was due to its having strayed from
the true path of Islam.
The prescription,
then, to such ills was a "return to Islam," an amorphous slogan that
entailed a reordering social and political life in accordance with the
religious teachings of the Prophet, the Qur'an and the Sunna. (The example of
the Prophet Mohamed as it is relayed through Islamic tradition).
Although the specifies
remained vague, the Islamists believed it promised a more authentic society,
and, as such, represented an indigenous alternative to Western models of
development. It also resonated strongly with a dispossessed population, the
majority of which were preeluded from any real
opportunity for advaneement. As such, Islam became a
"potent ideology of popular dissent." (Muhammad Faour,
The Arab World After Desert Storm (Washington: U.S. Institute of Peace Press,
1993, p. 55).
The initial goal was
not to destroy Islamie activism, but to temper the
extremists and co-opt the moderates, at least long enough for economic reforms
to improve living standards. There was never any intention of allowing the
Islamist groups into the political arena, or to otherwise share power with
them; rather, the state tolerated their existence as long as they did not
challenge the regime's right to rule. While Mubarak created space in the
religious and cultural spheres for those willing to cooperate with the
state-and allowed groups like the Muslim Brothers to continue providing social
services-the regime retained full control over what it perceived to be the core
issues of economic and foreign poliey.
The official ulema
subsequently worked with the regime by offering theological responses and
critiques of the militants, and, in particular, their use of violence against
fellow Muslims. The ulema continued these efforts throughout the 1990's in part
to preserve their institutional interests, and, in part, to continue their
propagation of Islam. In return for its cooperation, the Mubarak government
provided significant resourees and a degree of
independence to AI-Azhar and the Ministry of
Religious Endowments. (Skovgaaard-Peterson. Defining
Islam tor the Egyptian Stole, p. 220).
The Muslim
Brotherhood also worked with the Mubarek government
in the 1980's, serving as an intermediary between the state and the
Islamic militants. By accepting state authority, the Brotherhood thus was
allowed to operate and published a newspaper, al-Da 'wa
(tbe Call), for a short period, and continued to
provide social seryices throughout Egypt. In tbe 1980's, young activists were able to bring their
experience in university politics to the realm of the professional syndicates.
(Gehad Auda, "Tbe Nonnalization of the Islamic
Movement in Egypt from the 1970's to the Early 1990's", in Marty and
Appleby, Fundamentalisms and the State, University of Chicago Press, 1994, p.
390).
They made early gains
in the Engineering Syndicate in the mid-1980's, and by 1987 had won amajority of seats on that board. They made similar imoads into the doctor's and
pharmacists associations, and in 1992 they gained control of the board of the
lawyer's syndicate. Thus poliey of "mutual
accommodation" benefited the Brotherhood in its effort to re-establish
itself as the leading Islamic organization in Egyptian society. (See Geneive Abdo. No God but God: Egypt and the Triumph of
Islam, Oxford University Press, 2000).
While the early 1980'
s were relatively quiet in Egypt, sporadic violence began in the mid to
late-1980's. The violence began with a senes of
attacks on Coptic Christians in upper Egypt. Militant groups targeted Copts for
the money that could be raised by robbing their shops, and also to strike at
the historically cosmopolitan fabric of Egyptiansociety.
The state was slow to respond to these attacks, even as they contributed to the
communal tensions that had been increasing since the Sadat era. In the late
1980's, the tactics of the militants shifted, as al-Jihad began targeting
government officials, particularly, those involved in the security services. In
1987, there were four assassination attempts on government officials,
ostensibly undertaken by Islamic Jihad.
In 1989, the Minister
oflnterior, Zaki Bar, was
targeted by al-Gama'a AI-Islamiyya
(the Islamic group), Egypt's second major militant organization. Several months
later, in 1990, the speaker of the Egyptian Parliament, Refaat
EI Mahgoub, was assassinated. In 1992, Farag Foda, a leading secular critic ofthe
Islamists was shot to death outside his home in Cairo. In that same year, other
militant groups struck at foreign tourists, a leading source of foreign
exchange for the government. When bombs exploded in Cairo, it was dear that the
violence of upper Egypt had penetrated the urban life of the capital.
The Soviet invasion
of Afghanistan in 1979, and the subsequent war, had an enormous impact upon the
capability and direction of these groups. The United States and Saudi Arabia
provided significant funding and training for the Mujahadeen forces fighting
the Soviet occupation. Working with the Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI) agency
ofPakistan, the U.S. Cen1ral Intelligence Agency
provided upwards of$6 billion in arms, equipment and training over the course
of ten years. Moreover this was matched "dollar for dollar" by the
Saudi government. (George Crile, "Charlie Did It," Financial Times,
June 7-8, 2003).
For its part, the
Egyptian government-like other Arab governments-actively encouraged its young
men to join the Jihad against the godless communism. Many who bad been jailed for their role in the events of 1981, left
for Afghanistan immediately upon their release. This included among others,
Ayman al-Zawahiri, the leader of Islamic Jihad and future advisor to Osama Bin
Laden. Omar Abdel Rahman, spiritual head of al-Gamaa
commonly known as the 'Blind Sheikh' was another participant in the broader
effort. The Afghan war was also an important moment in the development of an
international financial network for "Jihadi" groups. Fundraising
organizations were created with branches in Western capitals as weIl as in the Middle East to funnel money into Islamic
militancy. When the war ended, these networks and groups continued to operate,
and began redirecting their focus to other venues including Kashmir, Chechnya,
Algeria and Egypt. (Robert Oakley, former-Ambassador to Pakistan, referenced in
Hibbard and Litte, Islamic Activism and US. Foreign
Policy, p. 76).
Estimates regarding
the number of Egyptians who joined the fight range from several hundred to
several thousand, although a11 agree that they were coordinated largely by
Islamist organizations. A number of the militant groups, particu1arly al-Jihad,
saw this as an opportunity to rebuild their organizations after the repression stemming
from Sadat's assassination.The Afghan war
subsequently contributed to a new level of conflict between the Egyptian
militants and the state. The capacity of both Islamic Jihad and al-Gama 'a, as weIl as the regularity ofviolence,
increased dramatically with the return ofthe
mujahedin (holy warriors). These returnees had been trained in explosives and guerriIla tactics and many of them had honed their skills
in combat. Their expertise was now being turned on the regime in a manner
similar to that occurrlng in neighboring countries
such as Algeria.
Moreover, the
Egyptian military was largely unprepared to deal with this new level of
expertise and commitment. Unlike those who bad never left Egypt, these men knew
what they were doing. The attempted assassination of Interior Minister Zaki Badr in 1989, for example,
demonstrated what the security services now faced. Although the attack failed,
the use of explosives detonated by remote control demonstrated a level of
sophistication that had not existed earlier in the decade. Of equal concern was
the international funders and operatives which gave these groups significant
support, a situation created ironically by U.S., Saudi and Pakistani
intelligence agencies.
The events leading up
to new confrontations between the state and the militants began in early 1990,
with a senes of provocations by Islamic activists.
While some actions were non-violent-including a peaceful march by the Gama'a al-Islamiyya through one
of Cairo' s slums-others were more aggressive, including a number of
anti-Christian riots and attacks on churches in upper Egypt. The government
responded by going on the offensive; it assassinated the spokesman of tbe Gama'a on the streets of
Cairo, and sent its spiritual leader, Sheikh Mubammad
Abdel Rahman, into exile. The Gama ' a retaliated by assassinating Rifaat Mahgoub, the Speaker of
the National Assembly. Abdel Rahman eventually received a visa to the United
States and set up operations in Jersey City, NI. He was also the 'blind Sheikh'
who was later convicted in a U .S. court for bis involvement in the first
attack on the World Trade Towers in the early 1990s.
And after a year and
a half of relative quiet-during which time the Gulf War occurred, the Islamic
Salvation Front (FIS), was about win-Islamic violence once again escalated.
There was a slaughter of 13 Christians in tbe Spring
of 1992 by a small faction in upper Egypt, followed by Farag Foda's assassination in June of that year. (This was
reflected in a leaked U.S. National Intelligence Estimate reported in tbe London Sunday Times in February 1994 wbicb stated that the Egyptian government was in danger ofbeing overthrown. The report is referenced in Jon
Alterman, "Egypt: Stable, but for How Long?" The Washington
Quarterly, Autumn 2000, p. 108).
While these events
did little to provoke the government, it was the subsequent attack on foreign
tourists the following Fall-and the Gama'a's
announcement of a concerted campaign against Western tourism-that prompted the
government to strike back. (It is estimated that the tourist industry brought
into Egypt $3.3 Billion annually at this time).
Thousands of people
were arrested or detained without charge during these sweeps, with many being
tortured and killed in police custody. Despite govemment
gains. however, both the Gama 'a and Islamic Jihad continued their operations.
These included several assassination attempts on leading state figures, as well
as on local police and security officers. Coptic Christians were also targeted
for attack. Some of the more high profile attacks included a failed
attempt on the life of Interior Minister Hassan al Alfi,
and a similar attempt on the Prime Minster Atef Sedky. The latter attempt proved somewhat disastrous for
the militants, since the attack claimed only the life of a local schoolgirl,
which state media covered extensively. Nonetheless, the violence was
escalating, and a government victory was far from assured.(Lawyers Committee on
Human Rights, Escalating Attactics on Human Rights
Protection in Egypt, Washington: Lawyers Committee, 1995).
Many were held
without trial for several years, while those who did face charges were tried in
military courts. The govemment also passed a law
barring political activity of groups that were not registered political
parties, and actively cracked down on the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood.
As long as the
militants limited their attacks to govemment
officials and police-who bad little if any popular support-the population was
behind them. When the Gama'a shifted tacticst and started targeting foreign tourists and
Egyptian civilians (even Copts), popu1ar support rapidly fell.
This occurred
for two reasons. On the one band, the decline in tourism seriously impacted the
livelihood of ordinary Egyptians, particu1arly in upper Egypt, and created
economic hardship for those whom the militants were ostensibly meant to
support. On the other band, popu1ar opinion just did not perceive as legitimate
the kilIing of fellow Muslims.
By late 1994 the govemment's beavy handed tactics
were beginning to pay off. By 1995, the fighting bad been effectively isolated
to the remote areas of central and upper Egypt, where the conflict
"degenerated into the timeless politics of vengeance and vendettas, an
endless cycle of killings and reprisals." (Ajami,
The Dream Palaces ofthe Arabs, p. 202).
Militant activity
continued, though, with two attacks in September and November 1997, the latter
of which was a gruesome attack on tourists in Luxor that left 60 dead. Far from
demonstrating a resurgence of militancy, however, this attacked marked the end
of the conflict. Imprisoned members of the Gama'a
subsequently ca1led for a ceasefire.
But while the state
proved able to deal with the security threat posed by the militants, the
ideological challenge proved more difficult to address. When the ulema
defended government policies in the 1960's and 70's, they were pereeived as puppets of thecregime.
Many of members of the ulema, refused to sanction this role, which ereated a split within AI-Azhar
between the leadership and those sympathetie to the
Islamist cause. WhiIe the Iatter
may have opposed the militant's use of violence, they agreed with the Islamist eritique of the regime, and shared the Islamist vision of
social order. These internal divisions also prodded the leadership into a more antagonistie relationship with the regime. Consequently,
when the Mubarek govemment
enlisted the ulema in its battIe with the militants
in the earIy 1990's, it had the unintended consequenee of empowering (and emboldening) both the
centrist leadership and the conservative ulema alike. (See Julie Taylor,
"State-Clerical Relations in Egypt: A Case of Strategie
Interaction," presented at the American Political Seience
Association Annual Meeting in Washington, DC, September 2000).
The government also
provided a forum for these religious leaders to comment on political events,
yet they used it in a way that did not always benefit the regime. In April
1993, for example, a group of ulema alled upon the
government to "release the Islamist prisoners and to negotiate with the
members of radical Islam." (See Steven Baraclough,
"Al-Azhar: Between the Govemment and the
Islamists," Middle East Journal, Vol. 52, No. 2, Spring 1998).
Similarly, in 1994,
Gad al-Haq attributed the rise of Islamic extremism to the state's manipulation
and control of religious affairs, and implicitly argued for a fteer hand in religious interpretation. He also became less
willing to issue blanket condemnations of attacks upon tourists and Copts, and
focused instead on issues of public morality. In taking these steps, the ulema
were presenting themselves as an alternative to both Islamic extremists and the
state. This allowed the ulema to develop an agenda of its own, and were calling
for " a retum to religion." (Zeghal, "Religion and Politics in Egypt," p.
382).
While there were
limits, AI-Azhar's leverage over the regime grew more
significant as the violence became more intense. The tactics of the regime
undermined its legitimacy, and made it increasingly reliant upon whatever
allies it could get. As a result, a wide-spectrum of conservative ulema
were promoted a moderate Islamist worldview through radio, television.
(See Judith Miller, God has Ninety-Nine Names: Reporting from a Militant Middle
East, 1996).
Thus, although the
Mubarak regime bad previously supported many of the secular intellectua1s who
were subsequently targeted-and provided space for them to challenge the
Islamists-the regime did little to defend them when such support became a
liability. The state's compromise with conservative religion, then, privileged
a communalist interpretation of the Egyptian nation and national identity, and
demonstrated that the tirst victim in the struggle to
maintain power was Egypt' s historical commitment to secular and cosmopolitan
norms.
At the heart of the
Islamist challenge in Egypt has been the continuing debate over how to defme the nation. At issue, is a conflict between those who
advocate a society based upon a salafiyya (or
Islamist) vision of social order-detined by the
establishment of an Islamic state and the full application of Sharia-and those
who embrace some notion of secular modernity. While the former argue that the
answer to Egypt's social ills is areturn to
tradition, the latter holds that it is the continuing influence of a stagnant
tradition that has been the source of Egypt's economic and political decline.
In the 19th century,
this debate was dominated by the reform movement of alAfghani,
Abdhuh and others. Challenged by European
imperialism, members of this movement advocated the embrace of science and
reason as a means of social revitalization. Among the more liberal elements of
this movement, religion was to be relegated to the private sphere, while the
institutions of state and society were reformed along western lines. The
premise behind this emulation of Europe was two-fold. First, developments in
science and technology were perceived to be an important element in
transforming the material conditions of Western societies, and Islamic
societies, it was believed, ought to follow suit. Second, many believed !hat
the unquestioning obedience to religious authority, and the lack of critical
thinking associated with it, had severely hindered the development of Arab
society. Only by embracing science and reason, then, could Arab societies
compete economically and politically with the West.
The more culturally
conservative elements in Egyptian society, however, rejected this reasoning,
and saw the European influence as an intrusion in traditional Egyptian life.
Such conservative elites perceived European values and ideas-particularly those
that emphasize individual self-interest over the interests of the community-as
largely inconsistent with those of Islam. The basic dichotomy between Egypt's
Islamists and secular intellectua1s has changed little since this era.
This was evident in
the 1990's when-in the midst of the militant violence-the debate re-emerged over
whether Egypt ought to have an Islamic or secular state. The secular argument
generally took one of two approaches. On the one.
A debate on this
issue between Islamist and secular intellectuals occurred during a meeting ofthe Cairo Book Fair in 1992, the proeeedings
of whieh ean be found in Misr Bayn a/ Daw/a
a/ Diniya wa a/Madaniya (Egypt: A Religious or CM/ State?)(Cairo, 1992).
Representing the Islamists were Muhammad Imara, Mamoun al-Hodeiby, the spokesman
for the Muslim Brotherhood, and Shekh Muhammad alGhazzali of AI-Azhar. On the
other side were two renowned secular intellectuals, Farag Foda,
the founder of a/-Tanwir, and Muhammad Ahrned Khanafa. The debate was
significant for a nurnber of reasons, including the
fact that it was the first and last debate on such a sensitive topic to be
hosted by a govemment institution in such a public
forum. Moreover, it was shortly after this debate that Farag Foda was gunned down by Islamie
militants outside his horne in Cairo. He argued that
nowhere in the Qur' an does it specify a particular
form of government, and thus a secular government is consistent with Islam. (Fauzi M. Naiiar, "Tbe Debate on Islam and Secularism in Egypt," Arab
Studies Quarterly, Spring 1996, Vol. 18, No. 2, p. 21).
It was not that the early
Wafdists were necessarily hostile to religion.
Rather, they were concemed about the politicization
of ecclesiastic authorities, and the manipulation of religion by political
actors (particularly by the monarchy). If this first approach is wary of religion's
influence upon politics, the second approach is concemed
with the effect of politics upon religion. Authors such as Mohammad Said
al-Ashmawy are deeply disturbed over the politicization of Islam. Though he
explicitly eschews the label of secularist, Ashmawy's position is premised upon
the belief that religion (and specifIcally Islam)
deals fundamentally with human spirituality, not with politics. (See Muhammad
Said al-Ashmawy, Islam and the Political Order, Washington, DC: The Council for
Research in Values and Philosophy, 1994).
Other concerns raised
by secular and liberal intellectua1s deal with the ambiguity of what an Islamic
state would entail. For example, the demand for the application of shari'a, despite its apparent simplicity, is rather misleading
because there is no single interpretation of Islamic law. Rather, there are
several schools of Islarnic jurisprudence-the Hanafi,
Malaki, Hanbali, and Shafi'i-which, while similar in
most matters, do differ on various issues. Second, the secularists fear the
abuse that would be inherent in an Islamic state. 139 Once shari
'a was established, any opposition could be equated with heresy, and dissent
would "become an insolence in the face of God' s law ..that has to be
punished by applying the appropriate hadd (Quranic
punishment)."The proponents of an Islamic state-a group often referred to
as 'integralists ' -reject these arguments, and believe that a elose affiliation between religion and politics is not just
preferable, but essential. The core of their argument lies in the assertion
that Islam has never known a distinction between public and private realms, and
that all aspects ofhuman existence are meant to be
regulated by God's will as defined in the Qur'an, the Sunna (example of the
Prophet) and the Shari'a. The basic assumption within
this claim is that without religion, there can be no normative basis to
political life and, hence, no morality. Moreover, secularism is understood from
this perspective as either a matter of unbelief (kufr) or of active hostility
to religion. The alternative to an Islamic state, then, "is not a civil
state, but rather an irreligious [one]." (Farid Zakariyya,
quoted in Alexander Flores, "Secularism, Integralism, and Political Islam:
The Egyptian Debate," in Joel Beinin and Joe Stork, Political Islam:
Essays from Middle East Report, Berkeley, 1997, p. 91).
By promoting
conservative Islam for its own ends, state elites have helped to validate the
integralist (and Islamist) vision of social order, and moved the salaflya interpretation of Islam into the ideological
mainstream. This also contributed greatly to the communalization of Egyptian
politics, with dire results for the Christian minority.
Discrimination
against the Coptic Christians-which comprise the largest minority in the
country-is evident in a variety of issues ranging from the official count of
the population,l to biring
procedures that exclude Christians from holding positions of authority. There
are no Christian govemors or mayors in Egypt, for
example, or Cabinet level officials. Members of the Coptic community are also
unrepresented in the upper ranks of the security services. Similarly, Cbristians are largely absent in the realm of academia. Of
Egypt' s 15 state universities, none have a Coptic Christian in a key
administrative post-either Dean or President-and only a very few Christians
hold teaching positions. Similarly, Christian students are not allowed to
attend AI-Azhar University despite its public
funding. As one of Egypt's pre-eminent universities, this type of
discrimination has long-term implications for future job prospects in such
fields as medicine, law and engineering. There is some dispute as to the actual
nwnbers of the Coptic population as weIl. Govemment figures place the
number at 6 million, or roughly 5 percent ofthe
population. Coptic activists claim a much higher figure, around 10 million.
while external sources place it at 7 to 8 million.
Other forms of
discrimination can be found in the treatment of minorities on matters of
religious freedom and marriage. While a Christian may convert to Islam, Muslims
who convert to Christianity have been subject to harassment by local law
enforcement. While such conversions are not specifically prohibited by law,
neither are hey recognized. Similarly, a Muslim woman
is legally prohibited from marrying a Christian man, though a Muslim man may
marry a Christian woman. There have also been numerous reports of Coptic girls
being abducted and forcibly converted to Islam (meaning included in a harem) by
Muslim men. While there are no reports of government involvement in such
abductions, the local police and government officials have harassed Christian
families seeking redress, and the government has clearly failed "to uphold
the law in such instances." Plus there is a law prohibiting Churching
construction (and repair) absent a presidential decree remains in force, even
while the government uses public funds for mosque construction and support.
(International Religious Freedom Report 2001, Egypt, U.S. Department of State).
On New Years Eve 1999, violenee in the southem city of AI-Kosheh led to
two days of rioting. During this period, Muslims burned and looted Coptic
stores, and killed 20 Christians. The violenee
reflected long simmering tensions between wealthy Christians and less weIl-off Muslims, though was very much intertwined with the
communalization of polities. When two Christians had been killed in the
previous year, the government rounded up 1,000 Copts-torturing many-convinced
that Christians were behind the killings. (Alberto Femandez.
"In the Year ofthe Martyrs" Anti-Coptic
Violence in Egypt, 1988-1993," Paper Presented at the Middle East Studies
Association Annual Meeting, San Francisco, November 18-20,2001).
The government's
response to the 1999-2000 violence reflected a similar unwillingness to address
the real issues. The initial trial indicted 96 defendants-58 Muslims and
38 Copts-but acquitted 92 of them. The remaining four were convieted
of only minor crimes. According to one analyst at the time, "the verdiets were intentionally light in order to avoid fanning
the flames of sectarian strife."( cited in Nadia About EI-Magd, "The Meanings of AI-Kosheh,"
AI-Ahram Weeldy, 3-9
February 2000).
While the Egyptian
government refuses to recognize the Coptic community as a minority-and argues
that the Egyptian nation is entirely of one 'ethnic' fabric-the government has
nonetheless refused to allow for equal treatment of the Christian population.
This is refleeted in the common pereeption
among members of the Coptic eommunity that they are
second class eitizens, and, thus, not 'fully
Egyptian.'(See "International Religions Freedom Report, 2004" U.S.
Department of State).
Moreover, the large
amounts of daily television and radio time dedicated to Islamic programming has
in the past either demeaned Christianity or emphasized the benefits of
conversion to Islam. Similarly, Islamist newspapers, commonly denigrate
Christianity and the Coptic community, as do the sermons at Friday prayers in
mosques around the country. Each of these trends contributes to the further
communalization of public life, and has increased Coptic alienation.
These issues were
also resurrected in 2001 when an Arabic language weekly, al Nabaa,
published a lengthy story-with numerous pictures-of a defrocked priest having
sex with women at a revered monastery. A major protest erupted among the Coptic
community that included several days of demonstrations in Cairo. While the
immediate cause of the protest was the publication of the article, these unprecedented
street protests were driven largely by the community' s sense of continued
persecution. The protestor' s grievances reflected long-standing frustration
with the Mubarak regime's unwillingness to protect minority rights, and ineluded a variety of critieisms
of both the Government and the Church leadership.
While the Mubarak
regime has sought to promote interfaith dialogue and other means to ease
tensions between the communities, the state' s promotion of communalism has had
a lasting impact upon Coptic as weIl as Muslim
identity. This has not been helped by the tendency of state actors to take
community issues up with the Coptic Church, and not with secular
representatives. And while there remain numerous Muslims and Christians willing
to reach out to one another, they frequently face opposition within their own
communities over such issues as inter-communal dialogue and the advocacy of
reform. This is especially evident in the internal divisions that exist within
the Coptic community over how to respond to both the state and the sectarian
tensions. Expatriate Coptic groups often differ with local groups over how to
approach many of the issues raised by their minority status. Similarly, the
communalism fostered by the state has constrained those in both groups who try
to promote religious tolerance and mutual understanding.
Elsewhere Farag Foda, a leading secular writer, was assassinated in 1992.
He had participated in the 1992 Cairo Book Fair forum, during which he bad he
had insulted Muhammad al-Ghazali, a leading member of Al-Azhar. The Front
subsequently issued afatwa designating Foda a kafir (beretic), the
punishment for which is death. During the murder trial, Sheikh al-Ghazali
testified to the fact that "anyone opposing the full implementation of the
sharia, as Foda did, was guilty of apostasy, and that
anyone killing such a person was not liable for punishment under Islamic
law." (Abdo, No God but God, p. 68).
The assassination of Foda was a galvanizing event, as was the attack two years
later on writer Naguib Mahfouz, Egypt's famed Nobel Laureate. In both cases,
the efforts by establishment clerics to ban their books or otherwise identify
them as apostates provided a warrant for their subsequent attacks by the more
radical militant groups. And although wi1ling to support secular thinkers in
their criticisms of Islamic militancy, the Egyptian regime was less willing to
aid such intellectuals when challenged by members of the religious
establishment.
For example, Nasr
Hamid Abu Zeid in 1993, a former professor at the
University of Cairo, was a scholar of Islamic studies and Arabic literature. By
attempting the application of hermeneutics to the interpretation of the
Qur'an, several of his colleagues with whom he had long differed considered his
analysis heresy, and coordinated with a group of Islamist lawyers to bring
formal charges against him. While Abu Zeid argued his
case on the grounds of freedom of thought and _expression (a constitutional
matter), those bringing the case invoked the rules of sharia (lslamic law), and focused on whether or not Abu Zeid's writings were a threat to the community of Muslims.
The court then ordered Abu Zeid divorced from his
wife, since "being married to an apostate from Islam was a violation of
the rights of God." (George N. Sfeir, "Basic Freedoms in a Fractured
Legal Culture: Egypt and the Case of Nasr Hamid Abu Zayid,"
Middle East JoumaJ, Summer 1998, p. 406).
Muhammad Said
al-Ashmawy, the former Chief Justice of the Cairo High Court however , has
found himself in a similar predicament to that of Abu Zeid.
In 1992, the Islamic Research Academy recommended that a number of bis books be
banned, and ordered the confiscation of five specific texts. In 1996, a similar
order was given for a book he published concerning women and the veil in Islam.
In this book he argued that there is nothing in the Quran or the Sunna that
require woman to wear a veil, and that this is solely a matter of custom.The Islamic Research Academy subsequently ordered
the confiscation of this book.
Other leading
scholars in Egypt were similarly targeted for attack, including author Said
Mahmud al-Qumny, whose book The God of Time, was
banned. The attack on The God of Time was part of a broader campaign against
196 books that al-Azhar deemed blasphemous. The case was submitted to the State
Security court upon the request of Al-Azhar, where al-Qumny
was subsequently charged with ''propagating ideas that denigrate Islam [under Artiele 198 of the Criminal Code]." (Egyptian
Organization for Human Rights, Press Release, May 1, 1997).
The underlying debate
in each of these cases-the limits of free expression and the acceptability of
questioning revealed religion-is not new. As noted above, there has long been a
debate over the degree to which Islam is open to interpretation.
What is perhaps most
significant, though, is the government's complicity in these attacks. The
intolerance of dissenting opinions on religious matters has been legitimated by
state policies which have been designed to encourage religious piety and
political quiescence, while stigmatizing both extremism and Westernization as
twin evils to be avoided. In doing so, however, it also helped redefine the
moral order of Egyptian public life. As one writer recently commented, the
emergence of "~ influential middle c1ass with a [traditional] mentality as
weIl as the politicization of Islam" has
created a new social environment, where the idea that society should be
organized around religious principles is largely accepted and where assaults on
'deviance' by state institutions is now commonplace.
While rhetorically
committed to a secular modernity, the regime has ceded the basic debate over
religion and public life to conservative clerics. As such, the regime sought to
appropriate the message of conservative Islam, not oppose it. Since the vast
majority of the population are sympathetic to the concems
raised by the Islamists, neither the regime nor the state-controlled media
wished to defend secular principles or ideas. Moreover, the assaults on intellectual
freedoms were perceived by the regime to be peripheral to their core economic
and political concerns. (See Judith Miller "The Challenge of Radical
Islam," Foreign Affairs 72, no. 2,1993).
Furthermore,
aimed at constraining moderate Islamists was the reform of the Hisba laws in 1997, which had allow Islamists lawyers to
bring cases of Islamic morality to court. The regime has also continued to
ignore the complaints of Coptic Christians, secular intellectua1s and Shi'a
Muslims.
At the same time, the
Mubarak government claims to support avision of modemity that promotes tolerance, pluralism and economic
development. In short, the Mubarak regime is trying to serve as both an
advocate of secular modemity and Islamic tradition at
the same time.The inconsistency of these two trends
has generated a 'superficial hybrid,' where the successful promotion of
economic modemity would appear to entail the
promotion of critical reasoning.
Successful
modernization also requires at least some degree of independence for the realm
of civil society, and a greater emphasis upon the rule of law and accountable
government. Moreover, the success of the state in promoting a communalist
vision of society-and of depicting conservative religious belief as culturally
more authentic-has greatly affected the middle classes which have become
increasingly conservative and overtly Islamic in the last twenty years.
Despite the
government's success in replacing. top officials of the religious
establishment, moreover, the Mubarak regime has been largely unable to
eradicate the deeply entrenched conservatism that exists within these
institutions. And it is here that the state's politicization of Islam over the
last thirty years is most evident. By inviting Saudi influence and financing to
eradicate the left-and, later, to counter the Islamists-both the Sadat and
Mubarak regime helped to destroy the intellectual basis for a liberal modernist
(or humanist) Islam and discredited the idea that religion was open to
interpretation. These policies subsequently contributed to the demise of
modernist Islam within Egypt. In its stead has been placed a conservative
interpretation of Islamic tradition.
Moreover, by using
the security services (and courts) to prosecute heterodox views, the Mubarak
government has "repeatedly sent a clear message that religion is not a
private matter and that any 'deviation ftom the true
religion' will not be tolerated." (Hossam Bahgat,
"AI-Azhar is wrong, but the state is the real
culprit," The Dally Star, September 23, 2004).
The influenee of eonservative Islam
in Egyptian public life was greatly abetted by the changing orientation ofstate elites that began in the 1970's. By using Islam as
a basis of nationalist legitimacy, bot,h Sadat and
Mubarak abandoned the earlier eommitments to seeular modernity that marked the Nasser era. It also ereated an opportunity for conservative activists to
promote their vision of Islam in public life. While the ruling party-the
National Democratie Party-advocates a modernist
ideology of development, both the Mubarak and Sadat regimes consistently sought
to situate their authority within a moral framework linked to Islamie tradition. More importantly, the active promotion
of Islam through state-run media and the official religious establishment has
been a key factor in explaining the resurgence of eonservative
Islamic polities. Not only did this contribute to the re-emergenee
ofthe long-standing debates over the nature of
Egypt's social order, but it helps to explain the partieular
outcome. By attempting to appear more culturally authentie
than its religious opposition, state actors contributed greatly to the construetion of an Islamie social
order defined by exclusive eonceptions of national
identity and conservative interpretations of religion.
This role of state
actors in promoting eonservative Islam helps to
explain, then, two key anomalies in contemporary Egyptian polities. The first
was the emerging dominance of Islamist polities in the aftermath of the
government's victory over its militant opposition in the 1990's. While the
militants failed to dislodge the Mubarek as the noted
political commentator and fonner-Ambassdor Tahseen Basbir remarked, even though the Islamists were
"checked in [their] bid for power, ... the Islamization of society gained ground."referenced in Fouad Ajami,
"The Sorrows ofEgypt," Foreign Affairs
(September/October. 1995)
The Islamist critique
bad nonetheless taken hold and the vernacular of political discourse was
fundamentally transformed. This raised the inevitable question: ''why had this
occurred?" Why weren't the victors able to defme
the new 'rules of the game'? Related to this was a second anomaly: why did the
regime tolerate a religious establishment that was, at least from the early
1990's, extremely outspoken and moving "closer to the Islamists ideas and
further away from the officialline?"207 This was particularly perplexing
given the state's complicity in high profile assaults upon intellectual
freedom, and the regime's apparent absence in the debate over social order.
The answers to these
questions are best found by moving away from a dichotomous understanding of
Egyptian politics that emphasizes a secular state vying with an Islamist
opposition-and recognizing instead the central role of official institutions in
promoting conservative Islam. The focus of this research, then, is on the
interaction of three sets of actors-the state elite, the religious
establishment and the Islamist opposition-and the manner in which this dynamic
facilitated an ideological transformation of Egyptian politics. While
conventional wisdom tends to attribute the resurgence of Islam to popular
unrest or an inherent religiosity among the population, the approach defined
here emphasizes the important role of the state in creating an environment
where Islamist politics tlourished. The state
politicized not just the ulema,but the discourse of
conservative Islam. It even went so far as to support some of the groups that
would later emerge as its prlmary opponents. In this
way, the government' (Dalacoura, Islam, Liberalism
anti Human Rights, p. 126-7).
Politicization of
religion helped to validate the ideas and organizations associated with the
Islamist movement, and ushered in a new era of religious politics.The
implications of this instrumental manipulation of religion have been
significant. Not only has it contributed to greater communalization of the
polity, but it has helped to create an environment where the persecution of
Coptic Christians, secular intellectua1s and those with dissenting
religious opinions has occurred with regul~ty (and
often with state complicity). The most significant victim ofthe
ideological battles ofthe last thirty years, then,
has been the conception of Egypt as a plural society. The right to differ,
either intellectua1ly or politically, has been stigmatized and often equated
with either heresy or treason. The takfir cases, for example, demonstrate the
weakness of the,government in the face of a religious
communalism of its own making; by failing to stand,up
to chauvinistic tendencies within official institutions, the ruling regime has
become complicit in their actions. Moreover, the failure to cultivate an
inclusive basis of national identity-and a political culture of tolerance and
compromise-has contributed to major divisions in society and continuing social
tensions. In short, by relying upon coercive state structures to constrain dissent,
and by using Islam to promote political quiescence, the state continues to
exclude large segments of the population from public life, and undercuts the
possibility of developing a truly open society.
These findings do
not, however, imply the imminent downfall ofthe
regime or an imminent Islamist takeover. What it does signify is that minority
rights, political development, civil society and regional stability will all
remain problematic issues for the near future. The Islamic discourse that now
dominates in Egypt has demonstrated intolerant and exclusive tendencies, and as
such does not provide the kind of pluralist basis for a what is in fact a
diverse soci~ty. How this affects Egypt's future
remains to be seen, though it is likely that the two opposing elements of
Egyptian culture-the secular intellectual and conservative Islamic-will
continue to clash. If the state is able to improve economic well-being,
increase political participation or otherwise generate alternative sources of
legitimacy, its dependency upon religious politics may diminish, and the
influence of conservative Islam may lessen. The irony, of course, is that any
effort to genuinely open the political arena will seriously threaten the
existence of the regime, since free elections would likely benefit the Islamist
opposition. In other words, the state has limited its options by embracing
conservative Islam as a source of legitimacy.
As pointed out, the
goal of the Muslim Brotherhood has always remained the same: to reestablish
Sharia rule in Egypt and elsewhere, whether by peaceful or violent means. And
now, despite the best efforts of the Mubarak regime (which, like the Nasser and
Sadat regimes before it, has tried to keep the Ikhwan at bay with a combination
of force and concessions) to limit its influence, it is gaining strength in
Egypt. However the Islamist group has now won 76 seats -- more than five times
the number it held in the outgoing chamber.
One of the most
important developments in the recent history of the Muslim Brotherhood
movement has been its adoption of participatory politics as a major strategy.
The Brotherhood’s engagement in the political process has been accompanied by
the embrace of a new, pro-democracy narrative in which the movement claims to
seek the creation not of a religious state, but of a "civil state with an
Islamic source of authority.” In some countries, the Brotherhood’s embrace of
electoral politics has also led to the formation of political parties.In light of these developments, it has been argued
that the Brotherhood will become moderated as it integrates more fully into the
political process, and conversely, more radicalized, should it be excluded. But
has the MB's own track record provided any evidence to support this hypothesis?
Has the Brotherhood’s participation in politics brought about a fundamental
ideological change in the movement, and led it to alter its radical nature and objectives?Two cases, both of which will be examined in
this paper, shed some light on these questions: that of Egypt, where the
Brotherhood is officially outlawed, and that of Jordan, where the Brotherhood
is legal and has formed its own political party. In both cases, the
Brotherhood’s embrace of politics has rewarded it with some considerable
electoral successes in the recent past. At the same time, those achievements
have also compelled the Egyptian and Jordanian regimes to move firmly to deny
the Brotherhood new electoral gains and to try and reduce its political role.
The Jordanian Brotherhood has complained that the government rigged recent
elections, causing the Brotherhood’s party to perform poorly. And yet,
despite these claims, Jordanian experts say the Brotherhood’s electoral
setbacks can not be ascribed entirely to governmental
manipulation alone. Instead, it seems that the Brotherhood has not been able to
persuade the masses of its ideological agenda.Meanwhile,
Hamas's victory in the January 2006 legislative elections didn’t help the group
accomplish its own professed goals of liberating and Islamizing Palestine.
Instead, Hamas ended up politically isolated in Gaza. Moreover, in
Morocco, the Brotherhood-inspired Justice and Development Party did not perform
as well as expected in the legislative elections of September 2007, which were
relatively free and fair compared to elections in other Arab countries.
All of this suggests
that the Brotherhood’s political strategy has recently come up against some
genuine limits—including limits imposed not only by states to curb the MB’s
political ascendancy, but also limits to the Brotherhood’s own ability to
mobilize voters on the basis of its slogan "Islam is the solution.” The
more the MB has advanced in the polls, and the more the possibility of its
assuming power loomed on the horizon, the more the movement was expected, at
home and abroad, to offer pragmatic solutions to people’s problems and to make
the sort of compromises required of political parties in a pluralistic
political order. But the Brotherhood has not met those expectations, and as a
result, has suffered in the political arena in recent times.
It appears, then, as
the Egyptian analyst Khalil al-Anani has recently put
it,[1] that "the Islamist Spring" may well be coming to a close. But
if the MB's political strategy has reached a dead end, what will its various
branches choose to do now and in the future? Hamas provided one response to
this dilemma when it took over Gaza by force. That response may well be a model
that other Brotherhood branches will follow in the future. On the other end of
the spectrum, however, is the example offered by the Islamic AKP (Justice and
Development Party) in Turkey, which won victories in the 2002 and 2007
legislative elections—but only after distancing itself from traditional
Brotherhood ideology. This achievement suggests that an Islamic political party
can assume power and keep it in a civil state, so long as it is willing to
accept the sovereignty of that political order and reject the ideological
objectives of establishing an Islamic state. But is the MB at large willing
to take this step? On this question, the views of the Brotherhood regarding the
AKP’s model and success are especially revealing, and will also be examined in
this paper.
But while the
Brotherhood was founded with the expressed purpose of establishing the sovereignty
of sharia (Islamic law), uniting Muslim lands, liberating them from all foreign
presence, and eventually spreading Islam worldwide. And while these objectives
have also been pursued through jihad, especially since the period of
repression it experienced during Nasser’s reign in, through dawa,
or missionary and social activities.
It thus is important
to understand the relationship between dawa and
politics (siyasah) in Brotherhood organizations. In
politics, the Brotherhood may claim to seek the creation of a civil
state. But at the level of dawa, the MB doesn’t
make compromises with its basic ideological objectives, because divine truth,
as it see it, cannot be subject to political negotiation. The Brotherhood’s
political activities are meant to advance the Islamizing objectives of the
Brotherhood as a dawa movement.
MB political parties
in Arab countries are, organizationally speaking, not separate from the dawa organization. This is so even in Morocco, where the
Brotherhood’s political party—the Justice and Development Party (Hizb al-Adalah wal-Tanmiyah)—is widely regarded as having gone further
than other MB parties in distancing itself from the dawa
organization and the revivalist movement from which it sprang, the
"Monotheism and Reform Movement" (Harakat al-Tawhid wal-Islah).[2]
In many ways, the two
strategies of dawa and siyasah
are contradictory and inevitably produce deep ambiguities in the Brotherhood’s
ideological message. For example, as a dawa movement,
the Brotherhood calls for the implementation of sharia and the establishment of
an Islamic state, and cannot accept non-Muslims as citizens fully equal to
Muslims, which should be a sine qua non for a civil political party. Moreover,
engagement in political activity and elections requires dialogue and
partnership with other political forces, including with ideological rivals. As
such, the Brotherhood’s political activities have sometimes found themselves in
conflict with the message of the dawa. These tensions
have given rise to the famous “grey zones”—the ambiguous positions on
ideological and political issues that provide key benchmarks for gauging an
organization’s commitment to democratic and pluralistic values.
A Civil Or Sharia State?
Since the beginning
of the Egyptian Brotherhood's involvement in electoral politics in the 1980s,
its public statements have emphasized its commitment to promoting democracy,
freedom, justice, human rights, and common citizenship for members of religious
minorities. The Brotherhood’s participation in politics has also created a felt
need within the movement’s ranks to form a political party.
The Egyptian Brothers
most in favor of establishing a political party belong to the “second
generation” or "middle generation" (jil al-wasat). These men, many of whom were activists in Islamist
student organizations in the 1970s, are skilled and politically savvy, and more
interested in political work than in dawa. Some of
these activists have advocated setting up a party alongside the Brotherhood's dawa structure, while others have suggested that the
Brotherhood transform itself entirely into a political party. Today, the
Egyptian Brotherhood's discourse is abuzz with discussion about the future
Brotherhood party, which is often described as “a civil party with a religious
source of authority” (marja’iyyah.)
Contemporary Islamist
writers ordinarily describe this concept of a “civil state with an Islamic
source of authority” as an alternative to the traditional Brotherhood concept
of a state operating on the principle of divine rule (hakimiyyah),
which requires the full implementation of sharia. But while the Egyptian
Brotherhood gives lip service to the creation of a civil party and a civil
state, it continues to adhere as an organization to the principle of hakimiyyah. It regards itself as a comprehensive movement
that combines religion and the state and seeks to implement sharia in all
aspects of human activity.
The Brotherhood’s
mission statement, which is permanently posted on its official Arabic-language
website,[3] defines the Brotherhood as a Muslim community (jama’ah)
that preaches for and demands the rule of Allah’s law (tahkim
shar’ allah). It recapitulates the Brotherhood creed
first formulated at its fifth conference (January 1939) that declares that
Islam is a complete and total system and is the final arbiter of life in all
its aspects, in all nations and in all times.[4] The “Reform Initiative,” which
the Brotherhood launched in March 2004, states clearly that the ultimate goal
of Islamic reform is the implementation of sharia. It also says:
We have a clear
mission—to implement Allah’s law, on the basis of our belief that that it is
the real, effective way out of all our problems—domestic or external,
political, economic, social or cultural. That is to be achieved by forming the
Muslim individual, the Muslim home, the Muslim government, and the state which
will lead the Islamic states, reunite the scattered Muslims, restore their
glory, retrieve for them their lost lands and stolen homelands, and carry the banner
of the call to Allah in order to bless the world with Islam’s teachings.[5]
In the Egyptian
context, even the most ardent advocates of the siyasah
strategy have neither accepted the separation of religion and state, nor
abandoned the principle that Islam is both religion and state (din wa-dawlah). These advocates also uphold the Brotherhood’s
identity as a religious dawa movement that is
committed to Islam’s total and universal nature. Thus, according to Abd al-Mun’im Abu al-Futuh, one of the
most outspoken “second generation” advocates of the political strategy, the
most important achievement of the Brotherhood has been its success in spreading
the concept of a universal and comprehensive Islam and of the inseparability of
state and religion.[6] Issam al-Aryan, another
prominent second generation leader and promoter of the siyasah
strategy, defined the Brotherhood's objective as:
The construction of a
total revival on the foundations and principles of Islam, which begins with
reforming the Muslim individual, the Muslim home and the Muslim society,
continues with reforming government and restoring the international entity [al-kiyan al-duwali] of the Islamic
nation, and ends with being the masters of the world [ustadhiyat
al-‘alam] through guidance and preaching [bil-hidayah wal-irshad wal-dawa].[7]
This concept, that
the Brotherhood is a guide to society, obviously does not conform to the idea
of a civil party, one among many that compete with one another without claiming
possession of the absolute truth or pretending to guide the others. Neither is
the Islamic concept of the “Guide” as the title of the Brotherhood's leader
indicative of a democratic organization. The Brotherhood has, therefore, made
it a point to refer to its leader as the “Chairman of the MB group" on its
English-language website, to his deputy as the “Deputy Chairman” and so forth.
On the Brotherhood’s Arabic-language sites and in its publications, however,
the leader is still the “General Guide” (al-Murshid al-‘Aamm),
the organization's highest institution is the “Guidance Bureau” (Maktab al-Irshad), etc. Far from regarding itself as one
political actor among many, the Brotherhood views itself as speaking for Islam.
The Brotherhood's claim to be the true representative of Islam is reflected in
its electoral slogan, “Islam is the Solution” (al-Islam huwa
al-hal). The slogan has been sharply criticized, but
the Brotherhood has refused to give it up. The MB believes their movement
represents the real and true Islamic community. That is why the Brotherhood
would not transform itself into a political party: If Islam is comprehensive,
and the MB is Islam, then it cannot be reduced to a political party.
The Egyptian MB Party’s Program
In 2006 the Egyptian
Brotherhood made several public relations mistakes—including the display of
force by MB students performing martial arts in al-Azhar University (10
December 2006)—that hurt its efforts to project itself as a nonviolent, civil
movement. These mistakes, in turn, helped the regime paint the Brotherhood as a
violent movement that poses a threat to Egypt's national security. Facing the
regime's pressure and wanting to improve its image and acquire legitimacy as a
civil movement seeking democratic reform, the MB started in early 2007 to focus
public attention on its future political party and its program. The Brotherhood
announced that it had decided to establish a party and was on the verge of
publishing the party's program. Although this party has not been established
and its official program has not been published, unofficial draft texts
of its platform—not formally endorsed by the Brotherhood—have been circulated
and have aroused public debate.
The unofficial texts
not only support the supremacy of sharia in the Brotherhood's future state, but
also institutionalize it. Thus, the future party seeks to implement “the
authority of Islamic Sharia” (marja'iyyat al-shari'ah al-Islamiyyah) in the
following manner:[8]
o
The legislative branch should consult an assembly of religious scholars.
The president of the state must also consult this assembly of religious
scholars whenever he issues decisions that have legal power.
o
Whenever there is a definitive sharia ruling, backed by a definite holy text (nass), the legislative branch has no authority to legislate
differently. When a clear holy text is not available, the position of the
assembly of scholars can be put to vote in the legislative branch. Rejecting
that position requires an absolute majority of the members of the legislative
branch.
o
The assembly of religious scholars should be elected by religious scholars, and
enjoy total freedom from the executive branch.
The Brotherhood thus seeks to institutionalize sharia rule by establishing its
own version of the radical Shia concept of "rule of the jurist."
The draft program
further says that the state has fundamental religious functions, as it is
responsible for protecting and defending Islam. Those religious functions are
represented by the head of state, and consequently the head of state must be a
Muslim. That is also so because decisions on matters of war are sharia
decisions, requiring that whoever makes them will be a Muslim. (Other drafts
have specifically stated that the president must be a Muslim male.)[9] The
draft declared as well, however, that the state will be based on the principle
of citizenship (muwatanah), that all citizens will
have equal rights and obligations, and that "the woman will enjoy all her
rights, to be practiced in conformity with the fundamental values of
society."
How does the MB
square the equality of all citizens with the exclusion of non-Muslims and women
from the top state position? What are "the fundamental values of
society" that govern women rights, and who defines them? Those and similar
questions emerged following the appearance of the drafts. First Deputy General
Guide Muhammad Habib clarified what he described as the Brotherhood's "red
lines" on these issues: Copts and women, he stressed, cannot be the head
of state.[10] Moreover, the Brotherhood’s leadership rejected a proposal to
insert wording into the draft that presented the authority of sharia as
reflecting the people's, rather than the divine, will. The rejected formulation
stated: "The authority of the Islamic sharia is a constitutional principle
chosen by the nation by its free will…. That authority is not imposed on the
nation, and becomes an authority only due to the nation's choice."[11]
On all of these
issues, the draft program met with harsh criticism, including from within the
MB itself. In defense of the draft, Abd al-Futuh
argued that any misunderstanding resulted simply from "mistaken
phrasing," and that the assembly of religious scholars would be a
consultative body only and that a woman could be the head of state. He did not
say, however, that a non-Muslim could be head of state.[12]
Since the November
2005 legislative elections, the Egyptian government has undertaken a series of
measures that have aimed to deny the Brotherhood any political role. Those
measures have included large-scale and ongoing arrests that have targeted,
among others, top MB leaders; the use of military courts; a crackdown on the
Brotherhood’s financial infrastructure; and constitutional amendments, adopted
in March 2007, designed to undercut the Brotherhood's electoral activity.
As a consequence of these actions, not one Brotherhood-supported candidate was
elected in the Majlis al-Shura (Consultative Council) elections of June 2007.
As the government has
imposed these constraints, the Brotherhood's political strategies have come
under increasing criticism from within both the Islamist movement and the
Brotherhood itself. In early 2007, Ali Abd al-Hafiz of Asyut University led a
group of Brotherhood members out of the organization, and formed what he called
“the Alternative Trend” (al-Tayar al-Badil). He called on the Brotherhood to separate itself
entirely from the political realm, arguing that one cannot claim to be a
religious and moral guide to society while, at the same time, competing in
elections against those one pretends to guide.[13]
In January 2007,
Abdullah al-Nafisi, a former Brotherhood member and renowned Islamist scholar,
went even further. He argued that the Brotherhood’s political strategy had
exhausted the movement by involving it in endless skirmishes with the regime,
and had few valuable achievements to show for it. By being so immersed in daily
political struggles, the Brotherhood had lost strategic direction and long-term
systematic thinking, and had become a burden on the Islamist movement itself.
It was better for the Brotherhood to dissolve itself, he concluded, and
transform itself into a school of thought.[14]
In a similar
argument, Muhammad Salim al-Awa—a well-known Islamist thinker, former
Brotherhood member and close associate of Shaykh Yusuf al-Qaradawi—urged
the Brotherhood in June 2007 to leave politics altogether for ten years. He
pleaded that the movement should focus instead on educational, cultural and
social work. The Brotherhood's political action had given nothing to the Muslim
people of Egypt, he argued, adding that the right way to fight injustice and
tyranny is not by running for parliament, but by educating the people and
caring for them.[15]
So far, the
Brotherhood's leadership has reacted both to the regime's new constraints and
to criticism from Islamists by staying its course. It did not resort to public
protests and demonstrations in response to the regime's crackdown, nor has it
shown signs of changing its strategy. In response to its critics, the
leadership has told its followers that the movement had seen worse repression
in its long history, and that it has survived in the past through patience and
perseverance.
Moreover, the MB
leadership has rejected ideological and organizational change, asserting that
the movement has a course, a set of “constants” or “fixed principles” (thawabit), and a historical heritage that must be adhered
to. Whoever chooses to follow a different path that is not in harmony with the
movement’s course is free to do so—but only outside the movement. As such, the
fixed and constant principles of the MB must always be respected and followed,
lest the movement disintegrate into factions and parties. It is “our belief
that Islam is total, comprehensive, and an integrated whole … it is
unimaginable therefore that someone from the ranks should show up, calling for
the breaking up of Islam, trying to push the movement into the unknown,” wrote
Muhammad Habib.[16] (Those “calling for the breaking up of Islam” are either
the advocates of separating siyasah from dawa, or those that favor abandoning the political strategy
altogether).
The Brotherhood's
rejection of separating the religious and political realms derives from its
view of itself as a comprehensive movement that is committed to the application
of sharia in all realms of human life. But why has the Egyptian Brotherhood
chosen to refrain from violent reaction? This is apparently explained by the
Brotherhood's doctrine of pursuing power.
That doctrine is
based on the Brotherhood’s long-term dawa strategy of
Islamizing society from the bottom up. According to this plan, the Brotherhood
will be able to take power only at the stage of tamkin,
when the movement will have won the hearts and minds of a significant majority,
if not all, of the people. At this stage, all the necessary steps to prepare
society as whole for the embrace of a fully Islamic order will have been taken.
These steps entail, among other things, the penetration and ideological
indoctrination of such "influential institutions" as the military,
the police, the media, educational institutions like al-Azhar, legal
institutions and the parliament. Moreover, the external, international
environment also needs to be prepared for the Brotherhood’s ascension to
power.[17]
The Brotherhood’s
reaction to the Mubarak regime’s imposition of constraints on its activities
seems to reflect its assessment that the ground is not yet sufficiently
prepared for it to attain power. The Brotherhood’s leaders have in fact
publicly stated that the organization is not yet ready to assume complete
power. The MB’s General Guide Muhammad Mahdi Akif has even characterized all
the recent cases in which Islamists have assumed power—in Sudan, Iran,
Afghanistan and Somalia—as failures, because those regimes were not raised to
power by the people’s will. He added that the Brotherhood will be ready and
able to assume power only when the people accept its message and desire its
rule.[18] In light of these statements, it appears the Brotherhood leadership
has chosen to avoid making any provocative moves, as it does not want to
provide the regime with a legitimate reason for taking measures that could put
the movement at risk.
Hamas’s election
victory in Gaza in 2006 and its subsequent formation of a government did not
conform to the Egyptian Brotherhood’s concept of reaching power either. Both
the domestic and external environments were unprepared for it. Indeed, in
August 2007 Deputy General Guide Muhammad Habib stated that Hamas's election
victory had "negatively affected the political reality in Egypt and in the
Arab world"[19] (that is to say, Hamas’s victory has damaged the prospects
of the Brotherhood in the region).
It should be clear
that the Brotherhood has not ruled out the use of violence in principle.
Although Akif did indeed say in March 2007 that violence would not be one of
the Brotherhood’s means for reacting to its exclusion from the political system,[20]
he later qualified that remark in August 2007. At that time, he did not abjure
violence, but argued that violence should not be undertaken when the regime is
favored in the balance of power and thus, likely to win in a conflict. As Akif
said, "It is not in everyone's interest that violence or a clash take
place now, and it is not in [our] interest now to conduct resistance against
the government, because it has millions who have been prepared to confront
protests, to repress demonstrators, and to beat and arrest them (emphasis
added.)"[21]
In light of this, it
seems that the Brotherhood's leadership likely believes that there is little
advantage in risking further trouble now. Rather, it apparently opts to prepare
for the day after President Hosni Mubarak departs, when the Brotherhood will
have a chance to play a key role in shaping the new order. Patiently waiting
for that time seems to be the Egyptian Brotherhood’s chosen option—at least for
now.
The Jordanian MB
The Jordanian branch
of the Brotherhood was established in 1945 to pursue the Islamization of
society, the creation of an Islamic state that would implement sharia, the
conduct of jihad to liberate occupied Muslim lands, the unification of the
Muslim nation, and the liberation of the globe from idols (tawaghit).[22]
In the 1950s and 60s, the Jordanian Brotherhood formed an alliance with the
Jordanian state to oppose their common enemy, Nasser’s pan-Arabism and
socialism. That alliance ended in the 1980s, however, when Islamism became the
main ideological rival to the monarchy.
Since then, the
Jordanian MB has come under the influence of the radical, takfiri ideology of
Said Qutb, Abdullah Azzam and others. It has also
become increasingly influenced by Hamas. This has led to the Jordanian MB’s
increasingly confrontational posture toward the state and, in turn, the
regime’s efforts to contain and reduce the Brotherhood's power. [22]
In 1992, the
Jordanian MB formed a political party—the Islamic Action Front (IAF). One
reason for the creation of this party was to protect the Jordanian MB’s dawa activities from any measures the government might
adopt against its political activities. The IAF’s declared objectives include
fostering a return to Islamic life and applying sharia in all fields, preparing
the Muslim Nation for jihad against Zionist and imperialist enemies, helping
the Palestinian cause and seeking to liberate Palestine achieving
national unity and liberty, confronting imperialist and foreign influences, and
establishing a system of government based on democratic principles and shura,
or consultation.[23]
The party’s blueprint
for a new Jordan, entitled “The Islamist Movement’s Vision of Reform in
Jordan,” demands the implementation of Islamic law, and states that “sharia is
the source of the laws and of legislation” (al-Shari’ah
al-Islamiyyah hiya masdar
al-qawanin wal-tashri’at).
The document further states that the "Islamic Movement" seeks to
establish Allah's sharia on earth and to construct life on the basis of justice
and liberty, in a civil society whose source of authority is Islamic.[24] Far
from abandoning the idea of creating an Islamic state that will implement
sharia, the MB has established a political party committed to advancing that
goal.
The MB and IAF oppose
the Jordanian government on the most critical strategic issues. Several fatwas
issued by the IAF's committee of sharia scholars denounced Jordan's alliance
with the United States and its assistance to American and allied forces in
Iraq. They also attacked the Jordanian king directly, stating that a ruler who
allies himself with the enemies of his religion and his nation becomes one of
them.[25] Another IAF fatwa proclaimed that Jordan’s relations with Israel
contradicted the sharia and must be severed. It said that maintaining those
relations amounted to a betrayal of Allah, the Prophet and the Muslim
Nation.[26] The IAF has additionally supported the Iran-Hezbollah-Syria-Hamas
axis and maintained close contacts with the Syrian regime, despite that
regime’s persecution of the Syrian branch of the MB.
The Jordanian
Brotherhood's strong ties to Hamas raise the question of whether it still is a
truly Jordanian organization. Unlike their Egyptian counterparts, the Jordanian
Brothers have stated clearly that their aim is to reach power without delay.
Following Hamas’s 2006 victory in Gaza, IAF leaders expressed confidence that
they, too, would soon win an electoral victory, boasting that the Islamic
movement was ready to assume political power.[27]
As the Jordanian MB
has become more radical, however, the government has moved to limit its power
and influence. It passed legislation limiting the Brotherhood’s dawa activities and implemented new measures to control the
movement’s financial arm and thus reduce its ability to sustain its
country-wide network of social, educational and religious institutions. In July
2007 the MB escalated the standoff with the government by withdrawing from
municipal elections while they were in progress, accusing the government of
fraud, and threatening to boycott the November 2007 legislative elections. The
government responded by signaling that it might ban the Brotherhood from
politics.
This confrontation
led to an internal dispute within the Brotherhood. Ultimately, more pragmatic
voices overcame the opposition of hardliners, and the Brotherhood participated
in the legislative elections. But it won only 7 out of the 22 seats that it
contested, compared to the 17 it had won in the previous elections.
The Jordanian Brotherhood
subsequently claimed that the elections were rigged by the government. But
according to reliable observers, the Brotherhood’s electoral setbacks can not be ascribed wholly to the government’s
interference. Observers believe that some voters may not have supported the
Brotherhood because of its close association with Hamas, whose popular appeal
has been waning somewhat especially since its violent takeover of Gaza. In any
case, the disaffection of voters with the Brotherhood is cited as a major factor
in that electoral defeat. As Muhammad Abu Rumman, the
Jordanian expert on the MB, has explained:
The organization has
totally failed to offer the public a convincing political discourse which would
transcend resounding slogans. The people are fed up with those slogans and know
for certain that they are unrealistic and incongruous with the citizen's
concerns and grave economic conditions. The Brotherhood's electoral campaign
was characterized by old, used-up phrases which exposed its candidates as being
devoid of any realistic political vision.[28]
This political
failure was only one more demonstration of the Jordanian Brotherhood's crisis.
That crisis has produced criticism of the MB leadership and calls for a
dramatic change of direction. Even before the elections, Ibrahim Gharaibah, a former senior MB member, proposed sweeping
organizational and ideological changes, arguing that the Brotherhood had
outlived its original mission and that it had lost its direction. He
further said that the Brotherhood must choose between three different courses
of action—namely, dawa, politics or social
work—because it was impossible to combine them. He urged the Brotherhood to
become a social movement that would focus on organizing and leading the middle
classes in the face of new challenges posed by globalization and privatization.
Alternatively, he suggested that the Brotherhood movement could either
transform itself completely into a political party or turn its political arm
into a party that was truly independent of the wider movement.[29]
An article on the
Jordanian MB’s official website offered yet another strategy, urging the
Brotherhood to think "creatively" about new ways to confront
repressive regimes. It proposed changing the rules of the political game—for example,
by organizing large-scale civil disobedience. It called for an end to the
"Meccan period" in the Brotherhood’s thinking—an allusion to the time
when the Prophet Mohammed and his followers were persecuted by the tribes of
Mecca, which Mohammed ended abruptly by immigrating to Yathrib. The article
further suggested that the MB should react more aggressively to regime
repression and follow Hamas’s example. "If the Brotherhood's bones are to
be broken, why not break the enemy's bones too?" asked the writer.[30]
MB Views Of The “Turkish Model”
The AKP’s July 2007
victory in the Turkish elections generated mixed reactions amongst MB branches
throughout the Arab world. Some saw the AKP’s success as a vindication of the
Brotherhood’s strategic decision to participate in electoral politics. Others
expressed strong reservations to the very idea of considering the AKP an
Islamist party, and voiced doubts about whether the AKP’s victory should
rightly be considered a victory for the Islamic movement.
Among the AKP’s
supporters, Shaykh Faisal Mawlawi, the head of Al-Jama’ah al-Islamiyya, the
Lebanese Brotherhood branch, had no problem with the AKP’s professed commitment
to secularism. The AKP did not abandon its Islamic principles, he said, but
only tried to achieve what was possible in difficult conditions. Moreover, he
argued that the AKP had succeeded in moving a step closer to an original
Islamic solution that could be developed and implemented in the age of
materialistic globalization.[31] Abdelilah Benkirane, a leader of the Moroccan Justice and Development
Party, was more skeptical. As he said, the AKP “are far more advanced in
politics than us: We are still in the dawa phase. And
they may be a role model, but they make too many concessions on Islam: They even
serve alcohol at their official receptions, it’s shameful.”[32]
For their part, the
leaders of the Egyptian Brotherhood rejected any suggestion that their
organization was analogous to the AKP. That was probably in reaction to calls
for the Egyptian MB to emulate the AKP by shedding the traditional Ikhwani ideology, which some have described as unpopular
and hence, useless in the political arena. Additionally, the Egyptian
Brotherhood’s leadership argued forcefully that the AKP was not the right role
model for the Islamic movement.[33] Among other things, they claimed that the
AKP’s goal was merely to wield political power without generating a tangible,
substantive Islamic change in society. The Brotherhood, by contrast, seeks
political power for the purpose of creating a fully Islamic society.
Furthermore, the Egyptian MB leaders pointed out that Turkey’s Prime Minister
Erdogan adheres to the rules of the Turkish political system, to Turkey’s
constitution, and to the country’s secular identity. This adherence to
secularism—or the “AKP’s choice,” as the Egyptian leaders described it—cannot
be the Brotherhood’s position in any form. They said that Brotherhood seeks to
revive the unified Islamic nation, restore its leading global role, and
reestablish the Islamic Caliphate, whereas the AKP has no universal Islamic
agenda—and even worse, seeks integration into Europe.
The MB And The United States
Neutralizing American
opposition to the Muslim Brotherhood is a key objective in the Egyptian MB’s
plan to prepare the way for its future assumption of political power. The
Brotherhood’s “Reform Initiative,” which was launched in March 2004, aimed to
persuade outsiders that the Brotherhood was in fact a “moderate Islamist”
movement. The MB remains unwilling, however, to pay for dialogue with the
United States by making any substantial ideological or political concessions.
And as the self-appointed leader of the Arab Islamic struggle, the Egyptian MB
continues to hold firm to the idea that its overall project is in total conflict
with that of the United States.
In the view of
General Guide Akif, the policies of the United States are particularly hostile
toward the Arab and Muslim world.[34] He stated in a recent missive that
Islam is the only way to save the international community from American
tyranny, which is bound to spread a "destructive chaos" (a swipe
aimed at what the MB perceives to be the American notion of spreading
“constructive chaos” in order to reform the Middle East) and destroy the whole
world.
In another recent missive Akif called on young jihadis, like those who
committed the suicide attacks in Morocco and Algeria, to direct their efforts,
using all possible means, “against the real enemy of the Nation (Umma), the
enemy which occupies, kills, desecrates and plunders . . . in al-Quds, in
Baghdad and in Kabul.”[35] Akif’s deputy, Muhammad Habib, said that the role of
the Brotherhood was to resist “the American project, which seeks to bring the
Nation down to its knees, to weaken its faith, to corrupt its morality, to
plunder its resources, and to eradicate its cultural particularity.”[36]
Second generation MB
leaders like Issam al-Aryan have expressed interest
in dialogue with the United States. But al-Aryan, too, has held firmly to
the position that the Brotherhood's project is fundamentally opposed to the
American one. He welcomed dialogue “as a cultural and human value,” but
at the same time pointed to a basic conflict between, on the one hand, “the
growing American project of empire and hegemony,” and on the other, the
Brotherhood's project of constructing an Islamic revival, liberating Muslim
lands from any foreign influence, unifying the Arabs, and creating an
international Islamic order (kiyan dawli islami).[37]
In July 2007 al-Aryan
called for opening relations with the West, but he warned that the Muslim
Brothers should not submit to Western dictates and unfair preconditions. The
purpose of any dialogue with the West, as he saw it, was to demand that the
West respect the right of Muslims to choose their way of life and to be ruled
by the sharia (wa-shari’atihim allati
tahkumuhum). The West should not impose another
system on Muslim countries.[3
The Shia Question
While Egyptian
Brotherhood leaders have voiced criticisms about Iran's role in Iraq and the
Shi'a resurgence, they also see Iran and Hezbollah as major partners in the
struggle against Israel and the U.S. In the past, this has meant that the
Egyptian MB has routinely rejected the view that Iran constitutes a strategic
threat to Arabs. Moreover, it has generally welcomed Iran’s nuclear program by
reiterating the Iranian regime’s claim that the program was for peaceful
purposes, while at the same time adding that any possible military purpose
would “create a sort of a balance” between the Arab and Islamic world, on the
one hand, and Israel and its allies on the other.[39]
The Egyptian MB has
also tended not to show much concern over Iran’s efforts to spread Shi’a Islam
in Arab countries. Akif has repeatedly dismissed the phenomenon of Sunni conversions
to Shi’a Islam in Egypt as insignificant, and has rejected the idea of a
rising, increasingly powerful “Shi’a crescent” as neither logical nor
realistic.[40] His position has been that the rivalry between Sunnis and Shi’a
should be postponed until the day when the Muslim Nation has won its battles
with the West and the Muslims have recovered all their rights.
In May 2007, however,
the Egyptian Brotherhood’s public pronouncements about Iran and the Shi’a as a
whole seemed to change somewhat after meetings between the United States and
Iran were announced. Akif, for instance, warned that such negotiations were
likely to make Iran the dominant regional actor and thus would threaten the
power of Arab Sunni states.[41] More recently, the Deputy General Guide Habib
said that Iran’s role in the Middle East was “raising concerns,” and that Iran
was seeking to enlarge its sphere of influence into Arab societies. He added,
however, that Iran’s strategy was a legitimate response to American policies in
the region, and roundly criticized what he called the "Arab moderate
axis" for serving American interests. He further urged Arab countries to
stand up to the United States and support Islamic "resistance
projects" (mashru'at al-muqawamah)
worldwide.[42]
Generally speaking,
the Jordanian MB’s attitude toward Iran and toward Shiism as a whole appears to
be much less coherent than that of the Egyptian branch. In fact, the MB’s
Jordanian branch appears to be internally deeply divided on the Shia question.
The takfiri, anti-Shi’a sentiment within its ranks conflicts with its professed
solidarity with Hamas, Iran's ally. Therefore, while the Jordanian MB highly
values Iran's support of the Palestinian cause, it has also been deeply
critical of Iran's role in the destruction, sectarianism, and violence against
Sunnis in Iraq, going so far as to allege that Iran actually facilitated the
American invasion of that country. It has also been claimed that Iran helped
the United States topple the Sunni Taliban regime in Afghanistan.[43]
Jan. 3, 2007 As an
example see, Egyptian court: "Islam is the final and most complete religion
and therefore Muslims already practice full freedom of religion and cannot
convert"
1. Khalil al-'Anani, "Hal Iktamal Qaws Intikasat al-Islamiyyin al-'Arab?"
http://www.daralhayat.com/opinion/09-2007/item-20070926-42f60a75-c0a8-10ed-00c3-e8c477ec2c9e/story.html,
27 September 2007.
2. Idris Lagrini, “Al-Harakat al-Islamiyyah
al-Musharikah fi al-Mu`assasat
al-Siyasiyyah fi al-Bilad al-‘Arabiyyah
wa-Turkiya,”
http://www.islamismscope.com/index.php?art/id:220; Ámru
Hamzawi, “Anmat Musharakat al-Harakat al-Islamiyyah
fi al-Siyasah al-‘Arabiyyah,”
Al-Hayat (24 July 2007); ‘Abd al-Salam Tawil, “Qira`ah
fi al-Masar al-Siyasi li-Hizb al-‘Adalah wal-Tanmiyah al-Maghribi”,
www.islamismscope.com/index.php?art/id:332; Husam Tamam, "Al-Maghrib–Dars fi
al-'Alaqah bayna al-Da'awi wal-Siyasi, fi Manhajiyat al-Tamyiz wa-Idaratihi Waqi'iyyan,"
http://www.islamonline.net/arabic/Daawa/movement/2006/07/03c.shtml, 25 July
2006.
3.
www.ikhwanonline.com/Article.asp?ArtID=120&SecID=0.
4. Richard P.
Mitchell, The Society of the Muslim Brothers (London: Oxford University Press,
1969), p. 14.
5.
www.ikhwanonline.com, 3 March 2004.
6. “Inside the Muslim
Brotherhood—an Interview with Abdul Moneim Abu El-Foutouh,” Islamism Digest (August 2006), www.cfsot.com/publications/ISLAM~2.pdf.
7. “Dr. al-‘Aryan Yaktub: Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun wa-intikhabat Majlis al-Shura, limadha
Nashtarik?”
http://www.ikhwanonline.com/Article.asp?ArtID=28550&SecID=390, 22 May 2007.
8. “Barnamaj Hizb al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin, al-Isdar al-Awwal,”
http://www.islamonline.net/arabic/Daawa/2007/08/ikhwan.pdf. 25 August 2007.
9. Muhammad Baha`,
"Barnamij Hizb
al-Ikhwan- Iyjabiyyat wa-Silbiyyat,"
http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=article_C&cid=11899593748568&pagename=Zone-arabic-Daawa%2FDWALayout,
24 September 2007.
10. First Deputy
General Guide Muhammad Habib, quoted in
http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1184649919338&pagename=zone-Arabic-Daawa%2FDWALayout,
16 August 2007.
11. “Ta'dilat Mufakkir Qubti 'ala Barnamaj al-Ikhwan,”
http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=articleA_C&cid=1188044035567&pagename=Zone-Arabic-Daawa%2FDWALout,
3 September 2007.
12. "Abu al-Futuh Yahki Qissat
Barnamij al-Ikhwan,"
http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=ArticleA_C&cid=1190886237309&pagename=Zone-Arabic-Daawa%2FDWALayout,
9 October 2007.
13. Al-Sharq al-Awsat (30 June 2007);
www.masrawy.com/News/2007/Egypt/Politics/May/28/ikhwan-asiut.aspx, 28 May 2007.
See also Mamduh Thabit, “Qiyadi
Munshaqq ‘an al-Ikhwan Yad’u
ila ‘Tayar Badil,”
www.almasry-alyoum.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=62839, 31 May 2007; ‘Abdullah al-Tahawi, “Kuntu Ikhwaniyan,” www.masr.20at.com/newArticle.php?sid=10315, 21
May 2007; “Al-Tayar al-Badil,”
http://elbarode.maktoobblog.com/?post=340200
14. ‘Abdullah ben
Fahd al-Nafisi, “Al-Halah al-Islamiyyah
fi Qatar,” Al-Manar al-Jadid,
no. 37 (January 2007),
www.almanaraljadeed.com/show.asp?newid=31783&pageid=18.
15. “Al-‘Awa: Ad’u al-Ikhwan ila Tark al-‘Amal
al-Siyasi,” Islamonline
(10 June 2007),
http://www.islamonline.net/servelet/Satellite?c=ArticleA_C&cid=1181062529733&pagename=Zone-Arabic-News/NWALayout.
16.
http://www.ikhwanonline.com/Article.asp?ArtID=29851&SecID=391, 21 July
2007; http://www.ikhwanonline.com/Article.asp?ArtID=30193&SecID=391, 5
August 2007; Muhammad Habib,
http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=ArticleA_C&cid=1184649919338&pagename=zone-arabic-Daawa%2FDWALayout,
16 August 2007.
17. “Al-Watha`iq al-Sirriyyah lil-Ikhwan al-Muslimin” (The
Secret Documents of the MB), Al-Musawwar Weekly (3
June 1994): 20-23, 70-73; “Khuttat al-Ikhwan lil-Istila` ‘ala al-Hukm” (The
MB’s Plan to Take Over Power), Al-Musawwar Weekly (10
June 1994): 14 -19, 78.
18. Interview in
http://www.alwatan.com.kw/Default.aspx?pageId=84&MgDid=483589, 27 March
2007.
19.
www.ikhwanonline.com, 15 August 2007.
20. Interview in
http://www.alwatan.com.kw/Default.aspx?pageId=84&MgDid=483589, 27 March
2007.
21. Interview in
http://www.al-araby.com/docs/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=130746.
22. “The Objectives
and the Means” of the Jordanian MB, posted on the organization’s official site,
www.ikhwan-jor.org/ikhwan_jo_ahdaf.htm.
23. IAF’s
Fundamental Regulations–The Seventh Edition, posted since 1 August 2002 on the
IAF’s official website, www.jabha.net/body4.asp?field=doc&id=2.
24.
http://www.jabha.net/aslah.ASP, accessed 17 September 2007.
25.
www.jabha.net/body5.asp?field=ftawa&id=3.
26. “Fatwa Shar’iyyah Sadirah ‘an Lajnat ‘Ulama al-Shari’ah al-Islamiyyah fi Hizb al-‘Amal al-Islami,” www.jabha.net/body5.asp?field=ftawa&id=15, 8
April 2002.
27. IAF leader Zaki Bani Irshid iterview on www.ikhwanonline.com, 13 May 2006.
[1] Muhammad Abu Rumman, "al-Ikhwan ba'd al-Hazimah", Al-Ghad, 22 November 2007,
http://www.alghad.jo/index.php?article=7597.
29. Ibrahim Gharaibah, “Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun
fi Muwajahat al-Mustaqbal,”
http://www.alghad.jo/index.php?article=6424, 30 May 2007; Ibrahim Gharaibah, "Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun
wa-Tahawwulat al-‘Amal al-Siyasi,”
http://www.alghad.jo/index.php?article=6462, 5 June 2007.
30. Usama Abu Irshid, "Hamas Tudashshin Bidayat Nihayat 'al-Hiqbah al-Makkiyyah' fi al-Tafkir al-Ikhwani,"
http://www.ikhwan-jor.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=672,
22 June 2007.
31.
http://www.egyptwindow.net/modules.php?name=News&file=print&sid=6034,
24 July 2007.
32. Quoted by Wendy
Kristiansen, “Can Morocco’s Islamists Check al-Qaida?” Le Monde diplomatique
(August 2007), http://mondediplo.com/2007/08/06morocco.
33. Jum'ah Amin 'Abd al-'Aziz, Al-Mas`alah
al-Turkiyyah wa-Tawdhih al-Afham,”
http://www.ikhwanonline.com/Article.asp?ArtId=30131&SecID=390, 2 August
2007; Muhammad Mursi, “Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun wal-Ahzab al-Islamiyyah al-Mu’asirah,”
http://www.ikhwanonline.com/Article.asp?ArtID=30200&SecID=390, 5 August
2007.
34. “Amrika Tanshur al-Fawdhah fi al-‘Aalam,”
http://www.ikhwanonline.com/print.asp?ArtId=28784&SecID=213, 31 May 2007.
35. “Al-Mashru’ al-Amriki
al-Sahyuni,”
http://www.ikhwanonline.com/print.asp?ArtID=27784&SecID=213, 19 April 2007.
36. http://www.ikhwanonline.com/print.asp?ArtID=28606&SecID=390,
24 May 2007.
37. “Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun wa-Amirika,”
www.ikhwanonline.com, 21 December 2005.
38. Issam al-‘Aryan, “Hal Yumkin an Yatakarrar fi al-‘Alam al-‘Arabi
ma Hadatha fi Turkya?”
http://www.ikhwanonline.com/print.asp?ArtID=30042&SecID=390, 30 July 2007.
39. "Misr: al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun la Yumani’un fi Hiyazat Iran Silahan Nawawiyyan,” Al-Sharq al-Awsat (18 April 2006).
40. Akif in
http://www.alwatan.com.kw/Default.aspx?pageId=84&MgDid=483589, 27 March
2007; http://www.ikhwanonline.com/print.asp?ArtID=26281&SecID=210, 11
February 2007.
41.
http://www.ikhwanonline.com/print.asp?ArtID=28784&SecID=213, 31 May 2007.
42.
www.ikhwanonline.com, 15 August 2007; http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=ArticleA_C&cid=1184649919338&pagename=zone-Arabic-Daawa%2FDWALayout,
16 August 2007.
43. Muhammad
al-Najjar, “Ikhwan al-Urdun wa-Iran–Bidayat Talaq am Muraja’at ‘Alaqat?”
http://www.aljazeera.net/News/archive/archive?ArchiveId=1032410, 12 February
2007.
44. Muhammad Abu Rumman, “Islamiyyu al-Sharq fi Hadhrat al-Ustadh Erdogan,”
http://www.alghad.jo/index.php?article=6832, 29 July 2007.
45. Khalil al-'Anani, "Hal Iktamal Qaws Intikasat al-Islamiyyin al-'Arab?",
http://www.daralhayat.com/opinion/09-2007/item-20070926-42f60a75-c0a8-10ed-00c3-e8c477ec2c9e/story.html,
27 September 2007.
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