Very long --- but worth the time
Dick
THE 15TH ANNUAL TEMPLETON LECTURE
ON RELIGION AND WORLD AFFAIRS
MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD ORGANIZATIONS IN AMERICA:
GOALS, IDEOLOGIES, AND STRATEGIES
by Lorenzo Vidino
December 19, 2011
Lorenzo Vidino, Ph.D., is an academic and security expert
who specializes in Islamism and political violence in Europe
and North America. Currently a visiting fellow at the Center
for Security Studies, ETH Zurich, and a lecturer at the
University of Zurich, he previously held positions at the
RAND Corporation, the Belfer Center for Science and
International Affairs, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard
University, the U.S. Institute of Peace, and the Fletcher
School of Law and Diplomacy. He has taught at Tufts
University, the University of Maryland, and the National
Defense University. He is the author of two books (his
latest, The New Muslim Brotherhood in the West, was
published by Columbia University Press in the fall of 2010)
and frequent articles in several prominent newspapers (The
International Herald Tribune, The Wall Street Journal, The
Washington Post, The Boston Globe) and academic journals
(Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, The Washington
Quarterly, Terrorism and Political Violence). He has
testified before the U.S. Congress and consults with
governments, law firms, think tanks and media in several
countries. A native of Milan, Italy, he holds a law degree
from the University of Milan Law School and a doctorate in
international relations from the Fletcher School of Law and
Diplomacy. This essay is a revised version of the Templeton
Lecture he delivered in Philadelphia on May 19, 2011.
Available on the web and in pdf format at:
http://www.fpri.org/enotes/2011/201112.vidino.muslimbrotherhood.html
Audio and video available at:
http://www.fpri.org/multimedia/20110519.vidino.muslimbrotherhood.html
Previous Templeton lecture available at:
http://www.fpri.org/education/templetonlecture.html
THE 15TH ANNUAL TEMPLETON LECTURE
ON RELIGION AND WORLD AFFAIRS
MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD ORGANIZATIONS IN AMERICA:
GOALS, IDEOLOGIES, AND STRATEGIES
by Lorenzo Vidino
A story is illustrative of many of the dynamics I am going
to address. It is the story of Abdul Rahman Alamoudi, an
Eritrean-born biochemist, a member of the upper class in his
country, who came to the United States in 1980 for graduate
school at Boston University. After earning his degree, he
moved to Washington, D.C. and became involved in several
mainstream Muslim organizations. He began to develop an
impressive network of contacts within the upper echelons of
the U.S. political establishment. In 1990, Mr. Alamoudi co-
founded the American Muslim Council and soon became a
regular visitor to the White House, establishing good
relationships with both Republican and Democratic
administrations. He held frequent meetings in Congress, and
even managed to lobby Congress successfully to host the
first opening invocation from an Islamic leader in Congress.
The Department of Defense put Mr. Alamoudi in the powerful
position of training and vetting the imams who attend to the
religious needs of Muslims in the military. His
organization was praised by the FBI as the most mainstream
Muslim group in the United States. The State Department
appointed Mr. Alamoudi as Goodwill Ambassador, asking him to
travel throughout the world representing American Muslims.
Washington's establishment clearly considered Mr. Alamoudi a
successful representative and moderate Muslim leader who
could be a spokesman and model for the American Muslim
community.
In 2003, however, an unexpected discovery during a routine
customs inspection at London's Heathrow Airport undid
Alamoudi's accomplishments. He was found to have concealed
more than $300,000 in a suitcase. The investigation that
followed revealed that Alamoudi had been smuggling cash from
Libya illegally since 1995. That specific amount of money
was intended to support a murky plot linked to al Qaeda to
assassinate Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah. A year later, Mr.
Alamoudi pled guilty to all charges and is currently serving
a 23-year sentence in jail. The investigation also showed
that Alamoudi had financial dealings with Hamas and al
Qaeda, among other organizations.
Interestingly, to many people in Washington, Alamoudi's ties
did not come as a complete shock. Since 1990, in fact, law
enforcement had been monitoring Alamoudi's links to
suspected terrorist elements in the United States and
abroad. In addition, over the years, Alamoudi often made
comments that displayed his sympathy and ties for Islamist
groups banned in the United States. Once Mr. Alamoudi was on
the phone with an interlocutor and said that the 1998
bombing of the U.S. Embassies in East Africa were to be
condemned, but only because "Many African Muslims had died
and not a single American had died." But Alamoudi also
expressed his political views in public venues. In October
2000, speaking at Washington's Lafayette Park, only a block
from the White House, Alamoudi proudly proclaimed, "Hear
that, Bill Clinton, we're all supporters of Hamas. I wish
they added that I'm also a supporter of Hezbollah."
Now, the case of Alamoudi and the American Muslim Council
(AMC) raises several questions. In 1996, AMC claimed to have
5,000 members, out of a population of American Muslims it
estimated quite generously to be seven million. (The numbers
in reality were actually much lower than that.) How could
the head of an organization that by its own calculations
represented no more than .07 percent of the American Muslim
population, whose leadership had never been elected by the
Muslim community, and whose leaders were known to the
intelligence community as tied to terrorist groups, become
the de facto spokesman for the American Muslim community
for Washington's establishment?
The height of Mr. Alamoudi's fall makes his case unique.
But the issues raised by this story are not limited to him.
It tells us about three interrelated issues. First, there is
the nature and the modus operandi of the Muslim Brotherhood
globally and here in the United States. The second issue
relates to the organizational dynamics of the Muslim
community here in the United States. And finally, there is
the issue of the U.S. government's attitudes regarding the
Muslim community and the Muslim Brotherhood-two very
different issues.
THE NATURE OF THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD
The Muslim Brotherhood is the oldest and most influential
Islamist movement. It was founded in Egypt in 1928. And,
like most of the grassroots movements that appeared in Egypt
at the time, it was strongly opposed to colonial rule and
advocated Egyptian independence. But while most of the
movements that opposed British colonialism at the time in
Egypt took from Western ideologies, the Brotherhood based
its discourse on Islam. Creating what would become the model
of generations of Islamists, the Brotherhood saw in Islam
the answer to Western military, political, economic, and
cultural influence over the Muslim world.
Hassan al-Banna, the Brotherhood's founder, viewed Islam as
a complete, all-embracing system governing all aspects of
life-both private and public. For him, Islam was not just
"empty acts of frustration, but politics, society, economy,
law and culture." Solutions to all problems of Egypt and
more broadly of the entire Muslim community world-wide could
be found in this system, according to the Brotherhood.
In its ideology, the Brotherhood was looking at a mythical
past as a solution for its current problems. Yet its modus
operandi was very modern, and used many methods of modern
political movements to both spread its ideas and mobilize
support. The Brotherhood sought bottom-up Islamization of
society for the creation an Islamic state, through
proselytizing, spreading the ideas of the group, and
convincing people to buy into this interpretation of
Islamism
If grassroots Islamization was the main method that the
Brotherhood used from the beginning, it must also be said
that violence was part of the original equation. From the
1930s and 1940s, the Brotherhood used violence against its
opponents, whether the British, the Jewish community or the
Egyptian government. For decades, the Brotherhood was
subjected to very harsh persecution by the Egyptian
government. The worst time was in the 1960s, at the hands of
Gamal Abdel Nasser. This time included torture camps,
executions, and, for the lucky ones, deportations.
THE GLOBALIZATION OF THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD
This heavy suffering at the hands of Nasser led to three
developments. First, one wing of the Brotherhood decided to
embrace violence completely. Proselytizing was impossible.
The Brotherhood had to use violence to overthrow the
Egyptian regime and any other regime that was not Islamic
enough. So when we hear that the Muslim Brothers are the
forefathers of al Qaeda, it is a simplification, but it's
partially true. The belief that only violence can achieve
the goal of creating an Islamic state has its origin in the
thinking of Brotherhood theoretician Sayyid Qutb in the
1960s.
Second, a wing of the Brotherhood in the 1960s decided that
violence wasn't going to achieve any success. The
Brotherhood was too weak to confront Nasser and the Egyptian
regime. Only grassroots activities-"bottom-up
Islamization"-was the way forward. The Brotherhood we see
today in Egypt, participating in elections, comes from this
wing of the Brotherhood. They decided to find a modus
vivendi with the Egyptian regime, although technically
outlawed for decades in Egypt. Nevertheless, they
participated in political life and most importantly in
social life, providing social services and working on this
bottom-up Islamization.
Finally, the third development, that took place the 1960s,
was that some members migrated to other countries. Rather
than opting for violence, or participation in the system,
they chose to leave Egypt for other countries. Many went to
the Arab Gulf, to Saudi Arabia and other countries where
they held leading positions in government and the education
system. But quite a few actually came to the West and
received political asylum, whether in Europe or in North
America.
Today, groups in more than 80 countries trace their origins
to the Muslim Brotherhood and have adopted different forms
and tactics according to the environment in which they
operate. In a country like Jordan, they can participate in
elections. This has been true for a long time so they are a
political party. In Syria, the Muslim Brotherhood has been
outlawed for many decades and survives underground. And the
Brotherhood in Syria may well be reemerging. In the
Palestinian territories, it took a peculiar turn and became
Hamas. Entities belonging to this global movement succeeded
based on an informal but very sophisticated network-with
personal, financial, organizational, and most importantly
ideological ties. There is a global Muslim Brotherhood in
which organizations work according to a common vision but
with operational independence.
Every branch, in every country, is free to choose its
tactics and goals independently. There are consultations and
constant communication but there is independence. It is not
a monolithic organization. As noted, this global movement
has a presence in the West-including the United States. The
formation of these networks in the United States, as in most
Western countries, follows a similar pattern. The small
number of Brotherhood refugees who escaped persecution in
Egypt and Syria, and other countries, and came to the West
started interacting with more students from upper-middle
class of their home countries. These latter students came to
the United States and to Europe to study as graduate
students like Mr. Alamoudi in European and American
universities.
These small milieus formed in the 1960s and '70s bore
immediate fruit, as they formed the first Muslim
organizations in Europe and North America. In the United
States, the Muslim Student Association was created in 1963
at the University of Illinois. The West's freedoms allowed
the Brotherhood to do what was prohibited back home. Their
activism soon attracted other Muslim students and small
numbers of Muslim immigrants who had had no contact with
Brotherhood ideology in their home countries. It is
important to note that the first Brothers coming to America
or to Europe were not part of a concerted plot to Islamize
the West. Yet, the small organizations that spontaneously
formed in the 1960s and '70s soon developed beyond the most
optimistic expectations of their founders.
Today, thanks to ideological flexibility, unrelenting
activism, and access to large funding, the networks
originally established by the Brotherhood have grown
exponentially. Although their membership has remained small,
the "Western Brothers" have shown an enormous ability to
monopolize the Islamic discourse, making their
interpretation of Islam and political events the most
readily available. Moreover, in many countries, the Western
Brothers have positioned themselves at the forefront of the
competition to be the main interlocutors of local
establishments. Mr. Alamoudi is a good example. It is
apparent that no other competing Islamic movement has the
visibility, the political influence, and the access to
Western elites that the Western Brothers have obtained over
the last 20 years.
AMERICAN BROTHERHOOD ORGANIZATIONS
In the United States, the nucleus that started with the
Muslim Student Association in the 1960s spawned a myriad of
organizations like the Islamic Association of North America
(ISNA) and the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).
Each has its own magazine, website, annual conference, and
regional branches. But their unity is shown by common
financial sources, interlocking board of directors, and
occasional participation in common initiatives. The few
hundred individuals who run them form a small social network
united by family, business and most importantly ideological
ties.
Affluent, well-connected, highly educated and motivated,
they are a clique of leaders with few followers but ample
clout. They are often the people U.S. authorities reach out
to when seeking to engage the Muslim community, as the story
of Mr. Alamoudi showed. They are not the only ones. It is
not a monopoly, but certainly something close to it. Why is
this? I think it's a combination of three reasons. The
first is organizational skills. They are visible, vocal, and
they lobby. They have offices a few blocks from Capitol
Hill; and are Washington based. And they are very active.
Secondly, competing Islamic organizations don't share these
strengths. The American Muslim community tends to be very
well integrated. Most live in suburbs, scattered throughout
a huge country. They are extremely divided in terms of
ethnicity and origin. Most American Muslims do not have
affiliations. Some might belong to mosques, but simply at
the local level. They have little reason or incentive to
organize at the national level. Islamists do because they
have a political agenda. So it's fair to say that a well-
organized minority has managed to position itself as the
unappointed, yet de facto, voice of a largely unorganized
and silent majority. These organized minorities have views
and positions that are not necessarily shared by most of the
people they claim to represent.
Third, the Brotherhood organizations have this quasi-
monopoly with access to government due to dynamics inside
the U.S. government.
We cannot really speak of the Muslim Brotherhood in America
if we seek to identify offshoots of any Middle Eastern
branch of the Brotherhood, whether Egyptian or any other.
There is no "Muslim Komintern," with Cairo in the place of
Moscow, as one scholar has expressed it. The organizations
here have historical, organizational, and most importantly
ideologically ties to the Middle East but they are
independent. I think we should take a non-formalistic
approach. In the United States we have organizations with
ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. As such, we can call them
American or Western Brotherhood organizations.
Over the last 20-30 years, these organizations have
significantly readjusted their tactics and goals. The
Brotherhood is a pragmatic movement that would not blindly
apply what the Brotherhood and its founder had prescribed
for Egypt in 1930 to modern London or Philadelphia.
Undoubtedly, Western offshoots of the Brotherhood support
the formation of Islamic states in the Middle East. But
their goals for the West are different. Critics argue that
Western Brotherhood organizations have the goal of
establishing Sharia Law in the West. I do believe that the
prospect looms in their imagination. But introducing Sharia
in the West is hardly the Western Brothers' goal at this
stage.
Pragmatic and keenly aware of what they can and cannot do,
the Brothers' priorities lay elsewhere. And foremost among
their goals is the preservation of an Islamic identity among
American and Western Muslims in general. But unlike some
other conservative Muslim organizations, like Salafis for
example, Brotherhood organizations seek to strengthen the
Islamic identity of Western Muslim not by isolating them
from mainstream society. What they advocate is a sort of
conservatism without isolation, an openness without melting,
which of course, is not an easy task.
The second goal that is common to all of these organizations
is to be designated as official representatives of the
Muslim community of their country. Despite their unrelenting
activism and access to ample resources, the Brothers have
not been able to create a mass movement and attract the
allegiance of large numbers of American Muslims. The
majority of U.S. Muslims either rejects or simply ignore the
message coming from Brotherhood organizations. So the
Brothers understand that a preferential relationship with
American elites could provide them with financial and
political capital, and legitimacy. This would allow them to
significantly expand their reach and influence inside the
community. They would be the ones, like Mr. Alamoudi, who
would be in charge of appointing imams in the prison system,
and in the military. They would be the ones the media would
call when seeking the "Muslim opinion," if there is such a
thing. They would, in some cases, receive subsidies to
administer different social services. This is a more common
practice in Europe than in the United States.
So making a clever political calculation, Western
Brotherhood organizations are seeking to be recognized as
representatives of the Muslim community in order to actually
become it. And, of course, they would use this position of
preferential access to government to lobby government on
anything that has to do with Islam, whether it is domestic
or foreign policy.
THE U.S. GOVERNMENT DIVIDE: THE OPTIMISTS VS. THE PESSIMISTS
There is a divide within the policymaking community that
mirrors the divide we see when it comes to the Muslim
Brotherhood and Islamist movements overseas. So, we have
two extremes-the optimists and the pessimists. On one hand,
we see the optimists who argue that Western Brotherhood
organizations are essentially a socially conservative force
that encourages the integration of Muslim communities,
offers a model in which Muslims can live there faithfully
and maintain a strong Islamic identity while becoming
actively engaged citizens. So, according to optimists,
governments should not view these organizations with
suspicion, but rather harness their grassroots activities
and cooperate with them on common issues, including
terrorism and radicalization.
Pessimists, on the other hand, see a much more sinister
nature in the Western Brotherhood. In this view, Western
Brotherhood organizations are engaged in a slow but steady
social engineering program aimed at Islamizing Western
Muslim populations. Ultimately, they will compete with
Western governments for their allegiance. The fact that
these organizations are not engaging in violence but
participate actively in the democratic process is seen
simply as a cold calculation on their part. According to
pessimists, officials of Brotherhood-linked organizations
have understood that infiltrating the system rather than
attacking it head on is the best way to get what they want.
After all, the tactics used by al Qaeda are not really going
to work here. Instead, a slow, steady infiltration of the
system will. And the pessimists see significant evidence
pointing to duplicity in the tactics of Brotherhood
organizations. It might be useful to make a comparison to
the tactics used by the Communist party in the United
States, 50-plus years ago. In fact, one significant example
comes from Philadelphia.
Some may be familiar with the largest terrorism financing
case in American history. It was a case tried four years ago
in Texas against a charity called the Holy Land Foundation.
This charity was collecting millions of dollars allegedly
for orphans in the Palestinian territories, but in reality
for Hamas. The money was clearly going to finance terrorist
operations in the Palestinian territories and in Israel.
During that trial, the Department of Justice introduced
ample evidence of the presence of the Muslim Brotherhood
behind this charity and their activities inside the United
States. Some of the most interesting documents come from a
meeting at a Marriott Hotel, close to the Philadelphia
International Airport. There, about 20 top Hamas and Muslim
Brotherhood officials met in 1993. This was right after the
Oslo Agreements had been signed. They talked about how their
organization could continue their activities as they knew
Hamas was about to be designated as a terrorist
organization. This meeting had been bugged by the FBI. It's
a fantastic spy story because the FBI has the tapes of
everything these individuals said during the meeting. It's a
fascinating read. Those gathered were debating their two
conflicting directions: supporting Hamas but at the same
time not looking to Americans as if they were supporting
terrorism. Obviously, they faced a difficult situation.
But they argued that the Brotherhood in the United States
should have opted for a two-pronged approach that
differentiated between its internal and external strategy.
Within the Muslim community, the group vowed to maintain its
support for Hamas by collecting funds, hence the formation
of the charity the Holy Land Foundation. Yet, at the same
time, they sought to spread hatred of Israel and Jews among
the American-Muslim community. And one participant was
intercepted as saying, "We don't want the children of the
American-Muslim community, who are raised here in our
Islamic schools, to grow up surrendering to the issue of
peace with the Jews." Participants discussed how to
camouflage such views to the American public and influence
policies and opinions. As one attendee argued, "This can be
achieved by infiltrating the American media outlets,
universities, and research centers, by working with Islamic
political organizations and the sympathetic ones." One
participant agreed that hiding the group's real aims when
dealing with the American public was a necessary tactic. "I
swear by Allah that war is deception. Deceive, camouflage,
pretend that you're leaving while you're walking that way."
Another stressed the importance of tailoring the discourse
to the American sensitivity. He said, "Let's not hoist a
large Islamic flag." And he argued that organizations
should have nice sounding names, like Holy Land Foundation.
The one document that the pessimists have really used is an
internal memorandum that was also introduced as evidence by
the Department of Justice during the trial. It was written
by a senior member of the Brotherhood in the United States,
and in one of its points stated, "The process of settlement
in America of the Muslim Brotherhood is a civilization,
Jihadist process, with all the word means. The Brothers must
understand that their work in America is a kind of grand
Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization
from within and sabotaging its miserable house by their
hands."
THE U.S.-EUROPEAN DIVIDE
There is a divide between the United States and Europe when
it comes to government. The FBI and the Central
Intelligence Agency in the United States tend to be neutral
regarding these organizations. The Europeans tend to be very
vocal about their concerns. The Dutch Domestic Intelligence
writes,
Not all Muslim Brothers or their sympathizers are
recognizable as such. They do not always reveal
their religious loyalties, an ultra-orthodox
agenda to outsiders. Apparently moderate in their
attitude toward Western society, they certainly
have no violent intent. But they are trying to
pave the way for ultra-orthodox Islam to play a
greater role in the Western world. This is
accomplished by exercising religious influence
over Muslim immigrant communities and by forging
good relations, with relevant opinion
leaders-politicians, civil servants, mainstream
social organizations, known Islamic clerics,
academics, journalists and so on. This policy of
engagement has been more noticeable in recent
years and might herald a liberalization of the
movement's ideas. It presents itself as a widely
supported advocate and legitimate representative
of the Islamic community. But the ultimate aim,
though never stated openly, is to create then
implant and expand an ultra-orthodox Muslim block
inside Western Europe.
Pretty tough words. They come from a government entity and
Dutch Intelligence is quite well respected. But in the
Netherlands, as in any other Western country, including the
United States, there is no common assessment. There is no
white paper coming from the top and telling all branches of
government, all agencies, and all government officials how
to identify, assess and engage Brotherhood organizations.
Positions swing erratically from the optimist to the
pessimist point of view based on personal views, which in
many cases are not informed by facts. And for a variety of
reasons, politics also comes into play often, as you can
imagine, creating a very chaotic situation.
THE CASE OF CAIR
In the United States, this chaotic dynamic is exemplified by
the FBI's relationship with CAIR. This organization is
arguably the most visible and controversial of the U.S.-
based organizations that trace their origins to the Muslim
Brotherhood. Opinions about CAIR could not be more divided
within the FBI. On the one hand, we have FBI officials who
have gone on record and publicly thanked CAIR for its role
in "keeping the nation safe" and praising it for "its
commitment to maintaining a dialogue leading to the frank
and honest exchange of ideas." In 2006, the Washington, D.C.
FBI sent CAIR a commendation letter praising it for its
"dedication in representing the heart of the Muslim-American
community." These officials are optimists. At the same time,
top officials in the FBI, individuals like Steve Pomerantz,
who was the former Assistant Director and former Chief of
Counterterrorism at the FBI, has publicly stated that:
It is clear from a review of CAIR statements and
activities that one of its goals is to further the
agenda of radical Islamic terrorist groups by
providing political support. By masquerading as a
mainstream public affairs organization, CAIR has
taken the lead in trying to mislead the public
about the terrorists and their feelings of
militant Islamic movements.
In the wake of the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing
trial in 2008, the FBI formally cut its ties to CAIR.
I'm singling out the FBI, but I could take examples from
other organizations within the U.S. government-and within
any Western government. The FBI specifically, unlike the
Dutch Intelligence Agency mentioned earlier, has a very
narrow mandate. The FBI looks at criminal cases. If you are
breaking the law, the FBI opens a file on you and they are
extremely tough. However, if you're not breaking the law,
they don't look at you.
The Dutch Intelligence Agency has a broader mandate. It
reviews all kinds of threats to society. It has a broader
institutional mandate and approach. While Western
Brotherhood organizations may not be engaged in criminal
activities, they might have an agenda that is in the long
term subversive. But in the United States, there is no
agency that really looks at organizations that can be seen
as subversive. By mandate the FBI doesn't look at anything
that is not specifically a threat to national security.
Several European intelligence agencies do look beyond
national security threats and take a broader view. In the
FBI, it is either black or white-criminal or good. In
European intelligence, there is a gray area.
There is also the fact that CAIR, specifically when it comes
to terrorism, plays games. In some cases they are extremely
uncooperative. The hearings of Rep. Peter King in March 2011
were, of course, very controversial. Yet they highlighted
one very interesting story of a Somali community leader in
Minneapolis. Al Shabab, the al Qaeda affiliate from Somalia,
has been targeting the Somali community in Minneapolis. Some
20 American Muslims of Somali descent have been going to
Somalia to fight, and a few have actually died fighting
there. So this community leader who testified before
Congressman King's panel recounted how, when he reached out
to the FBI to work with them, to stop this recruitment
taking place in the community, CAIR and the other
organizations ostracized him and started a smear campaign
against him.
At the same time, we have had cases in which CAIR has been
cooperative with the FBI. There was the case of five kids
from Northern Virginia who went to Pakistan to obtain
training from al Qaeda affiliates there. CAIR was contacted
by individuals in the Muslim community and CAIR went to the
FBI. Put yourselves in the FBI Director's shoes: you don't
want to burn bridges with CAIR. Consequently, there is a
kind of understanding that as much as they are not the ideal
partners for the FBI when engaging the Muslim community,
they are a necessary one.
U.S. POLICY TOWARD BROTHERHOOD ORGANIZATIONS
How should governments interact with this organization?
First, the issue is very complex. Conceptualizing a movement
that mixes politics and religion, particularly a religion
about which most policymakers know very little, is extremely
complicated. There is a lot of sensitivity in the United
States, in particular, but in the West generally, about
dealing with religion from a political point of view.
Moreover, in some cases Brotherhood organizations display
the kind of moderation and pro-integration stance that
Western governments are so desperately seeking in their
Muslim interlocutors. In other cases, it is apparent that
they harbor an agenda and embrace values that are opposed to
those of a Western liberal democracy. So policymakers
understandably find themselves in a bind. Again, we go back
to the pessimists and optimists, and what the extremes of
the debate suggest.
Many pessimists call for policies that would exclude Western
Brotherhood organizations from any engagement. They consider
the Brotherhood deceitful actors seeking to destroy the same
freedoms that have allowed them to flourish. Critics argue
that these organizations should be marginalized or even
outlawed. In this view, they are considered the political
wing of a global Islamist insurgency. I think that, while
this position highlights some troubling aspects of the
Western Brotherhood organization's nature and agenda, this
position is unrealistic and arguably dangerous. Western
Brotherhood organizations do represent a cross section of
the Muslim community. If the government's aim is to hear all
voices, it makes little sense to exclude an important one.
Talking only to those Muslim leaders whose positions square
with the government's is not a constructive policy. When
these groups act outside of the law, as when they provide
financial support to organizations designated as terrorists,
like in the case of the Holy Land Foundation, they should be
prosecuted. However, since most of their activities are
within the law, these organizations are a reality that
cannot be ignored and should be engaged.
Now the optimists argue that Western Brotherhood
organizations are reliable partners that should be engaged
in order to favor integration and stem radicalization. This
approach is also very problematic. There is ample evidence
showing that the aims of the Western Brothers do not
necessarily correspond to those stated in public. So
assigning an almost monopolistic control of the community to
a handful of self-appointed leaders, whose aims are at best
unclear, seems naive. I think there's a better way.
ENGAGE BUT DON'T EMPOWER
There is a preferred way that lies in between the optimist
and the pessimist approach. It is what I call "engage but
don't empower." This approach is developing to some degree
in Europe; in the United States only to a lesser degree. It
involves three steps. First, understanding that assigning a
monopolistic control of the community to these organizations
is mistaken. The Muslim community is extremely diverse.
Speaking only to the most visible and vocal self-appointed
representatives, the lowest hanging fruits, is a mistaken
policy. Governments should be proactive and seek out many
other organizations, many other voices, which might not have
the structure, the sophistication that Brotherhood
organizations possess. Yet they represent important cross
sections of the community. So the activism and visibility of
Brotherhood organizations should not be mistaken for
universal representativeness.
Secondly, we need a more refined approach. There are indeed
advantages in not isolating Western Brotherhood
organizations. Although nobody can really predict the long-
term developments, engagement could lead to a moderation of
the movement. That is the approach taken for example in
France. Isolation, in contrast could have negative
repercussions, further radicalizing the movement and also
allowing it to use the "martyr card" in the community. But
this engagement needs to be based on a firm understanding of
the history, characteristics, connections, modus operandi,
and most importantly, aims of Brotherhood organizations. So
only an informed engagement can lead to a realistic and
constructive approach.
I think many policymakers are increasingly aware of the
difference between engagement and empowerment. So
establishing a permanent dialogue, and even occasionally
limited forms of partnership with Western Brotherhood
organizations, can produce some positive
outcomes-particularly in the security field. I know that's
controversial. Striking the right balance between engagement
and empowerment is not easy, but necessary not to give an
undue advantage to these organizations.
Finally, as we look ahead, no organization is static and
Brotherhood networks are evolving. The networks that were
created some 40-50 years ago have changed with time. The
first generation of pioneers, who created these networks, is
slowly being replaced by a second generation of Western-born
activists who will inevitably add their perspectives in
guiding these organizations. So, today the debate is more
moderate, more in line with Western attitudes and
sentiments. These organizations' language is increasingly
striking a chord with Western interlocutors. Is a genuine
change taking place inside these organizations? Some
scholars, especially French scholars, would argue that these
organizations are like the Euro-Communists: in the 1950s
they wanted a dictatorship of the Proletariat, they wanted
to turn France into a Communist country linked to Moscow;
yet, by the 1970s, they just desired fair wages and a good,
cushy 35-hour-a-week work week. They were no longer dreaming
of a Communist state. Some scholars argue this is what is
going to happen with these organizations. They no longer
want to implement that civilizational Jihad that the
pioneers of these organizations talked about. They are just
going to be a socially conservative force. Other people
contend that this pro-democracy, pro-integration statement
of the new generation is just a carefully devised
smokescreen for the movement's more nefarious aims.
Only time will tell what's going to happen with these
organizations. It is likely that, in this milieu, some of
the organizations will go in one direction and others in a
different direction. But for the time being, I think, given
this uncertainty, a policy of cautious and informed
engagement appears to be the most appropriate.
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As you read in my book review of Chris Steiner's book, $20 Per Gallon, the auto industry won't come back. Immigration will keep pouring more and more uneducated third world immigrants from the Middle East into Detroit, thus creating a beachhead for Islamic hegemony in America. If fifty percent illiteracy continues, we will see more homegrown terrorists spawned out of the Muslim ghettos of Detroit. Illiteracy plus Islam equals walking human bombs.
