Egypt Designates Hamas A Terrorist Organization

A tiny bit of good news for the forces of civilization. An Egyptian Court has declared Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood offshoot currently in control of the Gaza strip, a "terrorist organization." This from al-Jazeera:

A judicial source told AFP news agency that the court issued the verdict on Saturday, a ruling seen as keeping with a systematic crackdown on Islamist groups by President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. . . .

Egyptian authorities have accused Hamas of aiding armed groups, who have waged a string of deadly attacks on security forces in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula.

In January, an Egyptian court also declared Hamas' armed wing al-Qassam Brigades a "terrorist" group. . . .

Armed groups in Sinai have killed scores of policemen and soldiers since Morsi's overthrow, vowing revenge for a crackdown on his supporters that has left more than 1,400 people dead. Most of the attacks however have been claimed by the armed group Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, which has pledged its allegiance to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

There has been no word yet on whether Egypt acknowledges Hamas to be associated with Islam (sarcasm).

The Obama administration has been at odds with Egypt's current administration under President al Sisi since it came to power in a coup in 2013, overthrowing a Muslim Brotherhood administration and Obama ally that was intent on making Egypt into a permanent theocracy. In striking comparison to Obama, President al Sisi is the only politician on a national stage who has had the courage to openly charge that Islamic teachings motivate and cause terrorism. He did so at the same time he challenged the supreme religious council in Egypt to address and correct these teachings.

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Wahhabi Islam & A Muslim's Plan For The War Of Ideas

The war of ideas is the war that matters in regards to Islam. That is the one we need to win or our children's children will still be fighting the radical Islamicists long after we are gone. As I have pointed out for at least a decade, and contrary to what Obama has continuously claimed, the Muslims we are fighting are not motivated by some anamolous interpretation of their religion. They are the true believers in Wahhabi Islam and the schools of Islam Wahhabism has infected. And if that is to end, then we must support reformers who would bring their religion from the 7th century into the 21st.

This today from Zaid Nabulsi, a lawyer writing in the Jordan Times [reprinted in full]:

Enough is enough. It is time to speak out.

“Islam is innocent” is an incomplete sentence. Introspection is needed, for, if we shy away from reality, the alternative will be more images like those we witnessed last Tuesday night, when brave Lt. Muath Al Kasasbeh was burnt to death in a cage.

The inconvenient truth that is overlooked or willfully ignored by apologists for the indefensible is the fact that Wahabism, the cult of mediaeval austerity founded by Ibn Abdul Wahab (1703-1792), has over the last half century been exported to every mosque and school throughout the Muslim world until it completely enveloped mainstream Sunni Islamic teachings.

Wahabism has entirely replaced, and become, Sunni Islam; the two cannot be told apart anymore.

Some Wahabist teachings, which have permeated the air we breathe in the Muslim world, are simply irreconcilable with decent human values, especially the ones that declare that every non-Wahabist is a disposable body whose bloodletting is unproblematic.

So enough of this burial of our heads in the sand. It has become tiresome to keep hearing the unproductive cliché that Islam is innocent after each atrocity committed by devout fanatics who did nothing except execute the exact letter of their textbooks, which order them to slaughter the infidels.

The escapism that mainstream Islam has nothing to do with those atrocities does not hold water anymore because Wahabism and Islam have become indistinguishable.

To understand the crisis of Muslims today, one has to remember that Wahabism exists in several textbooks containing the alleged sayings of the Prophet Mohammad, or books of “Hadith”, revered by so many.

What we must confront is the undeniable fact that it is from many stories found in these books that the unprecedented cruelty of groups such as the so-called Islamic State and Jabhat Al Nusra emanates.

The problem today has nothing to do with the original spirit of Prophet Mohammad’s message. Nor has it anything to do with the tumultuous history of Muslims over 14 centuries, parts of which were no doubt glorious and enlightened.

The catastrophe today is with the visible manifestation of Islam in the modern world, as demonstrated by the prevalent beliefs and practices of many people who call themselves Muslims.

This negative image of Muslims is not all just smoke and no fire. This is what those 120 Islamic scholars who sent a letter to Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi last year could not fathom.

IS did not invent a new Islam. On the contrary, its followers are strict adherents of the same textbooks quoted in that long letter (bizarrely addressed to “Dr Ibrahim Awwad Al Badri”, Baghdadi’s real name, bestowing intellectual respectability upon this mass murderer, as if one were writing a letter to the mayor of Copenhagen).

In fact, the scholars’ letter was a misguided attempt to disinfect Wahabism, to cleanse it from itself, by claiming that IS simply misinterpreted texts that are otherwise compatible with human decency.

In that sense, the letter squabbled over the semantics of the alleged instructions by the Prophet to spread Islam by the sword, but it did not dare renounce the authenticity of those same sayings.

Instead, the scholars argued that IS has simply taken those instructions out of context, and so they addressed the devotees of Ibn Taymiyah (the mentor of Wahabism, 1263-1328) with counterarguments based on those same problematic Ibn Taymiyah texts that IS employed to justify its barbarity.

The truth of the matter is that, faced with the IS and Nusra atrocities, Muslims cannot afford to give Wahabism a facelift.

If we truly want to defend Islam, we need to perform a much more invasive surgery.

Take the Muslim Brotherhood as an example of the prevalence of the Wahabist teachings among Muslims today.

The Brotherhood is the virtual womb that incubated all the current jihadist groups, including Al Qaeda itself (Al Zawahiri hailed from the Egyptian MB offshoot that murdered president Anwar Sadat).

Yet, when Abu Musab Al Zarqawi was killed in 2006, the three most senior leaders of the MB in Jordan brazenly visited the condolence house in Zarqa and announced to the media that Zarqawi was a martyr in the eyes of God, despite Zarqawi having blown up three hotels in Amman the previous year, killing scores of Jordanians going about their lives or celebrating a peaceful wedding.

We need not go too far back.

More recently, former Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi, of the MB, committed much worse deeds than his Jordanian counterparts while he was briefly in office, using his pardon prerogatives to release the murderers who carried out the 1997 Luxor massacre of 62 elderly European tourists.

Not only that, Morsi even appointed the leader of that group as a governor of Luxor itself.

The MB in Jordan, despite their token condemnation of the immolation of Kasasbeh, still refuse to describe him as a martyr.

Some may counter that it is poverty and economics, not Wahabist doctrine, that explain why so many Muslims are supportive of such murderous trends. This simply defies the facts.

The orgy of decapitations in Syria over the last four years was promoted by very rich Sunni clerics such as Yusuf Al Qaradawi and Mohammad Al Uraifi, aided by the countless satellite stations openly calling for the murder of Alawites and Shiites, and financed by billions from extremely wealthy but hateful Muslims.

So, enough with the denials. It is time to raise the alarm. We have a problem!

It is not a coincidence that for over a decade we, Muslims, dominated the world record in mindless televised massacres.

There is obviously a propensity towards eliminating “the other”, imbedded deep within Wahabist ideology.

It is not only foolish to deny this fact, it is also dangerous, for we would be covering the cancerous tumour with a bandage.

What we cannot deny is that many of the Wahabist textbooks are the same operating manuals that Islamist butchers use to justify their savagery.

For example, very few people know that while Muath was being set on fire in that macabre video, the voiceover was a recitation of an Ibn Taymiyah fatwa deeming the incineration of unbelievers a legitimate act of jihad.

Ibn Taymiyah is not some obscure scholar on the fringe of Sunni Islam. In the Sunni world, he is universally venerated with the title “Sheikh of Islam”, elevating him to an almost infallible clerical status.

If we really want to defend Islam as a religion of mercy, if we really want to be believed when we proclaim the innocence of this religion, we need to do more than just repeat this meaningless mantra about us having nothing to do with IS.

We have to muster the courage to identify the specific texts that actually defame Islam, denounce them and permanently cleanse Islamic tradition of them.

Amen. This is what our nation's government should be giving its full throated support. Obama's claim that Islamic terrorism is separate and apart from Islam is not merely wholly at odds with reality, it works against people such as Mr. Nabulsi who would reform their religion in a war of ideas.

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Spinning The Middle East & The Murder Of An Ambassador

In 2007, Obama claimed that, if he was elected, Muslim hostility would ease. As the events of the past week have brought home, we are, today, in worse shape in the Middle East than we were four years ago - and indeed, than we were on 9-11-01 - with radical Salafists now in or near control in most Arab countries.

That is a reality that puts a stake in the heart of Obama's narrative that he has been a foreign policy success. To obfuscate, the administration on Sunday trotted out UN Ambassador Susan Rice to make the case that the 9-11-12 violence in Cairo and the murder of our Ambassador in Benghazi were nothing more than a spontaneous response - on 9-11 no less - to an anti Muslim film trailer that, incidentally, had been on the internet for months. As Conn Carol writes {h/t Instapundit):

[N]o one outside the White House believes a single video caused the violence. Liberal commentator and Tufts University international politics professor Dan Drezner has called Obama’s decision to blame the YouTube clip a “radically incomplete and dishonest answer.” As The New York Times Ross Douthat points out, the riots have far more to do with internal power politics.

And Rep. Alen West minced no words in responding to Rice's contentions:



(H/T Bluegrass Pundit)

As Charles Krauthammer pointed out a few days ago, what is happening is that the Obama administration is agreeing with the rioters, throwing our First Amendment under the bus rather than admit that the administration's Middle East policies of apology by the U.S., justification of Arab victimhood, and disengagement have borne a poisonous fruit.



Other pundits have reached similar conclusions, each worth a read. The best analysis comes from Victor Davis Hanson at PJM

:

The worst response to radical Islam has unfortunately become the present administration’s postmodern, so-cool policy. The Cairo fable, the al Arabiya “Bush did it” interview, the euphemisms (e.g., “man-caused disasters”), the insanity that Maj. Hasan’s murdering threatens our diversity programs, trying KSM in New York, reading Mutallab his Miranda rights, serial trashing of Guantanamo, James Clapper’s laughable assurance that the Muslim Brotherhood is “secular,” NASA’s all-important Muslim outreach, etc., at best remind the Islamists that Westerners would hardly be so self-abasing if there were not something to be ashamed about.

Barry Rubin, also writing at PJM, notes that the "causes of these demonstrations are not some act of Islamophobia, but the agitation of revolutionary Islamist groups that work systematically every day to build anti-Americanism, hatred of the West, and the loathing of Jews and Christians." That is also the conclusion Fouad Ajami, writing at the Washington Post.

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Update: Prof. Niall Ferguson also has an excellent article on the situation in the Middle East today, opining that "what is unfolding in the Middle East has the makings of the most perfect storm in American foreign policy since 1979."

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But deflecting attention from reality of the Middle East exposed by the 9-11-12 violence has not been the only rear guard action the Obama administration has been engaging in this past week. There is also the attempt to wholly gloss over the scandalous lack of security in Benghazi on 9-11-12 that led directly to the murder of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans.

To this end, the State Dept. is stonewalling, outrageously refusing to answer any more questions on the murders in Benghazi. Further the administration used Ambassador Susan Rice's appearance on on all of the Sunday talk shows to provide a complete defense of the administration. Rice insisted that security in Benghazi, which, on 9-11-12 consisted of a locked door and two American and four Libyan security personnel, was "strong" and "significant." This despite the fact that "terror cells in Benghazi had carried out five attacks since April, including one at the same consulate, a bombing at the same consulate in June." And despite the fact there was forewarning of the attack. And despite the fact that 9-11 is a date even an idiot knows is a very likely to be a day of violence directed at U.S. targets by Osama-loving Salafis.

Rice is lying shamelessly. The security plan in Benghazi was not "significant" or "strong," it was criminally reckless. Now, hold your breath until the MSM holds the Obama administration to account for this any time before Nov. 7.

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Outrageous: Justice Dept. Publicly Fingers Key Figure Behind Anti-Muslim Film (Updated)

This is perhaps the single most outrageous act of the Obama administration and Eric Holder's Justice Dept. to date - and that is saying a lot.

Federal authorities have identified a southern California man once convicted of financial crimes as the key figure behind the anti-Muslim film that ignited mob violence against U.S. embassies across the Mideast, a U.S. law enforcement official said Thursday.

Attorney General Eric Holder said that Justice Department officials had opened a criminal investigation into the deaths of the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other diplomats killed during an attack on the American mission in Benghazi. It was not immediately clear whether authorities were focusing on the California filmmaker as part of that probe.

The "key figure" had used an alias in making the film for his own personal security. The AP article quoted above goes on to provide the actual name of "key figure." I will not repeat it here.

To be clear, it doesn't matter WHO produced this film. It is not a crime. So what possible justification is there for the FBI to publicly identify the "key figure" behind this film? There is none. Our 1st Amendment absolutely forbids any legal action against this man. This is thuggery in its purest form - endangering the life of the person fingered and sending a message to anyone else in the U.S. who might want to make their feelings on Islam known but are too afraid to exercise their rights without anonymity because some Salafi nut job might behead them.

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Update: Instapundit has gone nuclear over this in a series of long posts and round-ups, opining that "Barack Obama should resign." See here, here, here and here. -------------

You want to know the true canard of the Obama administration. Its that this film trailer, available world wide on Youtube for two months, was anything other than a pretext for the Salafists and Muslim Brotherhood to organize violence against the U.S. on 9-11. What our government should be doing is naming those bastards, either as part of an arrest or as notification of their next of kin. Instead, we apologize to them for our freedom of speech and now publicly finger the "key figure" behind the movie.

The modern left has nothing but contempt for "free speech" - at least to the extent that it is speech with which they personally disagree. The left's support of Islam does not arise out of respect for religion, but out of a common cause to undermine the Christian foundations of our society. Does Holder and the left really want to play this game of making "blasphemy" a crime in the U.S.? The same people who denigrate Christianity at seemingly every available opportunity want to make "blasphemy" a crime? Does this mean we can prosecute the "key figure" behind "Religuous?"

Salafi Islam and Iran's own version of it, the veleyat-e-faqi, are not religions, they are cults. The "Allah" they worship is immoral and bloodthirsty, barbaric and pitiless, irrational and intent on the destruction of all things not Islamic. Unless Salafi Islam, and indeed, all of Arab culture goes through a "rennasaince" and "reformation," we are ultimately headed towards a genocidal conflict not of our choosing. The only other alternative is to mobilize public opinion on a massive scale by unapologetically shining a blinding spotlight on these cults - the ones' that believe it is fine to assassinate anyone who leaves their religion, or who disagrees with their interpretation of the Koran, or that murdering 3,000 innocent people on a single day eleven years ago was a good thing, and that the perpetrators are in heaven enjoying non-stop sex and wine. We can fight this with guns or the pressure of public opinion on a world wide scale. But we are going to fight it one way or the other. Eric Holder and Obama would have it be with guns.

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Update: ABC News is now reporting that the film maker might face jail time for his movie. The only "crime" here is that the Obama administration wants to deflect the reality of today's radicalized Middle East onto the film maker. This is the most blatant and grotesque violation of the First Amendment I can ever recall. It is Orwellian in its purest sense. And it really is a red line. If he spends a day in jail over this, this country needs not an election, but a revolution. -------------

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So How Do Islamic Radicals Celebrate 9-11?

They attack a few U.S. embassies, of course.

As I set forth below, Islamic radicals are today ascendant in the Middle East. The Arab Spring has been the victory of Salafists. And as I pointed out, Egypt has already taken the first big steps down the path followed by Iran in 1979 as it became a radical Islamic theocracy. So, shades of 1979, it is no surprise that our diplomatic posts in both Cairo and Libya were attacked on this 9-11. The ostensible reason for the attacks was that some private U.S. citizens, Egyptian ex-pats, made a video criticizing Islam. The film has been available to audiences in the Middle East since 1 July.

In Cairo:

Mainly ultraconservative protesters [read Salafi / Wahhabi Islamists and supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood] climbed the walls of the U.S. Embassy in Egypt's capital Tuesday and brought down the American flag, replacing it with a black Islamist flag to protest a U.S.-produced film attacking the Prophet Muhammad. . . .

The unrest in Cairo began when hundreds of protesters marched to the downtown embassy, gathering outside its walls and chanting against the movie and the U.S. "Say it, don't fear: Their ambassador must leave," the crowd chanted. Dozens of protesters then scaled the embassy walls, and several went into the courtyard and took down the flag from a pole. They brought it back to the crowd outside, which tried to burn it, but failing that tore it apart. The protesters on the wall then raised on the flagpole a black flag with a Muslim declaration of faith, "There is no god but God and Muhammad is his prophet." The flag, similar to the banner used by Al Qaeda, is commonly used by ultraconservatives around the region. The crowd grew throughout the evening with thousands standing outside the embassy, chanting "Islamic, Islamic. The right of our prophet will not die." A group of women in black veils and robes that left only their eyes exposed chanted, "Worshippers of the Cross, leave the Prophet Muhammad alone." Dozens of riot police lined up along the embassy walls but did not stop protesters from climbing the wall. . . .

Instead of responding with outrage, not merely at the protests, but the failure of the new Muslim Brotherhood government in Cairo to protect our embassy, the response from the Obama administration's State Department essentially 'apologized for blasphemy' by a person who has every right to free speech in the U.S.:

The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims — as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions,. . . Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy. We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others

That is utterly disgusting in its apologetic tone and counterproductive for its failure to defend Americans' freedoms. Moreover, it completely fails to hold the Egyptian government to account for their failure to defend the Embassy.

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Update: I couldn't agree more with this response from Charles Krauthammer:



And then there is this from Instapundit: "Advice to Obama: To stiffen your spine, imagine these were Tea Partiers instead of Islamic fundamentalists who hate America and all it stands for." Funny, but based all too much on reality.

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The attack on our diplomatic in Libya was more severe, involving what amounted to a full scale attack:

Libya's deputy interior minister Wanis al-Sharef told AFP: "One American official was killed and another injured in the hand. The other staff members were evacuated and are safe and sound."

He could not say if the dead man was a diplomat.

Abdelmonoem al-Horr, spokesman for the Libyan interior ministry's security commission, said rocket-propelled grenades were fired at the consulate from a nearby farm. Security forces and the interior ministry were trying to contain the situation, he added. . . .

"Demonstrators attacked the US consulate in Benghazi. They fired shots in the air before entering the building," Libya's deputy interior minister, Wanis al-Sharif Sharif, who is in charge of the country's eastern region, told AFP.

"Dozens of demonstrators attacked the consulate and set fire to it," said a Benghazi resident, who only gave his name as Omar, adding that he had seen the flames and heard shots in the vicinity.

Another Libyan witness said armed men had closed the streets leading up to the consulate, among them ultra-conservative Salafists. . . .

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UPDATE: The attack by Salafists on our Consulate in Benghazi, Libya is now confirmed to have taken the lives of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Embassy staff members.

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Consider these attacks the canary in the coal mine. We are, in many ways, in a much more precarious position vis-a-vis the Middle East than we were eleven years ago. The Salafists - those people whose ideology was shared by Osama bin Laden - now are in or close to control of most of the Arab nations of the Middle East. There will be blood.

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A Moment Of Perfect Clarity - The Centrality Of Political Islam Is To Conquer All

If there is a recurring theme within political Islam it is the permanent jihad to wipe out any trace of non-Muslim civilization. Once you appreciate that you’ll begin to see the Arab-Israeli conflict, the Mosque built over the Jewish Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the persecution of Christians in Muslim lands and the spread of “no-go” neighborhoods in Europe in an entirely new light.

What a brilliant observation. It gets to the very centrality of "political" Islam. The observation was made by "Dan From NY" commenting at Doug Ross's site on the Islamist's burning and looting of the famous L’Institut d’Egypte but a few days ago in Cairo. His observation brings perfect clarity. It boils down the real threat of political Islam to the world in a few short sentences. Islam cannot co-exist. It's adherents have little to no time to waste with engaging in the realm of ideas to spread their message. They seek to impose Islam on everyone, and they keep all adherents in line with the very real threat of the sword. Islam must conquer - and part and parcel of that effort is to "wipe out any trace of non-Muslim civilization." And it explains why, if there is no moderation of Islam, then it will never be compatible with the rest of the world. It presages death, murder and mayhem on a grand scale forced upon us before an eventual winner take all.

Unfortunately, it seems all too common in the West, where Christianity dominates, to project a benign nature on Islam, despite the mountains of evidence to the contrary. And our political leaders have long encouraged that view, refusing to be honest and engage in the war of ideas. It is a dangerous and suicidal game that we play in the West with "political" Islam. I would note as an aside that at least one of the Republican candidates for the nomination understands that. Whether or not he wins the nomination, I hope that he becomes our "Geert Wilders," willing to speak out much more on this reality. On a final note, consider Dan from NY's paradigm for analysis of political Islam as you read this from today's news:

Islamists kill dozens in Nigeria Christmas bombs

Islamist militants set off bombs across Nigeria on Christmas Day - three targeting churches including one that killed at least 27 people - raising fears that they are trying to ignite sectarian civil war.

The Boko Haram Islamist sect, which aims to impose sharia law across the country, claimed responsibility for the three church bombs, the second Christmas in a row the group has caused mass carnage with deadly bombings of churches. Security forces also blamed the sect for two other blasts in the north.

St Theresa's Catholic Church in Madala, a satellite town about 40 km (25 miles) from the centre of the capital Abuja, was packed when the bomb exploded just outside. . . .

Boko Haram - which in the Hausa language spoken in northern Nigeria means "Western education is sinful" - is loosely modelled on the Taliban movement . . .

It has emerged as the biggest security threat in Nigeria, a country of 160 million split evenly between Christians and Muslims, who for the most part live side by side in peace.

Its low level insurgency used to be largely confined to northeastern Nigeria, but it has struck several parts of the north, centre and the capital Abuja this year.

Last Christmas Eve, a series of bomb blasts around Jos killed 32 people, and other people died in attacks on two churches in the northeast. . . .

The White House condemned "this senseless violence and tragic loss of life on Christmas Day."

"Senseless violence?" That is why we invite ever greater violence from the political Islamists. The violence was not senseless at all. It was purposeful.  Our President - not this one, because that is not possible, but the next - needs to stands up and repeat Dan From NY's observation.  That is step one in ending the violence before it eventually escalates to cataclysmic proportions.

Update: You will find memorialized many more acts of violence and persecution of Christians at the hands of Muslims during this month at Powerline. Update: Linked by Theo Spark, home of the best hot toddy's on the net.

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Quick Hits

Unemployment -
Instapundit - [Gallup reports] unemployment up to 10.3 Percent. I’ve noticed a divergence between the Gallup numbers and the “official” numbers lately. I wonder why that is? Is it seasonal adjustment, or something else? Underemployment is up to 19.7 percent.

BizzyBlog comments on an IBD editorial explaining why businesses aren't accepting Obama's offer to "get in the game."

CPAC -
The speeches at Hot Air: Coulter, Cain, Romney, Bolton, Daniels

Globull Warming -
I have several core concerns with global warming theory, with the single most fundamental being that I don't trust the historical temperature record for all the reasons set forth here and here. We learn today that several scientists, inlcuding Anthony Watts, are about to set up an independent temperature monitoring program that addresses those concerns. Whatever data this produces, the concept - the actual practice of transparent science in the climate field - sounds quite promising.

Egypt
Mark Steyn critiques the dismal performance of our intelligence agencies.

Michael Totten on Tariq Rammadan and the false face of moderation in the Muslim Brotherhood

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The Iranian Revolution, DNI Clapper & The Muslim Brotherhood

Update: After 18 days of demonstrations, the military executed a coup in Egypt today. This is the best possible news for Egypt and the West.

Today, our Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, referred to the Muslim Brotherhood as a "peaceful" and a "largely secular organization". Really. On a related note, today is "Islamic Revolution's Victory Day" in Iran. It was this day in 1979 that the last of the Shah's forces fell. As we ponder the Obama administrations apparent willingness to countenance the Muslim Brotherhood as a benign organization and potential partner for the U.S. in Egypt, it would do well to remember just a few of the highlights from the Iranian Revolution.

Like the Muslim Brotherhood (see, e.g., here, here, here), Khomeini left a long paper trail of books setting forth his true radical Islamist views:

In the 1960s and 70s Khomeini had already talked about almost everything he did. Even in 1944 he talked about how evil democracy and modernity are, how evil the rule of law is. He talked about the establishment of Velayat-e faqih, the rule of Islamic jurists.

Yet, like the Brotherhood of today, as the opportunity to take power presented itself, Khomeini articulated a very benign viewpoint, portraying himself as a freedom lover, willing to tolerate complete freedom of speech, and expressly disavowing any role for himself or the Shia clergy in the government. For example:

"In Iran's Islamic government the media have the freedom to express all Iran's realities and events, and people have the freedom to form any form of political parties and gatherings that they like." Interview with the Italian newspaper Paese Sera, Paris, November 2, 1978

"In the Islamic government all people have complete freedom to have any kind of opinion." Interview with Human Rights Watch, Paris, November 10, 1978

"In Islamic Iran the clergy themselves will not govern but only observe and support the government's leaders. The government of the country at all levels will be observed, evaluated, and publicly criticized." -- Interview with Reuters news agency, Paris, October 26, 1978

The secular opposition to the Shah was disorganized in Iran, but it was widespread, from liberal democrats to labour. "Khomeini worked to unite this opposition behind him by focusing on the socio-economic problems of the Shah's regime (corruption and unequal income and development), while avoiding specifics among the general public that might divide the factions — particularly his plan for clerical rule . . ." And while the Khomeinists were significantly outnumbered amongst many protesters against the Shah, they were by far the most organized.

Khomeini did not reveal his true colors until after taking power, when he became hyper-militant in stamping out all opposition to his theocracy. For example, in his own words:

"Those who are trying to bring corruption and destruction to our country in the name of democracy will be oppressed. They are worse than Bani-Ghorizeh Jews, and they must be hanged. We will oppress them by God's order and God's call to prayer." -- In a talk at the Fayzieah School, Qom, August 30, 1979

"Those who have not voted for the Islamic Republic, it means that they want the previous system. Those who boycott the election so no one votes for the Islamic Republic are seditious. We will treat them like enemies, and we will oppress them. You are enemies that you want to cause trouble. You are enemies that you are conspiring against Islam and against the country. Your comings and goings are controlled. We have been informed that you are in contact with those who want to bring our country back to its previous system. Now that your conspiracy has been proven, we will destroy you all. If you don't stop your evilness, we will mobilize an even higher mobilization, and we will clean out all of you. We will not allow you groups of corrupt people to remain and continue your activities. -- In a message at the end of the month-long Islamic fasting celebration, September 3, 1979

As one observer put it, in terms that parallel the situation in Egypt today:

What began as an authentic and anti-dictatorial popular revolution based on a broad coalition of all anti-Shah forces was soon transformed into an Islamic fundamentalist power-grab," that significant support came from Khomeini's non-theocratic allies who had thought he intended to be more a spiritual guide than a ruler — Khomeini being in his mid-70s, having never held public office, been out of Iran for more than a decade, and having told questioners things like "the religious dignitaries do not want to rule."

Khomeini's consolidation of power between 1979 and 1982 was bloody and deliberate. Khomeini initially threw his entire authority behind secular moderate Mehdi Bazargan as the new head of state while he built up his own, separate revolutionary apparatus loyal only to him. On March 30, 1980, Khomeini arranged for a national vote on whether to replace the monarchy with an "Islamic Republic." The term "Islamic Republic" was left undefined, and it was only after winning the vote with a 98% majority vote did Khomeini have a Constitution drawn up - for a theocracy. And before the next vote on the Constitution, Khomeini moved into full force, crushing the opposition, murdering thousands once associated with the shah, closing down newspapers opposed to a theocracy, and threatening with death any who would vote against him. In the end, it was Khomeini and his "radicals who won. Because they were the most ruthless. They were the most brutal."

Given the organization and popularity of the Brotherhood today in Egypt, there is little reason to think that they could not achieve similar results over time. We should have no misconceptions. As to the nature of the Brotherhood, this from Zhudi Jasser, issued today after DNI Clapper's dangerously ridiculous characterization of the Muslim Brotherhood:

"The Muslim Brotherhood is the antithesis of a secular organization as asserted today by James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence. Clapper's statement presents a significant concern that our primary Intelligence officer has a complete lack of understanding of an organization that presents the greatest threat to the security of the United States. The Director of Intelligence is either grossly naïve or covering up for an ideology that is in an ideological war with the United States and western society.

The Muslim Brotherhood is built on the ideology of political Islam which adheres to a belief in Islamic Supremacy. To be a secular organization the Brotherhood would have to completely disavow the very beliefs that define the organization.

Further, the Muslim Brotherhood is a threat to the political process in a post-Mubarak Egypt and throughout the middle-east. Thugs like Mubarak have created an atmosphere that has allowed the Brotherhood to thrive. The United States needs to be active within the country of Egypt countering the ideology of the Brotherhood helping the people of Egypt develop liberty-minded, democratic infrastructure to secure the country's future. We need to demonstrate to Egyptians that freedom does not come in the form of Islamic law or in the rule of theocratic clerics.

Our Intelligence community cannot afford to allow political correctness or this severally mistaken understanding of the Brotherhood to enter the conversation of how we will confront the changes in Egypt."

As we deal with political Islam domestically and abroad it has hundreds of permutations from the most violent (Al Qaeda) to the non-violent (Islamist groups in the west). They all are pursuing the same goal which is the Islamic state based in Sharia Law. This is because they all share the same roots - The Muslim Brotherhood. This very conflict is what defines our American Islamic Forum for Democracy. If America gets this conflict wrong we are doomed to become accomplices in the ascendancy of Islamic theocracy throughout the world which ultimately threatens our national security.

As I wrote below, Mubarak's decision today, refusing to step down, makes a violent revolution exponentially more likely - and nothing would more favor the Brotherhood. Obama should be doing all in his power to encourage a coup by the military that would forestall such an event, and that would allow time for secular opposition to organize prior to elections. Hopefully that would be enough to prevent a repeat of Iran.

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How Suicidally Clueless Is The Obama Administration

The above video shows Director of National Intelligence James Clapper this morning telling a House hearing that the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is a "secular" organization that eschews violence. Who's briefing this idiot, Tariq Ramadan and CAIR? This organization is dedicated to imposing a world wide caliphate. They have as recently as a week ago advocated the formation of a govenment like Iran's. Virtually every Sunni terrorist organization is an offshoot of the Brotherhood. They were calling for war with Israel a week ago. Any of that sound secular and peaceful to you? This joker needs to go. He is either lying to America or a fool of immense proportions. In either event, occupying the position of DNI, he presents a danger to our nation.

What further chaffed was when FBI Director Mueller offered to brief the Congress critters on the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood - in a closed hearing. Bullshit. The people of America have a right to know the answers about the Brotherhood, particularly after the suicidal fantasy woven by Clapper this morning.

Update: The administration is trying to explain away the utterly ridiculous comments of Clapper. This Jake Tapper at ABC News:

The Muslim Brotherhood is quite obviously not a secular organization.

Jamie Smith, director of the office of public affairs for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence later said in a statement to ABC News: “To clarify Director Clapper’s point - in Egypt the Muslim Brotherhood makes efforts to work through a political system that has been, under Mubarak’s rule, one that is largely secular in its orientation – he is well aware that the Muslim Brotherhood is not a secular organization.”

How much the Muslim Brotherhood has eschewed violence and decried al Qaeda is subject to debate. Critics of the group point to its ties with Hamas, a terrorist organization according to the US State Department, for instance.

A Council on Foreign Relations background on the Muslim Brotherhood recently stated that “like other mass social movements, Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood is hardly a monolith; it comprises hardliners, reformers, and centrists, notes terrorism expert Lydia Khalil. And some hardline leaders have voiced support for al-Qaeda or use of violent jihad. For instance, as recently as 2006, Khalil points out, a member of Brotherhood elected to parliament, Ragib Hilal Hamida, voiced support for terrorism in the face of Western occupation. Instances like these raise questions over the group's commitment to nonviolence.”

Yeah, well, its the hardliners that have had me nervous since 1979 - when they ended up hijacking the Iranian Revolution. As to Clapper, his statement this morning was clear. To claim otherwise now beggars belief. If Obama has any sense of self-preservation, it is time to toss Clapper under the bus.

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Islamism, Socialism, Freedom & The War Of Ideas

Former Navy Cdr. and present day Islamic reformer, M. Zhudi Jasser, has written an essay on the Muslim Brotherhood, socialism Islamic style, and the American left's insane embrace of Islamists. His most important points:

. . . The transformation we are witnessing in Egypt may get us to finally develop a long enough attention span to develop a long term strategy on the ground to counter the ideologies of Islamism and its Islamic socialism. Read about political Islam, shariah and the goals of Islamist groups. Engage Muslims on Islamism. If the United States is truly dedicated to the Freedom Agenda our soldiers are risking their lives for in Iraq and Afghanistan, it is time to begin to vigorously promote genuine free markets, property rights, and the universal inalienable rights of individuals endowed by their Creator as the only antidote to Islamic socialism domestically and abroad.

If we continue to stay out of the debate raging within the House of Islam, Islamism and its inherent Islamic socialism will march across Muslim majority countries starting now with Egypt. It is time for America and all liberty-loving people to clearly take sides in this civil war of ideas within the Muslim consciousness. It is time for us to lift up reformist Muslims who separate mosque and state and believe in western democracy over the illusion of the Islamic state and its inherent Islamic socialism.

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Krauthammer's Rx For Egypt

It's nice to get out in front of the man I consider our nation's most astute observer of the political winds, Charles Krauthammer. Specifically, for ten days I have been writing that Obama needs to be focused like a laser on giving secular opposition a chance to develop in Egypt prior to the next election, that an interim government needs to be formed by the military, that there is no chance to salvage Mubarak, and that an interim government should not include the Muslim Brotherhood or its mouthpiece, el-Baradei. And today, Krauthammer weighs in, making exactly the same points.

Who doesn't love a democratic revolution? Who is not moved by the renunciation of fear and the reclamation of dignity in the streets of Cairo and Alexandria?

The worldwide euphoria that has greeted the Egyptian uprising is understandable. All revolutions are blissful in the first days. The romance could be forgiven if this were Paris 1789. But it is not. In the intervening 222 years, we have learned how these things can end.

The Egyptian awakening carries promise and hope and of course merits our support. But only a child can believe that a democratic outcome is inevitable. And only a blinkered optimist can believe that it is even the most likely outcome.

Yes, the Egyptian revolution is broad-based. But so were the French and the Russian and the Iranian revolutions. Indeed in Iran, the revolution only succeeded - the shah was long opposed by the mullahs - when the merchants, the housewives, the students and the secularists joined to bring him down.

And who ended up in control? The most disciplined, ruthless and ideologically committed - the radical Islamists.

This is why our paramount moral and strategic interest in Egypt is real democracy in which power does not devolve to those who believe in one man, one vote, one time. That would be Egypt's fate should the Muslim Brotherhood prevail. That was the fate of Gaza, now under the brutal thumb of Hamas, a Palestinian wing (see Article 2 of Hamas's founding covenant) of the Muslim Brotherhood. . . .

ElBaradei would be a disaster. . . .

The Egyptian military, on the other hand, is the most stable and important institution in the country. It is Western-oriented and rightly suspicious of the Brotherhood. And it is widely respected, carrying the prestige of the 1952 Free Officers Movement that overthrew the monarchy and the 1973 October War that restored Egyptian pride along with the Sinai.

The military is the best vehicle for guiding the country to free elections over the coming months. Whether it does so with Mubarak at the top, or with Vice President Omar Suleiman or perhaps with some technocrat who arouses no ire among the demonstrators, matters not to us. If the army calculates that sacrificing Mubarak (through exile) will satisfy the opposition and end the unrest, so be it.

The overriding objective is a period of stability during which secularists and other democratic elements of civil society can organize themselves for the coming elections and prevail. ElBaradei is a menace. Mubarak will be gone one way or the other. The key is the military. The United States should say very little in public and do everything behind the scenes to help the military midwife - and then guarantee - what is still something of a long shot: Egyptian democracy.

For a different take on this, you should visit Big Lizards. Dafydd does not think that the Muslim Brotherhood presents the threat that I believe it does, and his posts are always worth a read.

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Today's Reading: Totten on Egypt

Michael Totten is one of our most astute observers of the Middle East. He has two articles of note that shed a great deal of light on the situation in Egypt. The first, written in 2005, is Nassar's Biggest Crime wherein he discusses why the Muslim Brotherhood is the dominant opposition in Egypt today and the ramifications thereof, while secular political parties are nascent and disorganized. And do note the parallels between Sadat's strategy and that of el-Baradei, who is today championing the Muslim Brotherhood:

“When Nasser took over,” Big Pharaoh said, “people were angry at Britain and Israel. He nationalized all the industry. He banned political parties. He stifled everything. Banned the Muslim Brotherhood. Banned the Communists. Banned all. When Sadat took over in 1970, he had two enemies: the Communists and the Nasser remnants. So to counter these threats, he did what the United States did in Afghanistan during the Cold War – he made an alliance with the Islamists. He brought back the Muslim Brotherhood which had fled to Saudi Arabia when Nasser was around. He used them to destroy the left.”

“That was part of it,” he continued. “During the oil boom of 1973 a lot of Egyptians went to Saudi Arabia to work. Then in the 1990s, two important things happened. After the first Gulf War, Saudi Arabia began to Saudize its economy and said they no longer needed Egyptian workers. When the Egyptians came home they were contaminated with Wahhabism. Egypt’s economy kept getting worse. Unemployed members of the middle class either sat around and smoked shisha or got more religious. That was when Islamism moved from the lower class to the middle class. Now it is moving even to the upper class.”

“Egypt will get over it after a while,” I said, “just like Iran is getting over it now.”

“That will take 25 years! I don’t have 25 years!”

The Iranian theocracy has been in power for 26 years.

And here is Michael Totten today in PJM, interviewing Abbas Milani, Prof. of Iranian studies at Stanford, about the parallels between Egypt of today and the Iranian revolution of three decades ago:

MJT: I find this very disturbing. Iran in the 1970s—and I guess today, too—was much more liberal and modern than Egypt.

Abbas Milani: Oh, absolutely.

MJT: And yet Iran got this government. If it can happen in Iran, it can certainly happen in Egypt where the middle class is very small and people are not nearly as well educated.

Abbas Milani: And there are a lot more Islamists, and they are much better organized.

MJT: The liberals in Egypt are, what, ten percent of the population?

Abbas Milani: I’m not sure about that, but I do know something about the Muslim Brotherhood.

MJT: Okay, so what do you know?

Abbas Milani: They are extremely well organized.

MJT: Are they moderate? Many experts are saying so now, but I’m skeptical.

Abbas Milani: There are moderate elements within the Muslim Brotherhood. But if the Muslim Brotherhood still stands behind Sayyid Qutb, then no. He, along with Hassan al Banna, was one of its founding fathers. You should read him. He was absolutely uncompromising.

MJT: What about the guys running it now? There is all this talk about how they’re no longer as dangerous as they used to be, that they’ve renounced violence and want a democracy. I don’t really buy it, but some people insist this is the case, that the Muslim Brothers have gone mainstream and we have nothing to worry about.

Abbas Milani: I don’t know the Egyptian scene as well as Iran, so let’s look at the Iranian case. If you look at the whole Islamic movement you can see that there were moderate forces in the early part. There were quietist ayatollahs who took part in the revolution, including some who were senior to Khomeini in clerical status. They had an enormous popular base. They were truly moderate and they truly understood the dangers of Khomeini.

Within this movement was also Fadayan-e Islam, the Islamic terrorist group founded by Navvab Safavi who was very much enamored of the Muslim Brotherhood. He even met with Sayyid Qutb. If you look at how this vast network, that included moderates and radicals, evolved once the revolution came, it was the radicals who won. Because they were the most ruthless. They were the most brutal.

Everything I’ve seen indicates that there are moderate Muslim Brothers, but if the society goes into a protracted struggle, I have no doubt that the radicals would win.

Almost every radical group in the Middle East is an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood. . . .

Do read both articles in full as they contain a ton of insightful material. My take away, from reading both, is that I am even more convinced that our government should be doing all they can to keep the Muslim Brotherhood out of the government while buying time for secular opposition parties to develop and gain a following. It is our last and best hope. But if yesterday's report in the LA Times is accurate, however, the point is moot, and Obama is making a huge mistake.

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While El-Baradie Dissimulates, Obama Fantasizes About A Peaceful Muslim Brotherhood

Here is what being fed to America by our MSM and El Baradei:



Yet here is what is being said by the leadership of the Muslim Brotherhood in interviews to Iranian News, as reported in the Jerusalem Post today:

A leading member of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt told the Arabic-language Iranian news network Al-Alam on Monday that he would like to see the Egyptian people prepare for war against Israel, according to the Hebrew-language business newspaper Calcalist.

Muhammad Ghannem reportedly told Al- Alam that the Suez Canal should be closed immediately, and that the flow of gas from Egypt to Israel should cease “in order to bring about the downfall of the Mubarak regime.” He added that “the people should be prepared for war against Israel,” saying the world should understand that “the Egyptian people are prepared for anything to get rid of this regime.”

Ghannem praised Egyptian soldiers deployed by President Hosni Mubarak to Egyptian cities, saying they “would not kill their brothers.” He added that Washington was forced to abandon plans to help Mubarak stay in power after “seeing millions head for the streets.”

In my initial post on Egypt, A 3 A.M. Phone Call From Egypt, I said that Obama needed to get out in front events by calling on Mubarak to institute specific democratic and economic reforms on a short time table or to step down and let a caretaker government formed from the military to do it, and that Obama's entire focus needed to be on allowing time for secular opposition groups sufficient time and space to form.

I would add today that events have already gone too far too fast for Obama to do anything other than to call for Mubarak to make a quick exit and the military to form the transitional government until September elections. If Obama vacillates further, even that option will likely disappear. Allowing the deeply disingenuous Islamic snake, el-Baradei, tool of Iran and partner with the Muslim Brotherhood, to form part of a transitional government would be a catastrophic mistake, yet one that becomes ever more likely as Obama vacillates in the White House.

Update: Now this is what I would expect from the man serving out Jimmy Carter's second term. This from Hot Air:

In order to stay ahead of the crisis in Egypt, the Obama administration yesterday signaled that it supports the participation of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egyptian politics as long as they renounce violence and commit to democracy:

The Obama administration said for the first time that it supports a role for groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood, a banned Islamist organization, in a reformed Egyptian government.

The organization must reject violence and recognize democratic goals if the U.S. is to be comfortable with it taking part in the government, the White House said. But by even setting conditions for the involvement of such nonsecular groups, the administration took a surprise step in the midst of the crisis that has enveloped Egypt for the last week. . . .

About that renouncing violence bit - somebody needs to point out to Obama that Ghannem's remarks about "preparing for war" with Israel ought to be a clue as to the Muslim Brotherhood's take on violence. And these are the same people who advocated that Egypt go to war against Israel during Israel's war with Gaza in 2007. For Obama to say he will support the Muslim Brotherhood as part of a transitional government if they will only "renounce violence" is pure fantasy.

Why is Obama asking Egypt to violate its constitutional separation between Mosque and State at this point? Whether or not that makes sense in Egypt down the road, for now, Obama is repeating the mistakes of Carter in allowing the radical Islamists to get their foot in the door while the secular opposition parties are nascent and disorganized. As I said from Day 1, Obama should be focused like a laser on buying the time and space for Egypt's secular parties to develop, even if that means just buying them time until the September elections scheduled to be held in Egypt.

Hot Air later quotes NRO's Duncan Currie, who states

“I fully expect the Muslim Brotherhood to do well in any election,” Gerecht tells me. “They have a fairly substantial following.” He has no illusions about the group’s Islamist agenda, or about its virulent anti-Americanism, or about its hatred of Israel. In his view, calling for U.S. “engagement” with the Brotherhood is like calling for engagement with Ayatollah Khamenei. But Gerecht insists that allowing Brotherhood members to participate in a democratic process is the sine qua non of Egyptian political maturation. The country will never achieve real progress, he says, without first creating the political space necessary for a momentous debate over God and man. Indeed, Egypt’s secular liberals must defeat the Islamists in the public square, rather than through military repression. They must win the battle of ideas. …

If Egyptians voted the Brotherhood into a position of serious power, that would generate a kaleidoscope of problems for America and Israel (and Egypt). No serious analyst should pretend otherwise. But Gerecht’s logic is inescapable: You can’t have authentic Egyptian democracy while disenfranchising the country’s largest opposition movement. If you aren’t willing to countenance Brotherhood electoral participation, you shouldn’t be demanding representative government.

All well and good. I don't disagree with any of that. But if there is no organized secular opposition, then what we will see is a repeat of Iran circa 1979, with a well organized radical Islamist movement eventually instituting a democracy of "one vote, one time."

Update II: As over a million protesters line Cairo's streets, it appears Mubarak will be announcing that he will not run for another term. That point is moot now, I think. I doubt he will last out the week, with the question being who or what replaces him. It seems not everyone is enamored of El-Baradei leading up a transitional government. This from a French news agency: "The intellectual community of Egypt calls on Amr Moussa, secretary general of the Arab League, and Sami Enan, Chief of the Egyptian armed forces, to act as leaders of the opposition." These individuals are apparently even getting the thumbs up from the Brotherhood. I would assume that is tactical, as they hope to see all restrictions on religious organizations removed prior to the September elections. But as I said above, that would be about the best situation we could hope for.

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Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood Calling For War With Israel?

The cable news division of Fox News reported on air yesterday that a senior member of the Egyptian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, during an interview today with Iranian News, stated that Egypt needs to turn off gas supplies to Israel and to prepare for war against Israel.

More from the Jerusalem Post today:

A leading member of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt told the Arabic-language Iranian news network Al-Alam on Monday that he would like to see the Egyptian people prepare for war against Israel, according to the Hebrew-language business newspaper Calcalist.

Muhammad Ghannem reportedly told Al- Alam that the Suez Canal should be closed immediately, and that the flow of gas from Egypt to Israel should cease “in order to bring about the downfall of the Mubarak regime.” He added that “the people should be prepared for war against Israel,” saying the world should understand that “the Egyptian people are prepared for anything to get rid of this regime.”

Ghannem praised Egyptian soldiers deployed by President Hosni Mubarak to Egyptian cities, saying they “would not kill their brothers.” He added that Washington was forced to abandon plans to help Mubarak stay in power after “seeing millions head for the streets.”

Yet here is what being fed to America by our MSM and El Baradei:



Sounds like a myth, doesn't it.

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Bolton On Egypt

(H/T Ex-Dissident)

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Egypt's El Baradie Not An Option

With Egypt in flames and the rioters calling for the head of their dictator, Hosni Mubarak, the question becomes who will replace him should he fall. We all know that the Muslim Brotherhood would be a disaster for both Egypt, Israel and the West. But what about Mohammed El-Baradei, the former head of the IAEA who has entered Egyptian politics as an opponent of Mubarak. While El-Baradei seems to be on friendly terms with Obama, the truth is that he is an Islamist tied directly to the Brotherhood and Iran and, further, that he possesses a distinct animus towards Israel.

To understand El-Baradie's danger to a secular, democratic Egypt, a little background on Egyptian politics and the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood is necessary for context.

Egyptian Politics:

Egypt has been ruled by a series of dictators since gaining independence from Britain in 1956. The current dictator, Hosni Mubarak, took over following the assassination of Anwar Sadat by militant Islamists in 1981.

Egypt is ruled by a Constitution that technically allows opposition political parties. There are today, at least 18 political parties in Egypt. Most are of recent origin and with little popular following as opposition has been little tolerated during the decades of Mubarak's rule. The Constitution, as amended in 2007, strictly prohibits religiously based political parties - thus nominally putting a wall between mosque and state. That amendment was aimed directly at the ever more influential Muslim Brotherhood.

Egypt has been ruled under a decree of martial law since 1967 that suspends portions of the Constitution. Martial law gives military courts the power to try civilians and allows the government to detain for renewable 45-day periods and without court orders anyone deemed to be threatening state security. Public demonstrations are banned under the decree.

The Muslim Brotherhood

The largest opposition group in Egypt is the Muslim Brotherhood. Founded by Hassan al-Banna in Egypt in 1928, its motto is:

Allah is our objective.
The Prophet is our leader.
The Qur'an is our law.
Jihad is our way.
Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.

For a detailed discussion of the Muslim Brotherhood, see here. The Muslim Brotherhood is a radical organization that differs from al Qaeda - one of its offshoots - only in tactics. Its ideology is and has always been virulently anti-Western and, more particularly, anti-American. Virtually all Islamic terrorist organizations can trace their origins directly to - or within one or two degrees of separation to - the Brotherhood. The Brotherhood was itself a terrorist organization for much of its existence, but then opted to forgo violence as a tactic. Its goals, to achieve political dominance and create Islamic states ruled by Sharia law, have never changed.

To gain traction amongst the populace of Egypt, the Brotherhood has followed the tactics of Hamas, developing an extensive social services network at the local level. It has made the Brotherhood extremely popular.

This from Wiki showing the reach of the Egyptian Branch of the Muslim Brotherhood:

. . . The Brotherhood now dominates the professional and student associations of Egypt and is famous for its network of social services in neighborhoods and villages. In order to quell the Brotherhood's renewed influence, the government again resorted to repressive measures starting in 1992. . . .

In the 2005 parliamentary elections, the Brotherhood's candidates, who can only stand as independents, won 88 seats (20% of the total) to form the largest opposition bloc, despite many violations of the electoral process, including the arrest of hundreds of Brotherhood members. Meanwhile, the legally approved opposition parties won only 14 seats. . . .

A 2009 WSJ article here throws further light on what Egypt could expect were the Brotherhood to take control:

The Brotherhood has long insisted it holds no prejudice against Christians. Yet an Islamic state -- based on faith, not citizenship rights -- remains the group's core belief. . . .

Later in 2007, the Brotherhood attempted to clarify its vision by distributing a draft program for a political party it aims to establish. The document stated that a woman or a Christian cannot become Egypt's president, and called for the creation of a special council of Islamic clerics to vet legislation. . . .

The latest controversy surrounding the Brotherhood stemmed from its behavior during Israel's Gaza war, a campaign initially seen as a boon to the Islamist movement. Harnessing widespread popular feelings of sympathy with the Palestinian cause, the Brotherhood organized two massive street demonstrations in Alexandria and Cairo during the war, attacking President Mubarak's regime for failing to help Gaza's Hamas rulers.

But these protests soon fizzled. Calls by some Brotherhood leaders to send fighters to Gaza alienated many Egyptians who have no desire to see their own country, at peace with Israel since 1979, embroiled in war once again. . . .

So in short, should the Muslim Brotherhood attain power in Egypt, one could reasonably expect that they would try to create something akin to Iran's theocracy and that they would take an aggressive, military posture against Israel. It would be a disaster.

Mohammed El-Baradei

El-Baradei came to international prominence when he was elected head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in 1997. The mission of the IAEA is, in part, to "verify that safeguarded nuclear material and activities are not used for military purposes." Laughably, El-Baradei won a Nobel Peace Prize in 2005 for his efforts. But the reality of his tenure was insidious. He abused his position to provide cover for Iran while denouncing the logic of non-proliferation. This Feb. 2008 article in the WSJ provides a good summary:

On Friday, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Mohamed ElBaradei submitted a report on Iran's nuclear program to the IAEA's Board of Governors. It concluded that, barring "one major remaining issue relevant to the nature of Iran's nuclear programme," . . . Iran's explanations of its suspicious nuclear activities "are consistent with [the IAEA's] findings [or at least] not inconsistent."

The report represents Mr. ElBaradei's best effort to whitewash Tehran's record. Earlier this month, on Iranian television, he made clear his purpose, announcing that he expected "the issue would be solved this year." And if doing so required that he do battle against the IAEA's technical experts, reverse previous conclusions about suspect programs, and allow designees of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad an unprecedented role in crafting a "work plan" that would allow the regime to receive a cleaner bill of health from the IAEA — so be it.

. . . [El Baradei] has used his Nobel Prize to cultivate an image of a technocratic lawyer interested in peace and justice and above politics. In reality, he is a deeply political figure, animated by antipathy for the West and for Israel on what has increasingly become a single-minded crusade to rescue favored regimes from charges of proliferation. . . .

The IAEA's mission is to verify that "States comply with their commitments, under the Non-Proliferation Treaty and other non-proliferation agreements, to use nuclear material and facilities only for peaceful purposes." Yet in 2004 Mr. ElBaradei wrote in the New York Times that, "We must abandon the unworkable notion that it is morally reprehensible for some countries to pursue weapons of mass destruction, yet morally acceptable for others to rely on them for security."

IAEA technical experts have complained anonymously to the press that the latest report on Iran was revamped to suit the director's political goals. In 2004, Mr. ElBaradei sought to purge mention of Iranian attempts to purchase beryllium metal, an important component in a nuclear charge, from IAEA documents. He also left unmentioned Tehran's refusal to grant IAEA inspectors access to the Parchin military complex, where satellite imagery showed a facility seemingly designed to test and produce nuclear weapons.

The IAEA's latest report leaves unmentioned allegations by an Iranian opposition group of North Korean work on nuclear warheads at Khojir, a military research site near Tehran. It also amends previous conclusions and closes the book on questions about Iran's work on polonium 210 — which nuclear experts suspect Iran experimented with for use as an initiator for nuclear weapons, but which the regime claims was research on radioisotope batteries. In 2004, the IAEA declared itself "somewhat uncertain regarding the plausibility of the stated purpose of the [polonium] experiments." Today it finds these explanations "consistent with the Agency's findings and with other information available."

The IAEA director seems intent on undercutting Security Council diplomacy. Just weeks after President George Bush toured the Middle East to build Arab support for pressure on Tehran, Mr. ElBaradei appeared on Egyptian television on Feb. 5 to urge Arabs in the opposite direction, insisting Iran was cooperating and should not be pressured. And as he grows more and more isolated from Western powers intent on disarming Iran, Mr. ElBaradei has found champions in the developing and Arab world. They cheer his self-imposed mission — to hamstring U.S. efforts to constrain Iran's program, whether or not the regime is violating its non-proliferation obligations or pursuing nuclear weapons. . . .

El-Baradei's deep favoritism shown to Iran has paid off for him - literally. After he left the IAEA to enter politics, MEMRI reports that Iran funnelled $7 million to him in order to bankroll his political opposition to Mubarak. Evidently the ties between El-Baradei and Iran run deep.

But it is not just Iran with whom El-Baradei has very troubling ties. He is also in partnership with the Muslim Brotherhood. On Feb. 26, 2010, after a meeting with the Muslim Brotherhood among others, El-Baradei announced the formation of a new political movement, the National Association for Change. Chief among its stated concerns was repeal of the law preventing the Muslim Brotherhood from nominating religiously based candidates for office. El-Baradei repeated that call in a Der Spiegel interview days ago, while wholly sidestepping the question of what a Muslim Brotherhood rise to power in Egypt would mean for Israel:

SPIEGEL: Israel fears a revolution in Egypt. Many people in Jerusalem believe that the Muslim Brotherhood would then come to power and declare war on the Jewish state.

ElBaradei: We should stop demonizing the Muslim Brotherhood. It is incorrect that our only choice is between oppression under Mubarak and the chaos of religious extremists. I have many differences with the Muslim Brotherhood. But they have not committed any acts of violence in five decades. They too want change. If we want democracy and freedom, we have to include them instead of marginalizing them.

El-Baradei, in 2009, stated that he viewed "Israel as the greatest threat to the Middle East." Caroline Glick, for her part, views the above and sees in El-Baradei an Islamist in sheep's clothing and a clear threat to Israel. That too is my conclusion. If as seems possible, Obama should soon have a decision to make regarding whether to support El-Baradei for a position in a post-Mubarak government, he should know that doing so would run completely counter to our nation's interests.

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Egypt Update I

This is an update to my post on Egypt and Obama's response to the nascent revolution occurring there, A 3 A.M. Phone Call From Egypt.

Egypt's dictator Honsi Mubarak appeared on Egyptian television a few moments ago, declaring that he was replacing his cabinet, promising to improve the economy, and that he would restore security. Walid Phares commented afterwards on Fox that he doubted it would be enough to quell the uprising. I concur. Listening to the list of particulars being expressed by the rioters, their passion and numbers, and noting the utter economic basket case that is Egypt, it is safe to forecast that this will have no impact on the rioting.

Moreover, the seminal issue in any modern grass-roots revolution is what will the security forces and the military do. There is a report coming out of Egypt of at least some police changing sides, but it does not yet appear widespread.

According to the Telegraph:

The American Embassy in Cairo helped a young dissident attend a US-sponsored summit for activists in New York, while working to keep his identity secret from Egyptian state police.

On his return to Cairo in December 2008, the activist told US diplomats that an alliance of opposition groups had drawn up a plan to overthrow President Hosni Mubarak and install a democratic government in 2011. . . .

Fair enough, but "secret" promotion of democracy is not enough. As I pointed out below, Obama backed off promoting democracy throughout the Middle East when he took over the presidency. It was a mistake then, and Obama's silent impotence is a mistake now. He needs to get in front of the unrest in Egypt - and more particularly the Muslim Brotherhood - and act with more boldness if he is to have any impact on the situation. Instead, the only thing of note to come from the administration is an announcement that it would review the U.S. aid package for Egypt. Talk about fiddling while Rome burns. The President is supposed to issue a statement shortly. We will see if he is going to be impotent or important to the resolution of this Egyptian uprising.

And here is Obama now. First concern is loss of life - don't use force against the protesters. Mubarak must reopen means of communication and internet. Protesters have a right to assemble but need to be peaceful. Now Obama is claiming that he has always been strongly for Democratic reforms in Egypt. I guess that is why he dismantled Bush's programs for promoting democracy there. Obama is now offering to "work with" the government and the protesters over the next several days. The sum of his statement is that Obama is staying the course with Mubarak. This is a mistake, and it means that Obama is impotent.

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What It Will Take To Win The War Of Ideas

Aaron Elias, at PJM, has done an article on Muslim reformer Zhudi Jasser in light of the Ground Zero Mosque issue. But the article delves far beyond that into the much larger issue of the war of ideas for the future of Islam, the existential stakes of that war, and how we should, as a nation, be engaging in it. As Jasser notes, we are losing it at the moment.

Jasser's first point is that Islam is not a monolithic entity. Understanding that is the first step America need's to take in order to be able to distinguish its friends in the Muslim community from those who wish, whether by peaceful or violent means, to destroy Western civilization. This is equally as critical for America as it is for Muslims and the future of Islam:

Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, M.D., president and founder of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD), is one of these devout yet patriotic Muslims. A former U.S. Navy lieutenant commander with 11 years of service as a medical officer under his belt, . . .

Jasser founded AIFD in the wake of the 9/11 attacks in order to provide a Muslim American voice that would genuinely advocate and defend the founding principles of the U.S. Constitution. He has taken the fight against radical Islam to heart and sees it as a responsibility of all "true" Muslims. Where many U.S.-based Islamic organizations, such as CAIR and the Islamic Society of North America, claim to support the U.S. Constitution but provide dodgy answers and shoddy excuses for terrorism when the rubber meets the road, Dr. Jasser's AIFD is based on the founding principles of the United States. Where CAIR's rhetoric tends to create a tension between Americans and its Muslim members, the rhetoric of Jasser and AIFD refers to Americans as an "us" and not a "them."

"I have always looked upon myself, long before 9-11, as a Jeffersonian Muslim, if you will," Dr. Jasser answers when asked about his identification as a Muslim. "Along with the ideas of liberty as embodied in the works of our founding fathers, naturally emanating from that is a deep antipathy for Islamism (political Islam), salafism, jihadism, governmental sharia, and the global collectivist movement of the Muslim Brotherhood."

Terms such as "moderate," "secular," and "radical" are innately controversial as any group is able to contort them to mean what they want. For example, Jasser posits, the term "moderate" has become synonymous with being non-violent or anti-terrorism. But this is an oversimplification that blinds Americans to the very political ideologies - which he identifies as "Islamism" - that are the cogs and gears of terrorism.

"I know everyone is looking for an easy label to know the 'good Muslim' from the 'bad Muslim,'" Jasser continues, "but … I believe that the 'anti-Islamist' or at least 'non-Islamist' Muslims are on our side and the pro-Islamist Muslims, those who believe in the Islamic state and governmental sharia, are not on our side but on the side of political Islam."

The issue is far more complex than that as far as Muslims are concerned, as you get into issues of itjihad and Koranic interpretation, etc., but from a non-Muslim perspective, understanding the above concepts would go a long way towards putting America on the proper footing, both to defend itself against the Islamists who threaten the Western world from within and without and to support those Muslims who wish to, in the words of Zhudi Jasser, modernize their faith. Unfortunately, it is in this regards that Bush did a very poor job and Obama is doing an existentially horrendous job.

As I have pointed out many times on this blog, Obama has set America on a full scale retreat from the war of ideas. Obama, treating Islam as a monolithic entity while pretending that the Salafi-Wahhabi ideology practiced by militant jihadists and Muslim Brotherhood alike is not "true" Islam is the most dangeorus and harmful of fantasies. It will create an indiscriminate backlash against Muslims in America and only plays into the narrative of the Islamists who wish to destroy Western civilization. Further, it squanders what is now a true opportunity to influence the outcome of the war of ideas.

And indeed, Mr. Jasser goes on to make the same points in his interview:

Islamists naturally target America because its innate principles allow them to fabricate an external enemy to unify all Muslims, Dr. Jasser goes on. At the Oslo Freedom Forum, Jasser laid out why Americanism and the ideas of liberty are the only weapons against political Islam. He discussed how the Muslim world has become trapped in a war of ideas between secular nationalist fascism (i.e., Saddam Hussein, Hosni Mubarak, and Qaddafi) and militant Islamism (Iran, the Taliban, and the Muslim Brotherhood and its army of offshoots).

"America is really the only laboratory in the world that gives us the freedom to create a third alternative," Dr. Jasser states with certainty. "That is, an Islam based in modernity that separates mosque and state and celebrates universal religious freedom and liberty."

In that vein, Jasser puts forward the explanation that Americans' perceptions of Muslims will never change until they feel Muslim Americans are spending our own resources on issues more pressing than gargantuan and ostentatious religious structures that overshadow the ruins of a still-raw wound for Americans. Focusing on counterterrorism and reform centers built with the goal of countering the hostile ideologies of political Islam within the United States are two paths Jasser offers that will improve Islam's PR with America. Most importantly of all, Muslim Americans should show America that many of them have a completely different idea of what it means to give back to the country that has given them so many freedoms, and take a personal responsibility in combating the ideas of radical Islam and its root causes.

For now, the possibility of the Ground Zero mosque coalescing from idea into structure presents not only the insult to the millions of Americans who experienced true horror on September 11, 2001, nor the threat of a new mammoth gateway for radical Islamic ideas to slip into the U.S., but the threat of sending a message of weakness to Islamists the world over.

"It will be used by Islamist leadership around the world to say, 'despite the violence that al-Qaeda perpetrated on the American population, political Islam will always be victorious and from its ashes has risen the largest religious Muslim structure in the United States,'" Jasser warns. "As the administration continues to move backwards, [outlawing] the use of any specific religious Islamic terms like jihad, Islamsim, and salafism, the Islamists continue to make unopposed headway in the contest of ideas. We are losing the war of ideas."

Recent polls have revealed that an increasing number of Americans are developing negative views of Islam. Immediately after 9/11, the numbers sat at 39 percent negative. A 2006 study provided by Dr. Jasser discovered the numbers had risen to 46 percent negative, nearly half the country's population. The same study also found out that the number of Americans who associate Islam with acts of violence had nearly tripled from 13 percent to 33 percent in the same five years. Dr. Jasser blames these numbers in great part on the majority of Muslim organizations in D.C. who are "victim-mongering front groups for the Muslim Brotherhood."

"Until we treat the affliction of Islamism and separate mosque and state and begin a palpable movement against political Islam, those opinion polls will only worsen," Jasser points out. "If the organizers [of the Ground Zero mosque] were truly moderate, they would not be building mammoth structures like this but rather investing in spreading the ideas of liberty into the Muslim community against the ideas of political Islam and the Muslim Brotherhood. They would be teaching American Muslim youth to reach out by joining our military and homeland security efforts en masse rather than allowing Islamist organizations in D.C. like CAIR to brainwash young Muslims that our military and FBI are anti-Muslim and the U.S. is anti-Islam."

Jasser iterates that he believes the most effective method possible for Muslims to reach out to Americans would be to organize a movement to hold the 57 Organization of the Islamic Conference nations accountable for all their violations of human rights as well as demand they shift from Islamism and state sponsored sharia towards more liberty-minded governments that allow more freedoms to their citizens.

"Don't let the Islamists set the agenda," Dr. Jasser says. "Yes, we will not let up against their agenda. But that's defense. We need to generate an offense to preempt the Islamists within Muslim communities domestically and abroad.

"At AIFD our offense in countering the Muslim Brotherhood Project is our Muslim Liberty Project," Jasser goes on. "We will be rolling that out over the next year and it is patterned after Jeffersonian principles of universal religious freedom and principles of liberty targeted to devout Muslims. We target Muslim youth and young adults in giving them an alternative framework for government and society that is based on our U.S. constitutional principles and the Establishment Clause. … [Our goal is to] inoculate them against the potent ideas of political Islam."

Do read the entire article, as there is much more on the Ground Zero mosque. But the mosque is only a microcosm in the much bigger picture. And with a tide of political Islam rolling over Europe uncontested at the moment, this is an issue that we deal with now, or our grandchildren's grandchildren deal with at much greater cost in blood and gold in the future.

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