Political Islam, once employed as an identity marker, now divides more than it unites.

In recent remarks, Pakistan’s Army Chief General Asim Munir articulated his ideological vision for the country with a clarity that many leaders deliberately avoid. He unapologetically reaffirmed the Two-Nation Theory and emphasized the enduring divide between Hindus and Muslims—a worldview deeply rooted in religious exclusivism.

For me, this honesty is refreshing. At least he is not hiding behind the concept of “Taqiya” (dissimulation) or the carefully crafted ambiguity that many political actors use. He owns his hardline position openly.

But we must ask—what does this ideological commitment to Islamic identity actually mean in practice? If Islam is the unifying principle behind Pakistan’s statehood, as claimed by its top military leadership, then why have fellow Muslims suffered under its policies—both at home and across borders?

In 2023, the Pakistani state forcibly expelled nearly 1.7 million Afghan refugees, many of whom had been living in the country for decades. Men, women, and children—many of whom were born in Pakistan—were sent back to a nation plagued by instability and repression. These individuals were not ideological enemies or agents of discord; they were fellow Muslims seeking safety and sustenance. The logic behind their expulsion wasn’t religious. It was ethnic, political, and economic.

This contradiction isn’t new. In 1971, during the Bangladesh Liberation War, West Pakistan (now Pakistan) unleashed brutal violence against East Pakistanis (now Bangladeshis). According to historians, up to three million people were killed, and countless women were subjected to sexual violence. And who were the victims? They were not religious “others.” They were Muslims—sharing not just faith, but language, history, and family ties.

These historical and recent episodes raise a troubling question: Is Pakistan’s national identity truly anchored in Islam, or has religion been used selectively—as a political and strategic tool to justify repression, exclusion, and control?

The Two-Nation Theory, which underpinned the partition of British India in 1947, proposed that Muslims and Hindus were distinct nations who could not coexist peacefully in a single state. But this idea, though foundational to Pakistan’s creation, has since mutated. Rather than fostering a pluralistic Muslim society, the theory has been wielded to divide people further—between Punjabis and Pashtuns, Baloch and Mohajirs, Shias and Sunnis, Deobandis and Barelvis. The outcome is not national unity, but chronic fragmentation.

Instead of serving as a source of cohesion, Islam has become a battlefield of sectarian and ethnic contestation. Political Islam, once employed as an identity marker, now divides more than it unites. The lived reality of the Pakistani state contradicts its ideological claims. Whether it’s the suppression of Baloch voices, the marginalization of Sindhi culture, or the persecution of Shias, the nation has drifted far from its idealized Islamic unity.

This is not to say that Islam, as a faith or moral system, is to blame. The issue is how Islam has been instrumentalized by the state and military elites. When any religion becomes a political instrument, it loses its spiritual purpose and becomes a tool of coercion.

The youth of Pakistan—and indeed South Asia as a whole—deserve better than this endless recycling of exclusionary doctrines. They do not need more sermons on “us vs. them.” They need education systems that teach empathy, critical thinking, and historical introspection. They need media that values truth over propaganda. And most of all, they need leadership that champions collaboration over conflict.

True unity is not built by suppressing diversity. It is achieved by embracing it. Religion can inspire compassion and solidarity, but only when it is divorced from the machinery of state control and identity politics. A nation cannot find peace if its founding principle is fear of the other.

Pakistan’s future lies not in reinforcing ideological walls but in tearing them down—brick by brick. It lies in building bridges with its neighbors, reconciling with its own people, and redefining what it means to be Pakistani—not as a monolithic Islamic identity, but as a plural, inclusive, and humane society.

History has shown us where hate leads. It’s time to try something different.

Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not reflect Milli Chronicle’s point-of-view.

However, in recent years, it has garnered a reputation as a religion associated with terror and extremism. This transformation of perception can be largely attributed to the rise of Islamism, an ideology shaped by groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood (Al-Ikhwan Al-Muslimeen) and Jamaat-e-Islami.

In this article, we will explore how Islamism has gained prominence and examine its impact on Muslim communities and society at large, drawing from data provided by Pew Research.

The Muslim Brotherhood and Jamaat-e-Islami are distinct movements known for predominantly attracting members from different ethnic backgrounds, with the former primarily drawing from Arab communities and the latter from South Asian ones. Nonetheless, both movements share a common political ideology often described as “Islamist”, which advocates for the establishment of a uniquely Islamic system of governance.

Undoubtedly, the Muslim Brotherhood stands as the most influential modern Islamist organization worldwide. Its origins trace back to Egypt in 1928 when schoolteacher Hassan al-Banna founded it. Initially, the group focused on promoting Islam as a means of personal development and broader social reform.

Over time, it evolved into a politically oriented entity. The core of its ideology revolves around the establishment of Islamic states governed by shari’a, or Islamic law, serving as the foundational principle for almost all Islamist movements. Their emblematic slogan, “Islam is the solution”, reflects their commitment to applying Islam systematically across all aspects of life.

Following its inception, the Muslim Brotherhood expanded beyond Egypt’s borders, eventually establishing branches in nearly every Arab country. Moreover, it provided the ideological underpinning for several prominent Islamist movements beyond the Arab world, such as the Pakistan-based Jamaat-e-Islami, which translates broadly to “Islamic society”.

By the 1950s, the secular nationalist regime led by Gamal Abdel Nasser in Egypt perceived the politicized Islam of the Muslim Brotherhood as a significant threat to the Egyptian state’s security. Consequently, individuals suspected of belonging to the group were detained and, in some instances, subjected to torture.

In the subsequent decades, governments in other nations where the movement held sway, including Syria, Iraq, and Tunisia, adopted similar measures, leading many of the Brotherhood’s members to seek refuge in European countries like France, Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and elsewhere.

Expansion in Europe

During the 1980s, a significant number of immigrants who had initially introduced the Muslim Brotherhood to Europe came to the realization that their return to their countries of origin was unlikely, at least in the foreseeable future. Consequently, they embarked on endeavors within various European states to establish more enduring organizations inspired by the principles of the movement.

While the earliest adherents of the Muslim Brotherhood in Europe remained closely aligned with the movement’s original ideological objectives and organizational structure in the Middle East, subsequent European groups sought to adapt the movement’s agenda and priorities to resonate with new generations of Muslims born and raised in Europe.

This collective effort gave rise to some of the most prominent and recognizable Muslim organizations on the European continent. These include the Union des Organisations Islamiques de France (Union of French Islamic Organizations, established in 1983), the Islamische Gemeinschaft in Deutschland (Islamic Community in Germany, established in 1982), the Muslim Association of Britain (established in 1997), and the Ligue Islamique Interculturelle de Belgique (Intercultural Islamic League of Belgium, established in 1997).

Notable individuals among the founding members of these organizations include Kemal el-Helbawy of the Muslim Association of Britain, a former member of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood’s Central Guidance Bureau, and Said Ramadan of Islamische Gemeinschaft in Deutschland, who was a close personal aide and son-in-law to Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna, and father of the well-known contemporary Muslim intellectual, Tariq Ramadan.

Another prominent figure linked to the Muslim Brotherhood is Rachid Ghannouchi, the exiled leader of Tunisia’s Islamist party and a major intellectual influence within global Brotherhood circles, now residing in London.

Presently, national entities such as the Union des Organisations Islamiques de France are better understood as loose affiliates rather than formal branches of the Muslim Brotherhood. These national organizations serve as representative bodies for Muslims, advocating for Muslim causes, offering coordination, strategic leadership, and some financial support to numerous small, local Muslim organizations.

Particularly in France and the United Kingdom, some of these local organizations are led by individuals with no direct ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. Their activities encompass a wide range of services designed to meet the daily religious needs of Muslims, including ensuring access to halal food, operating prayer facilities, sponsoring Quranic after-school classes, distributing copies of the Quran, and providing burial services.

The large, national Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated organizations operate under the loose oversight of the Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe, based in Brussels and founded in 1989. This umbrella organization represents Muslim entities in over two dozen European countries.

While the Federation has occasionally experienced leadership disputes and rivalries among its major national bodies, all its constituent organizations share common goals and objectives: promoting Islam as a comprehensive way of life, strengthening the Muslim community in Europe, and encouraging Muslims to engage in European society to advance Islamic causes.

In 1992, the Federation played a key role in establishing the European Institute of Human Sciences, situated in Château-Chinon, central France (near Dijon), with branches in Paris and Lampeter, Wales (U.K.). This institute promotes the study of classical Islamic scholarship among European Muslims.

Additionally, the Federation founded the European Council for Fatwa and Research in Dublin, focusing on research in Islamic jurisprudence and providing religious guidance on practical matters specific to Muslims in Europe, such as the observance of prayers and the permissibility of utilizing Western financial systems, considering Islamic restrictions on interest and usury.

Other organizations inspired by the Muslim Brotherhood have also established Islamic centers throughout Europe to meet the religious needs of local Muslim communities, offering spaces for religious classes, libraries, and shops featuring Islamic literature and religious items.

Furthermore, as of 2008, approximately 400 mosques and prayer spaces in Europe were indirectly associated with the Muslim Brotherhood. While not directly affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood or its European coordinating structures, the Millî Görüş organization in Germany aligns with a similar ideological orientation within the Turkish community in that country.

Jamaat-e-Islami

Jamaat-e-Islami, headquartered in Pakistan and with branches extending into India and Bangladesh, stands as one of the most influential Islamic political movements in South Asia. This influence also resonates with South Asian Muslims worldwide.

In Europe, notably in the United Kingdom, where over two-thirds of the approximately 2.9 million Muslim population hails from South Asia, the group wields significant strength.

Groups associated with Jamaat-e-Islami share substantial common ground with those having affiliations to the Muslim Brotherhood. Both movements have experienced parallel developments in their evolution within Europe.

The earliest formal appearances of Jamaat-e-Islami in Europe trace back to the 1960s, marked by the establishment of the UK Islamic Mission and its subsidiary, Dawatul Islam. These organizations, which remain active today, are dedicated to promoting Islamic education, with a particular focus on Jamaat-e-Islami intellectual heritage and perspectives.

Among the older generations of Jamaat-e-Islami adherents in Europe, a strong adherence to the movement’s original ideological foundations persists. These foundations emphasized the necessity of establishing a distinct and wholly Islamic political system.

However, younger generations, especially those raised in the United Kingdom, have sought to distance themselves from the movement’s more rigid positions. These positions are exemplified in the writings of Jamaat-e-Islami’s founder, Abu Ala Mawdudi, who, alongside Hassan al-Banna, articulated the ideological framework of modern Islamism.

Notably, in the United Kingdom, two groups initially inspired by Jamaat-e-Islami—the Islamic Society of Britain and its youth branch, Young Muslims UK—have evolved to some degree into its competitors.

These emerging organizations aim to champion a uniquely “British Islam” that melds mainstream civic engagement with a robust and self-assured Muslim public identity.

While their active membership and intellectual appeal primarily attract well-educated, professional Muslims, these two groups also organize widely attended mass retreats and administer neighborhood mentoring programs in economically disadvantaged Muslim areas across the United Kingdom.

Increasing Visibility and Collaboration

In recent times, European organizations with historical ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and Jamaat-e-Islami have significantly intensified their cooperation with European governments. This trend has become especially pronounced since the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States, prompting European officials to actively engage with their Muslim communities.

Part of the reason behind this engagement is the presence of professional staff and middle-class leadership within these groups associated with the Muslim Brotherhood and Jamaat-e-Islami. Consequently, government officials and other influential figures within society sometimes perceive them as representatives of the entire Muslim community.

For instance, the Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated Union des Organisations Islamiques de France was among the earliest organizations to be invited to join the Conseil Français du Culte Musulman, an entity established by the French government in 2003 to advocate for the interests of the country’s Muslims in their interactions with the government.

Similarly, in the United Kingdom, the Muslim Council of Britain (many of whose leaders have ties to groups linked to Jamaat-e-Islami) became a pivotal point of engagement between the government and the nation’s Muslim population shortly after its founding in 1997.

However, this relationship experienced some strain following the 9/11 attacks and the July 2005 terrorist bombings on London’s transit system. In part, this tension arose because certain member organizations within the Council were believed to be fostering intolerance towards non-Muslims.

In parallel with Islamist organizations forging closer connections with European governments, some have also joined forces with non-Muslim activists to oppose specific government policies. For instance, a UK affiliate of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Muslim Association of Britain, played a central role in organizing numerous large-scale protests against the Iraq War.

Certainly, it’s crucial to differentiate between the Muslim Association of Britain and the Association of British Muslims, as these two organizations are distinctly separate and hold divergent positions and objectives.

Simultaneously, the Muslim Association of Britain collaborated with law enforcement and government security services in England to displace radical Muslim leaders from key mosques within the country. This initiative aimed to counteract the propagation of extremist ideologies, notably exemplified by the North London Central (“Finsbury Park”) Mosque, which had gained notoriety for its radical sermons.

Shifting Priorities?

The Muslim Brotherhood and its associated entities have often played a significant role in shaping the public discourse for European Muslims at large. However, it appears that this agenda is undergoing a transformation.

While many of the initial organizations inspired by the Brotherhood still have leadership from the first generation, many of whom were born outside of Europe, a new wave of leaders is emerging. These younger leaders, primarily born in Europe, are increasingly advocating for an agenda that prioritizes the interests and specific needs of Muslims within individual European countries, moving away from a sole focus on global Islamic issues, such as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Although there is a noticeable shift in the agenda, the Muslim Brotherhood remains a contentious topic in various parts of Western Europe.

Some Europeans hold the belief that certain Brotherhood-affiliated organizations promote agendas that encourage their followers to primarily identify as Muslims, potentially impeding the assimilation of Muslims in European societies.

Furthermore, scrutiny has been directed towards Brotherhood-linked figures in Europe who have made anti-Semitic remarks, expressed support for suicide bombings in Israel, or engaged in fundraising for groups associated with Hamas, the militant Palestinian Islamic organization.

Additionally, questions have been raised about potential connections between some Brotherhood-affiliated groups in the Middle East and global terrorist networks.

In light of these concerns, leaders of Brotherhood-affiliated groups in Europe may continue to face inquiries regarding the movement’s complex history, even as they strive to make their agenda more relevant to the evolving perspectives of new generations of Muslims.

Dalia Ziada

The ill performance and unwise decisions of the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood are the main reasons why the Muslim Brotherhood has failed in ruling Egypt.

Nine years ago, the Muslim Brotherhood were given a once in generation opportunity to rule Egypt, and they wasted it. The unexpected rise of the Muslim Brotherhood group to the topmost of power, in Egypt, followed by a quick and loud fall, has shattered the group into unassimilable pieces. The Muslim Brotherhood leaders had dug the grave of the group with their own hands, by insisting on placing their Islamist identity above the nationalist identity, that Egyptians dearly embrace.

Then, they shot the group right in the heart, by inciting their young followers to practice acts of violence, under the flag of defending Islam, against civilians, policemen, and state facilities in a vengeful reaction to their ouster from power. Even after fleeing Egypt, they continued to hurt their grassroots supporters, whom they left behind with no protection or support, by creating meaningless internal battles over the group’s leadership and finances. The ill performance and unwise decisions of the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood are the main reasons why the Muslim Brotherhood has failed in ruling Egypt.

The Opportunity

Before becoming a president, in 2012, Mohamed Morsi had not been known to most Egyptians, including those who identify with the Muslim Brotherhood. Morsi’s marginal victory with 51.7% against Ahmed Shafik, the former military aviator and the last prime minister of Mubarak’s regime, marked a plot twist in the decades-long rivalry between the military institution and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Morsi’s victory was widely celebrated by western media and academics as a step towards containing Islamists within an organized political system. But, inside Egypt, there was a heightened sense of shock and defeat, especially among the liberal and pro-democracy activists. The majority of the young Egyptians, who participated in the revolution against Mubarak, had not planned or expected to see Egypt turning into an Islamic theocracy governed by the Muslim Brotherhood in presidency and the far-right Salafist movement, in parliament.

Neither the military nor the liberal activists dared to challenge the results of the elections. The military could not afford exposing the country to the threat of initiating a civil war by not accepting the new reality of Islamists taking over. The chaotic aftermath of the Arab Spring offered a perfect environment for this hellish scenario. Likewise, it was easier for the pro-democracy activists to accept the results of the elections, even though they do not ideologically agree with the Muslim Brotherhood, than letting Egypt fall back into the sludge of dictatorship on the hands of Mubarak’s associates.

Meanwhile, the majority of Egyptians, pushed by fear of losing the secular Egypt that they know under the pressure of systematic Islamization of the state by the new rulers, chose to quietly retreat to their safe caves of apathy. “The couch party” was the term used by analysts to describe this phenomenon of Egyptians sudden withdrawal from political participation, at that time. The political ascendance of the Islamists instigated a shuffle in the relationship dynamics between the Islamists, the military, and the general public.

That was the beginning of a whole new chapter, where the average citizens started to reconsider the legitimacy of the Arab Spring revolution that ousted Mubarak from power, and the viability of the democratization process if it will happen on the expense of risking state security and stability.

The Mistake

The Muslim Brotherhood did not care to address the concerns of the public, or to console the defeated liberal activists. They did not even try to negotiate a political deal with the powerful military generals. On the contrary, they purposefully marginalized everyone who adopted a political or religious ideology that is different to them, and kept the hardcore Salafists as the only political allies. The Muslim Brotherhood took every step in the wrong direction of alienating themselves and stirring popular anger and resentment.

First, the Muslim Brotherhood turned against the military generals. On the first week of August 2012, nearly one month after Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohamed Morsi was seated as president, Morsi fired the two most popular leaders of the Armed Forces: Field Marshal Mohammed Tantawy, the Minister of Defense, and his Army Chief of Staff, General Sami Anan. Together, Tantawy and Anan had complete control over the military for years. Both commanders were highly respected by the Egyptian public and counterpart militaries, worldwide. Ironically, what the Muslim Brotherhood thought was a bold step to control the military institution, turned out to be their most unwise decision. The new Minister of Defense, Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, who was appointed by Morsi after the removal of Tantawy played a tremendous role in overthrowing the Muslim Brotherhood regime from power, a few months later.

In parliament, the performance of Muslim Brotherhood allies, was not only shocking to the public, but also threatening to the liberal and democratic values that motivated the young activists to lead a revolution against Mubarak. The legislations discussed by Islamist Members of Parliament were not about improving economy or advancing democracy. Rather, they were pre-occupied by making new laws to legalize child marriage, allow the return of the horrific practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), and prohibiting women from working in certain fields that they believed should be reserved exclusively to men.

They went as far as marginalizing the Coptic Christian citizens and disregarding their needs for individual freedom and security. This explains why women and Coptic Christian citizens represent the majority of El-Sisi’s electoral constituency. They are, also, the two main social groups that supported the ouster of the Muslim Brotherhood regime from power, in 2013.

Yet, the most shocking behavior by Islamist parliamentarians was when they refused to stand up to honor the Egyptian flag when the national anthem was playing, claiming that this is a non-Islamic practice. Even worse, some Salafist Members of Parliament used to disrespectfully disturb parliamentary discussions by standing up without permission and loudly reciting the Islamic “Azan” (the call for prayer), and then leaving the room in groups to perform prayer.

One of the biggest mistakes that the Muslim Brotherhood committed when in power was tolerating the discriminative practices of the Islamists against women and non-Muslim citizens, in order not to lose the support of their grassroots followers. That is despite the fact that, on another level, the Muslim Brotherhood took the effort to end its own discriminative rhetoric against women, to please western allies. For the first time ever, the female members of the Muslim Brotherhood were allowed to take leadership positions inside the political party that the group created after the Arab Spring revolution. These women were, in fact, the wives and daughters of the leaders of the group. They had no political experience and they were acting as instructed by the top leaders.

The Downfall

The victory of Islamists in presidential and parliamentary elections, in 2012, was a result of disgraceful manipulation of people’s religious piety and starvation for democratic change. The slogan the Islamists used in parliamentary elections, for example, was: “we are your way to Allah’s Heaven.” They deceived the religious pious grassroots citizens into believing that voting to political Islamists is voting to Allah. However, it did not take Egyptians more than a few month to realize that they committed a mistake by voting political Islamists in presidency and in parliament.

A series of surveys ran by Ibn Khaldun Center for Democratic Studies, between July 2012 and June 2013, about the public citizens’ satisfaction with presidential performance marked sharp declines in Islamists’ popularity and credibility among grassroots citizens. In July 2012, only one month after Morsi was elected, the survey showed that 40.3% of Egyptians were satisfied with the performance of the president. During this month, Morsi – the then new president – gave an endless list of flowery promises that included improving the economy and empowering women and religious minorities into decision-making positions, in a clear contradiction to his group’s ideology and principles. But, in November 2012, as public rallies surrounding the presidential palace to protest government’s failure were received by violent resistance from Muslim Brotherhood militia, the citizens’ satisfaction index dramatically declined to 8.5%.

By the end of June 2013, in coincidence with Morsi’s first anniversary in power, the Egyptians decided that the Muslim Brotherhood have wasted their opportunity and does not deserve to remain in power, any longer. The persistence of Egyptians to overthrow the Muslim Brotherhood from power was clearly expressed through a number of nonviolent tactics that built up to the momentum of nation-wide protests that eventually overthrew Morsi from power.

Towards the end of 2012, ordinary citizens, especially in Cairo, started to hang banners outside their houses and shopping stores located on main streets, portraying Islamists as Machiavellian manipulators. Soon after, a massive petition signing campaign, under the name “Tamarud” (Rebellion), was launched by young liberal democratic activists to mobilize the “couch party” citizens to express their rejection to the Muslim Brotherhood regime. Tamarud petition collected more than twenty-two million signatures in less than three months, between February and June 2013, exceeding the number of those who voted to Morsi in the presidential elections.

Tamarud petition called upon Morsi to resign and for the constitutional court to set a date for new presidential elections. In parallel, young liberal activists organized protests, on regular Fridays, outside the Presidential Palace and the Muslim Brotherhood’s headquarters. As the police forces and military guards at the presidential office refused to use violence to control the protesters, the Muslim Brotherhood’s leaders ordered the militia affiliated to the group to clash with them.

The decline of the military and police forces to obey the presidential orders to violently repress the protesters, awakened people’s desire to see the military coming back in power. By March 2013, the protests against the Muslim Brotherhood started to incorporate slogans calling for military’s return to political leadership. In addition to the regularly used slogan of “down with Muslim Brotherhood rule,” the people started once again to chant the revolution’s slogan “people and the military are one hand.” This renewed confidence in military, encouraged the Minister of Defense, Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, to instruct the military institution to take the side of the people against the Muslim Brotherhood.

On the 1st of July, as the protests calling for Morsi’s resignation multiplied and expanded, El-Sisi made a public statement, in his capacity as the Minister of Defense, giving Morsi an ultimatum of forty-eight hours to resign, in compliance with people’s demands. On the 2nd of July, Morsi responded by a televised speech about his electoral legitimacy, asserting that he was willing to defend it even by “shedding blood.” A few minutes after the speech, violent clashes between Muslim Brotherhood supporters and anti-Morsi protesters erupted at several locations across Egypt, resulting in fatalities. On the 3rd of July, El-Sisi announced the removal of Morsi from his position as president and transferring presidential powers to the president of the constitutional court until writing a new constitution and holding a presidential election.

The Polarization

Not all Egyptians observe the June 30th anniversary the same way. The perception varies with great degrees, based on the political tendencies of who is looking back at the day that initiated the new political reality of Egypt and the entire region of the Middle East.

For the Egyptian state, and its supporters, June 30th anniversary represents two significant events. It is the day, in 2013, when the Egyptian people rallied nation-wide to protest the rule of the Muslim Brotherhood and call upon the military institution to intervene to force convening early presidential elections. On the same day, exactly one year later, the retired Major General Abdel Fattah El-Sisi was sworn in as the new president of state, after an overwhelming majority of Egyptians elected him in reward to his central role in ridding Egypt of the Islamists’ rule.

Pragmatically, the people, also, believed that El-Sisi is the only person who can restore security and stability because the military is backing him. In his inauguration speech, El-Sisi made sure not to make promises to the people about what he can achieve. He only asserted that his main task is to save Egypt from the “people of evil,” and asked the Egyptians to help and support him on that mission.

On the flip side, the Muslim Brotherhood members and sympathizers remember the June 30th anniversary as a coup d’état against a democratically elected regime, that derived its legitimacy from the constitution and the will of the citizens who voted the group in.

In the middle, the pro-democracy activists, who led the Arab Spring revolution against Mubarak’s autocratic rule, and then supported the uprising against the Muslim Brotherhood, out of fear of a probable theocracy, are wondering, with a sense of guilt, if they have recklessly wasted Egypt’s rare chance for democracy when they cheered the early purge of the elected regime of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Article first published on Liberal Democracy Institute.

By believing the dishonest characterisation of Shawcross and his review you are in fact aiding the Islamist project.

The long-awaited independent review of Prevent by William Shawcross was finally released on Wednesday the 8^th January.

“Prevent” is one of the four “P”’s in the UK Counter Terrorism strategy called the Contest Strategy– alongside: “Pursue”, Prepare” and “Protect.” The Prevent strategy’s primary role is to stop people becoming terrorists or supporting terrorism through tackling the causes of radicalisation and respond to the ideological challenge of terrorism, safeguarding and supporting those most at risk of radicalisation through early intervention, identifying them and offering support, and enabling those who have already engaged in terrorism to disengage and rehabilitate

The review criticises the existing way that the strategy is being implemented for straying from its “overarching objective”  of stopping people from supporting terrorism and calls for more to be done to tackle the ideology that inspires and legitimises Islamist terrorist attacks. One would assume that this approach is common sense and the only way to “prevent” people from becoming violent. After all, prevention is better than cure and terrorism cannot be countered without neutralizing the ideas it is built upon.

We should all welcome an improved Prevent Strategy that more effectively stops people from becoming radicalised in the first place. But, inevitably, among those who hold the Islamist world view that Prevent seeks to challenge, this isn’t the case,.

As soon as Shawcross was appointed in January 2021, a slick, well-established strategy to assassinate his character him was deployed by Islamists and their supporters. Overnight, social media was awash with mendacious claims of Islamophobia, old quotes of his emerged and were shared wildly out of context in an unedifying ‘gotcha’ manner. Hundreds of people and groups publicly boycotted his review, before it had even started.

Why did they do this? And what else can we expect from the Islamist playbook now the review is published?

Character assassination is a psychological tool of war used by Islamists extensively to attack the credibility of the intended target. The intention is to harm their opponents and discredit their work, politically, morally, socially, and even economically, through the spreading of rumours, false accusations, and the manipulation of facts.  The Minister of Islamic Affairs in Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam, agrees with me. In other words, Shawcross should expect more of the same!

Keep an eye out for the (now) tiresome ploy of an opening statement to the press condemning the review signed by hundreds of organisations, many of whom (a quick google search would show) are sympathetic to the Islamist worldview. Furthermore, I and no doubt many others were bombarded with WhatsApp messages the evening before the release claiming that it is being driven by an “anti-Muslim ideology” by an individual that is “hostile to Muslims” and urging recipients to send an angry cut-and-paste rejection of the review to their local MP and “speak out against the Government”.

It is precisely because the review targets the very ideology that Islamists (especially the Muslim Brotherhood) hold dear that means that unless they disavow their world view, they have no option but to go on the offensive. Many of them will refuse to accept the review’s findings without reading it because, for them, Prevent in principle is xenophobic towards Muslims. They have cast themselves as the vanguard, defenders of Muslim rights, and they stand side by side with their comrades – to do anything else would mean that they have to believe an alternative truth and admit that they have been wrong the whole time. Don’t hold your breath and expect of them to do this!

The reality is that the review does not target Muslims or Islam. It targets Islamism and the groups and individuals that have supported extreme Islamist ideologies and narratives. It is not “anti-Muslim” to target Islamists and many Muslims agree. Most Muslims are not Islamists or even supporters of the ideology. Muslims suffer the largest number of casualties globally from Islamist terrorism and in the UK, non-Islamist Muslims are just as much the target of this vile ideology – in some cases even more because they are regarded as traitors to the cause. Furthermore, ordinary Muslims like me reject what we have called in the past the bigotry of low expectations, from non-Muslims, and we expect to be treated as equal citizens.

We have rejected the political goals of Islamism that reject the values that led our immigrant parents to stay in the UK – In other words, by believing the dishonest characterisation of Shawcross and his review you are in fact aiding the Islamist project, and, in doing so you are doing us harm.

About Author: Haras Rafiq is a Counter-Extremism and Counter Terrorism expert since 2004. Until recently, Haras was the Managing Director of ISGAP (Academic Research Centre) and served as CEO and Executive Board Member for seven years at Quilliam International (UK, USA and Canada) – and until 2018 as a member of the Advisory Group on Online Terrorist Propaganda at Europol’s European Counter-terrorism Centre (ECTC).

Haras is also a trustee of the UK Charity Muslims Against Antisemitism and has been a trustee of the UK and French Government Securities Think Tank – The Franco British Council. Haras has testified at various Parliamentary hearings including the All-Party Parliamentary Groups (UK) and at Senate Committee Hearings (USA) as well as the EU Parliament.

Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not reflect Milli Chronicle’s point-of-view.

Wokeism, in its various manifestations, arguably constitutes a perfect political vessel for Islamists.

Islamism in the West has an almost 70-year history, dating back to when the first members of the Muslim Brotherhood, either students pursuing graduate studies in Western universities or senior leaders fleeing persecution in their home countries, arrived in Europe and North America in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Since then, activists linked to various branches of the Muslim Brotherhood in the Arab world and other movements from the Indian sub-continent (Jemaat-e-Islami) and Turkey (Millî Görüş) that belong to the broad family of political Islam have established a stable presence in the West. These movements have since evolved ideologically and organizationally, and, despite their still relatively small size, they have become disproportionally influential forces in the West’s heterogeneous Muslim communities.

Some aspects of this presence have not changed substantially over time. For example, the inner workings of many Western Islamist networks, such as the scrupulous selection process, the internal secrecy and the hierarchical structure, are virtually identical to those of the early days, in substance replicating those of the mother structures in Muslim-majority societies. Yet, over the years, Western-based members of the characteristically flexible and pragmatic Islamist movement came to understand that several aspects of their political matrix had to be adapted.

Firstly, they understood that the goals the movement harbored for Muslim majority societies—Islamization of the entire society and installation of an Islamic government ruling based on sharia—could not realistically be achieved in the West, where Muslims constitute just a small minority. Western Islamists went on to see disseminating their politico-religious worldview inside Western Muslim communities and influencing Western policies and debates on pertinent issues as two more suitable goals.

Moreover, with time, Western Islamists understood that not only their goals but also their tactics needed to be adapted. Some of the narratives, frames and language that constitute the traditional repertoire of Islamism have remained unmutated. This has been particularly true among the tightly knit older members of the movement, and as the movement has sought to engage with the wider but still relatively small audience of conservative sympathizers in Western Muslim communities. But, at the same time, Western Islamists have substantially altered how they present themselves to two of its core audiences: Western Muslim communities (the majority of which have little knowledge about or interest in Islamism) and Western establishments (broadly intended to include governmental actors, media, and civil society).

Making traction with these two constituencies has been crucially important to Western Islamists since they realized, by the early 1980s, that their presence in the West was not temporary and that they could use it not just as a refuge from Middle Eastern regimes but to achieve a new and broad set of goals. The recently established and fast-growing Muslim communities of the West came to be seen as an ideally receptive audience for the Islamists’ religious and socio-political worldview, and Yussuf al-Qaradawi, the putative spiritual leader of the global Islamist movement, posited “the duty of the Islamic Movement [is] not to leave these [Western] expatriates to be swept by the whirlpool of the materialistic trend that prevails in the West.” As for influencing Western establishments, over the last thirty years Islamists have consistently sought to present themselves as legitimate representatives of local Muslim communities, reliable and moderate interlocutors for governments, media and society at-large.

In order to win over these constituencies, Western Islamists soon understood the need to tailor their messaging and frames. This process of language adaptation started decades ago but has deepened and accelerated over the last 10-15 years, as a new generation of young activists has come to the fore. Unlike the first generation of Islamists who arrived from the Middle East, this new cadre is more attuned to Western cultural sensitivities by virtue of being born in the West and having mostly been educated in social sciences, humanities and communications (while the educational background of most activists of the first generation heavily tended to be in disciplines such as engineering and medicine).

Many from this new generation of Islamist activists retain only tenuous formal links to established Islamist structures. They might have grown up with Islamist influences—in some cases literally, as some of them are the children of Islamist pioneers in the West—such as being active in Islamist youth groups or giving frequent lectures at mosques and events linked to the network. But they have often created their own ways of amplifying their voices, from establishing new organizations and a multi-platform online presence. Their degrees of connectivity with traditional Islamist organizations varies but is at times quite limited, at least formally.

Moreover, most of these young Islamist actors rarely use Islamist references and if they do so, it tends to be done in somewhat veiled terms. Instead, they speak the language of discrimination, anti-racism, internalized oppression, intersectionality and post-colonial theory. Several of the causes they embrace, such as the environment or lowering university fees, have nothing to do with Islamism. Others can be seen as overlapping with Islamism’s traditional grievances but are framed in typically progressive terms and with no apparent Islamist undertone. For example, Western Islamists’ recent adherence to calls to “de-colonize” school curricula fit the ideology’s inherent anti-colonial nature but are formulated adopting the phrasing commonly used in progressive circles.

These approaches have allowed the new generation of Western Islamists to make inroads in political, media and civil society circles in ways their predecessors could only hope. By largely shedding Islamist tropes and adopting progressive frames and causes, young Western Islamists have forged strong alliances in mainstream society and have come to be widely accepted in Western establishment circles. Many of them have therefore come to run as candidates in political parties, pen op-eds for and appear in debates on mainstream media; forge alliances with a broad array of progressive organizations and thought leaders; receive grants from respected foundations and governmental agencies.

In substance, long gone are the days in which Western Islamists publicly burned books, as during the Rushdie Affair in 1988. Many of today’s Islamists use frames, embrace causes and make alliances that puzzle not only long-time observers of the movement but also the first generation of pioneers. Some, particularly in Europe, have begun to refer to this trend as “woke Islamism”. The term is contested and can be seen as somewhat disparaging. But it has become relatively common among both observers and old-timers of the Islamist scene in the West, aptly describing a trend that has substantially accelerated over the last couple of years.

This article seeks to analyze some of the key dynamics behind woke Islamism in the West, from its origins to its many manifestations. Doing so is a complex endeavor, as the trend changes from country to country and is relatively new, making its developments and implications impossible to fully assess. Despite these challenges, the article aims to shed some light on a phenomenon that is substantially changing the face of Islamism in the West and that should therefore be understood by academics and policymakers alike.

Islamism and Ultra-Progressive Politics

The relationship between the Left and Islamism—both terms, to be sure, that include an incredibly diverse array of political views and currents—is a complex one. Even by limiting our analysis to the West, it is impossible to even remotely capture its many facets, a task that is anyway beyond the scope of this essay. Yet it is fair to say that one of the most prominent trends that have characterized the relationship between at least some of the most progressive and at times radical elements of the Left and Islamism is that of sympathy and desire to cooperate.

Many voices on the Left, including in its more progressive quarters, take a markedly different approach, highlighting the many issues on which the two movements sharply differ and arguing against any favorable view of Islamism. But a fascination with Islamism has gripped substantial parts of the Western Left since the 1950s. Islamism’s strong anti-colonial views, rejection of what it perceives as Western-imposed social and economic constructs, anti-Americanism and anti-Zionism, and its ability to mobilize masses have garnered admiration in broad sections of the Western Left.

This sympathy and perceived commonality of enemies have led many to postulate an alliance with Islamists. The view has been held, whether openly or not, by many in the Western Left, from mainstream voices to, at times, fringe, violent Leftist groups. Many of these theorizations have found little to no concretization. But, over the last twenty years, several operationalizations of the potential alliance (at times dubbed as red-green) have happened in more mainstream quarters of the Left in various Western countries. Many see a quintessential example of this dynamic in the alliance that emerged in the UK in the early 2000s around the Stop the War Coalition (STWC).

Originally a partnership of various organizations led by the Socialist Workers Party and the Communist Party of Britain, in the run up to the 2003 Iraq war STWC reached out to the Muslim Association of Britain, an organization founded and headed by prominent UK-based Muslim Brotherhood activists such as Kamal Helbawy, Azzam Tamimi and Anas al-Tikriti. Impressed by the turnout an anti-Israel protest MAB had organized in central London in April 2002, STWC leaders asked MAB to join the coalition. It should be noted that MAB’s anti-Israel protest had received widespread criticism for the presence of emblems of Hamas and Hezbollah and the burning of Israeli and American flags.

The offer generated intense internal debate, as MAB leaders weighed the benefits of extending their message on a much larger level and the potential costs that an alliance with Marxists, atheists and homosexuals could have caused them, particularly among the most conservative segments of the Muslim community. In the end, MAB accepted to enter in a form of a partnership on an equal basis, cooperating closely but remaining an autonomous bloc with its own agenda. It also imposed as necessary conditions for its participation the presence of halal food, faith-sensitive accommodations and gender-segregated meetings and demonstrations. STWC leaders, despite the protests of some of their members, reportedly agreed to all the conditions.

The cooperation between MAB and STWC was quite successful, as hundreds of thousands of demonstrators participated to their events. It also led to the formation of a political party, RESPECT/The Unity Coalition, which achieved minor successes at the polls. Its candidates included far Left leaders like “Old Labour” MP George Galloway and Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party leader Lindsey German, MAB members like Anas al Tikriti, and other Muslim activists like Salma Yaqoob and Yvonne Ridley, the British journalist who had converted to Islam after being held in captivity by the Taliban.

Somewhat similar forms of cooperation have taken place in other Western countries over the last twenty years. But over the last decade some of the more progressive quarters of the West’s Left have adopted issues, frames and a language that are significantly different from those it traditionally used. Identity politics, intersectionality, concerns over systemic injustices and prejudices have become the predominant issues among leftist activists, particularly of the younger generation. The term “woke,” despite being contested by some for having become somewhat derogatory of the trend, is frequently used to describe this approach to political activism.

Wokeism, in its various manifestations, arguably constitutes a perfect political vessel for Islamists. The tendency to blame “whiteness” and the white man’s allegedly domineering tendency for most of the world’s woes is, for example, a perfect fit for an ideology like Islamism that was born in the first half of the 20th century in opposition to colonialism and that has since blamed a large part of the Muslim world’s problems on the West. By the same token, strong forms of identity politics perfectly match with the long-standing claim of Western Islamists that Western Muslim communities should be allowed to have their own separate social, educational and legal structures. If in his writings in the 1990s Yussuf al-Qaradawi urged Western Islamists “have your small society within the larger society, try to have your own ‘Muslim ghetto,” today’s confrontational identity politics offer Islamists arguments to make the case that Muslims need “safe spaces” to be shielded from “structural racism” and preserve their identity.

Moreover, wokeism provides Western Islamists with a strong, multipurpose rhetorical weapon: Islamophobia. To be sure, anti-Muslim hatred and discrimination are, sadly, fairly widespread problematics, manifesting themselves throughout the West both in subtle ways and, occasionally, dramatically violent actions. But Islamists have a tendency to exaggerate and instrumentalize the issue to serve their own various, overlapping purposes.

With Muslim communities, Western Islamists seek to use the Islamophobia card to foster a strong Islamic identity and carve out a position of leadership for themselves. Western Islamists have long understood that no other factor has a greater impact on the formation of a collective identity than the existence or the perception of an outside force threatening the community.

They have also shown an unparalleled cunningness in becoming the main advocates of causes that outraged the majority of Muslims, even those who did not share Islamist leanings. From the Rushdie Affair to the Danish cartoons, from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to controversies over the veil in various European countries, Western Islamists have utilized their superior resources and mobilization skills to lead protests against events that they portrayed as part of a pattern of Western aggression against Muslims and Islam.

Fostering the idea that Muslims are under siege, discriminated and victimized, Western Islamists have portrayed themselves as the only voices willing and capable to stand up for the community. By framing them to suit their needs, they have exploited global political crises, undeniable forms of discrimination that have affected Western Muslims, and cultural tensions that have routinely appeared in most Western countries over the last twenty years. A “community under siege,” to use an expression often employed in Brotherhood circles after 9/11, tends to close ranks, reinforce its communal identity, and rely on aggressive and capable leaders who can defend it. Having nurtured this culture of victimhood, Western Islamists, as consummated identity entrepreneurs, have been consistent in tapping into the grievances of Western Muslims and presenting themselves as the only force able to “act as the first line of defence for Islam and Muslims all over the world.”

Externally, Islamophobia serves two main purposes. The first is to create a broad range of alliances with other communities that face discriminations and organizations that fight it. Western Islamists have increasingly framed Islamophobia as part of the structural injustices that, according to them, plague Western societies and, on that basis, have formed alliances with the most disparate organizations fighting discrimination. This includes entities from groups towards which the Islamist movement has historically shown animosity, such as Jewish or LBGTQ organizations. These alliances allow Islamists to gain greater access to mainstream society and counter the accusations of intolerance to which they have themselves been historically subjected.

Finally, Western Islamists utilize Islamophobia as a label for any criticism not just of Islam and Muslims but also of themselves. Any scrutiny of Islamist ideology and actors can be easily labelled as racist, an attempt by people with privilege to silence marginalized voices of color. This charge is made also against critics of Islamism with a Muslim background, as they too are not rarely accused of being Islamophobes.

Islamist Networks Go Woke

As wokeism has become gradually mainstream in Western societies over the last decade, Western Islamists have also increasingly embraced it. They have increasingly framed several of their “historical” issues, such as Palestine or anti-Muslim discrimination, through progressive frames that at times accompany but, in most cases, replace, at least externally, Islamist ones. And they also adopted new issues, such as the anti-capitalist agenda to tackle climate change or even gender equality, which have traditionally been alien, if not contrary to, Islamist discourse.

This new approach begs the question over its sincerity. A more skeptical observer could argue that it is purely façade, that Islamists use the language of the progressive Left simply to be seen as moderate, shed the bad image that tarnishes the Islamist milieus they come from, and be accepted in mainstream circles. But, fear the critics, Islamists have not abandoned their views and have just cleverly adopted wokeism as a political tool to better advance their goals, which in reality have little to do with progressive causes.

A different viewpoint is that the new cadres of activists that got their start in Western Islamist milieus are Western-born, have studied at Western universities (and, unlike the pioneers of the movement, not in technical faculties but mostly in humanities), and have frequently participated in the activities of non-Islamist entities. This, taken together, means young Islamists have been deeply exposed to wokeism and may have genuinely embraced at least some elements of its worldview and framing. In substance, it is not unreasonable that young Western Islamists generally embrace various aspects of wokeism, often juxtaposing and reconciling it with various elements of the Islamist worldview they also absorbed during their activism career.

It is impossible to assess which of the two opposing positions is correct, and obviously each case is different and should be looked at individually. In several instances a middle position, one that considers that Western Islamists are simultaneously embracing progressive causes and frames out of genuine conviction and more cynically adopting them to advance their cause without fully believing in them, is likely to be the most appropriate.

What seems clear though in this relatively new and fast-developing trend is the fact that, while individual activists might embrace wokeism independently, organizations and networks with clear and long-standing Islamist connections have been playing an important role in furthering this process. In substance, in what appears a fairly concerted effort, established Islamist groups or structures have been connecting, platforming and financially supporting activists with or without an Islamist background that adopt positions steeped in wokeism which advance the Islamist movement’s goals. In substance, while the adoption of wokeism might be spontaneous, there is ample evidence that Islamist structures seek to support it.

Examples of this dynamic abound. Among the most telling is that of Al Jazeera+ (better known as AJ+), which tellingly describes itself as “a unique, global digital news and storytelling brand dedicated to human rights and equality, holding power to account, and amplifying the voices of marginalized communities seeking to make their stories seen and heard” and “a social justice lens on a world struggling for change.” Launched in 2014, AJ+ is “the trailblazing brainchild of the young-and-restless creative minds of Al Jazeera’s Incubation and Innovation Unit, who earlier than most saw the emerging opportunity to reach a millennial audience with a video news product delivered via social media platforms.” As its own website openly states AJ+ “is part of the Al Jazeera Media Network, an editorially independent entity funded by the government of Qatar as an investment in promoting ‘the public good’ — in the way that the British taxpayer funds the BBC.”

Al Jazeera Arabic, the mother entity of the group, is well known for being heavily staffed with members and sympathizers of the Muslim Brotherhood and for regularly broadcasting Islamist viewpoints, a fact that has led the channel to be banned in several Arab countries and suffer severe criticism in the West. AJ+, which has a large social media presence in four languages (English, Spanish, Arabic and French), targets a very different audience from the mother channel and adopts a radically different approach. AJ+, in fact, regularly features stories that focus on issues central to the progressive movement and framed in quintessentially woke fashion.

Most of AJ+’s stories have little or nothing to do with Islamist-related issues, but consistently accuse Western societies of a ubiquitous pattern of injustice and discrimination against a variety of victim groups, from ethnic and religious minorities to the LBGTQ community. Supplementing these stories, which constitute the backbone of AJ+’s editorial line, are stories that do cover topics closer to the traditional interests of Islamists, such as various Middle Eastern conflicts or anti-Muslim sentiments in the West. The insertion of the latter topics in the broader narrative and the use of similar language to discuss all of them clearly aim at making Islamist points of view acceptable to the AJ+’s audience, a large portion of which is composed of millennials and younger individuals without a Muslim background.

As an example, AJ+ English regularly demonizes the U.S. government for a variety of past and current sins with stories such as The Government Plot To Erase Native Languages; The Real Story of the Alamo: forget what you learned in school; Capitalism is a disease; and Raoul Peck’s Journey Into The Heart of Whiteness. These stories are accompanied by others such as Fleeing to the Heart of the Empire, which compares the experiences of Vietnamese and Afghan refugees to America (“the heart of the empire”). “Once again,” reads the article, “those subject to America’s imperialist adventures are banging on the door, seeking to escape the conflagration as troops pull out. And once again, they are met with widespread indifference.” Other stories include Resistance and the ‘War On Terror’ in East Africa; Palestinians Are Striking to Fight Apartheid;) or On COVID, India and privilege.

A similar dynamic is visible for the French language version of AJ+. French AJ+ has launched or actively promoted a series of campaigns to denounce various incidents, many of them steeped in pop culture close to millennials and their juniors, it considered racist with quintessentially woke frames. They include promoting the hashtag #BlackHogwarts to point out that people of color are severely underrepresented in the Harry Potter series; denouncing both Miley Cyrus’ twerk and Kylie Jenner’s hairstyle as cultural appropriation; and criticizing the French football federation for featuring a white player, Antoine Griezmann, as its main testimonial of its anti-racism campaign.

Accompanying these messages, which serve no Islamist goal if not that of painting Western countries as irremediably racist and potentially weakening young people’s belief in them, French AJ+ puts out messages that are more in line with traditional Islamist viewpoints. The channel, for example, has actively championed the campaign to support Tariq Ramadan after the Brotherhood-linked scholar was accused by French authorities of sexual violence against various women. And over the last couple of years, once the government of Emmanuel Macron began adopting increasingly confrontational positions towards Islamism, French AJ+ stepped up its anti-France rhetoric. An article, for example, compares France to Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran, arguing that the European country’s anti-hijab laws are identical to those of countries that dictate what women should wear.

If AJ+ is a glossy, multimedia platform targeting the TikTok generation with short, simple but professionally produced messages, other entities with a clear Islamist background seek to disseminate a more academic version of Islamist wokeism. A perfect example of this dynamic is the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA), an “independent, nonprofit, research and public policy institution based in Istanbul, Turkey, and affiliated with Istanbul Zaim University.” Initially a small entity established in 2010, Zaim University has been closely affiliated with Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP). It has received substantial government funding and therefore experienced remarkable growth, reaching 10,000 students in just a few years.

CIGA was established at Zaim by prominent Palestinian scholar-cum-activist Sami al-Arian. Al-Arian is a very well-known name in Islamist circles and was famously the subject of a high-profile terrorism case in the US. He was arrested in February 2003 in Florida on a 17-count indictment. He eventually plead guilty to one charge, being sentenced to 57 months in prison for conspiring to violate a federal law that prohibits making or receiving contributions of funds, goods or services to, or for the benefit of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), a Specially Designated Terrorist. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, “in his guilty plea, al-Arian admitted that, during the period of the late 1980’s and early to mid-1990’s, he and several of his co-conspirators were associated with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. He further admitted that he performed various services for the PIJ in 1995 and thereafter, knowing that the PIJ had been designated as a Specially Designated Terrorist and that the PIJ engaged in horrific and deadly acts of violence.”

Upon release, al-Arian received political asylum in Turkey, where he opened CIGA. Under al-Arian’s leadership, CIGA has established itself as a major hub of Islamophobia studies. Since 2018, CIGA holds a large annual conference on Islamophobia, which brings together dozens among the most prominent academics and activists engaged in researching and challenging Islamophobia. An analysis of invitees, sponsors and topics of CIGA’s conferences clearly show a mix between traditional Islamism and ultra-progressivism, the perfect Islamist wokeism combination.

CIGA’s 2021 conference, which due the COVID-19 pandemic was held online, clearly showcased these features. The event was co-sponsored, among others, by Qatar’s Ahmed bin Khalifa University and by Cage, a highly controversial UK-based organization created in the early 2000s to advocate for the release of Guantanamo Bay detainees that has since embraced various Islamist causes. Speakers included individuals with clear Islamist connections such as Yasin Aktai, chief adviser for the president of Turkey’s AK Party; Chafika Attalai, a leading member of Collective Against Islamophobia in France (CCIF), an organization dissolved by the French government in the wake of the assassination of French school teacher Samuel Paty; and Cage’s Moazzam Begg, himself a former Guantanamo detainee. At the same time, many of the other speakers did not have any Islamist background, but were mostly Western-based academics, activists, defense lawyers in terrorism cases, and in general individuals in various capacities engaged in issues CIGA considered Islamophobia-related.

Somewhat embodying CIGA’s transnational academic Islamist wokeism is a young scholar from Austria, Farid Hafez. Hafez is a fellow at CIGA and was present at all three editions of CIGA’s Islamophobia conference. He is also a fellow at Bridge Initiative, “a multi-year research project on Islamophobia housed within” Georgetown University’s Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding (ACMCU). According to Georgetown’s website, the ACMCU “was established in 1993 with the mission of building stronger bridges of cooperation between Muslims and Christians, and enhancing the West’s understanding of the Islamic world. In December 2005, Georgetown received a $20 million dollar gift from His Royal Highness Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal of Saudi Arabia to support and expand the center.”

The center is run by two prominent Islamic studies scholars with well-known Islamist sympathies, John Esposito and Jonathan C. Brown. Tellingly, both scholars have close ties to Sami al-Arian, CIGA’s founder. Esposito publicly described al-Arian as “a good friend” and submitted a letter to the judge of his U.S. terrorism trial praising him as “an extraordinarily bright, articulate scholar and intellectual-activist, a man of conscience with a strong commitment to peace and social justice.” Brown is married to Leila al-Arian, Sami al-Arian’s daughter and, incidentally, a producer for Al-Jazeera. Hafez’s position at both centers is therefore unsurprising.

Hafez is a rising star of Islamophobia studies, giving talks at institutions on both sides of the Atlantic and cooperating with many other scholars of the circle. His approach to the subject very much adopts progressive frames to discuss the issue of Islamophobia. His latest book, for example, is revealingly titled The ‘Other’ Austria: Life in Austria beyond white male heteronormative German Catholic dominance.

But Hafez is also a very controversial figure with Islamist connections. In November 2020, for instance, Hafez was detained as part of Operation Luxor, the largest counterterrorism operation ever conducted in Austria. According to Austrian authorities, the individuals investigated were part of a Muslim Brotherhood/Hamas support network in the Central European country. Hafez has been vocal in proclaiming his innocence and arguing that the case is baseless and politically motivated. Some of his defenses caused controversy, like when his article Xinjiang and Kristallnacht in Austria: Freedom of Religion under Threat compared the actions of the Austrian government in Operation Luxor to the Nazi regime’s persecution of Jews and the Chinese government’s brutal treatment of the Uighurs. The article drew severe criticism from Jewish organizations in both Austria and the United States. He has nonetheless become a cause célèbre in Islamist and progressive circles, with petitions and online fundraising efforts created to support him.

Academically, Hafez has gained international attention for his role as co-editor of the annual European Islamophobia Report (EIR). Launched in 2015, the EIR is an edited volume in which contributors outline alleged incidents and trends of anti-Muslim discrimination in various European countries. Tellingly, the front cover of EIR’s latest edition (2021), a more than 900-page book analyzing 31 countries, features French President Emmanuel Macron on the cover, a clear indication that EIR’s targets are not just those individuals and actors that engage in clear-cut anti-Muslim hatred but also mainstream personalities that challenge Islamism.

EIR has some strong links to Turkey, a country whose AKP regime in recent years has consistently accused Europe of pervasive Islamophobia. The report’s co-editor is Enes Bayrakli, who has served as SETA’s director of European studies and Brussels office coordinator. Formally independent, SETA is virtually unanimously seen as a propaganda arm of the AKP. The founder of SETA is Ibrahim Kalin, President Erdogan’s spokesperson, and recently the co-author of a book with Georgetown University’s Bridge Initiative director John Esposito. Kalin is also a fellow at Georgetown’s ACMCU, Bridge’s parent institution.

For several years EIR was published by SETA and funded by the European Union as part of the EU-Turkey Civil Society Dialogue. This created controversies and various European governments and European MPs publicly stated their views opposing the idea of European public funds paying for an Islamophobia report published by an AKP-linked think tank. EIR’s 2020 edition was no longer published by SETA but by the Vienna-based Leopold Weiss Institute. The institute has no website and is not known to organize any activity, but a search of Austrian databases shows that its director is Farid Hafez.

Turkey’s role in previous editions of EIR was evident, and it is particularly interesting to note how high-ranking Turkish politicians attended and keynoted EIR launch events. EIR’s findings were also often used by Turkish politicians to support their political positions. For example, at the launch of the 2018 edition of the EIR, Faruk Kaymakci, Turkey’s deputy foreign minister and director for EU affairs, stated that the rise of far right movements and growing Islamophobia were the main challenges to the European Union and argued that Turkey joining the EU could be the “antidote” to these issues. “With Turkey’s membership, the EU can change its image,” he stated, “EU institutions can reach the Muslim world; otherwise the EU will be seen as an imperialist Christian club.”

Reactions and Possible Developments

As said, irrespective of whether the adoption of woke issues and frames on the part of Western Islamists is genuine or tactical, it has allowed many of its activists to be accepted in ultra-progressive milieus in ways pioneers of the movement in the West could not. From anti-racism structures to mainstream media, from governmental agencies funding anti-discrimination and diversity work to progressive intellectual circles and churches, woke Islamists have made valuable alliances which grant them greater visibility and access. Moreover, their very proximity to these environments partially shields them from the critics’ accusations of being Islamists.

At the same time, over the last few years the phenomenon of woke Islamism has received increased scrutiny and criticism. This is particularly true in France and, more broadly, the French-speaking world, where concerns over Islamism and its impact on society have arguably been more heightened than in any other part of the West. Moreover, in France concerns over the spread of wokeism in general, which is largely seen as a divisive American cultural import, have been widespread and President Macron has openly declared he is “against woke culture.”

In this environment it is not surprising that discussions over the contested term Islamo-gauchisme (Islamo-Leftism) take place at the highest levels of French government and culture, with France’s higher education minister Frédérique Vidal stating that “Islamo-gauchism is eating away at our society as a whole.” Le Figaro’s piece described how FEMYSO, a Brussels-based student and youth organization founded by top leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood in the West and historically run by scions of prominent Brotherhood leaders and heads of Brotherhood-linked student groups throughout Europe, received large funding from the European Union to conduct anti-Islamophobia and pro-hijab campaigns. FEMYSO framed many of its slogans in typical woke Islamist fashion. For example, it described one its projects, MEET, as an “EU-funded comprehensive programme aimed at tackling gendered Islamophobia,” which it described as the “intersectional discrimination that Muslim women and girls suffer based mainly on grounds of ethnicity, religion and gender.”

But sharp criticism of woke Islamism has come also from non-governmental voices, many of them of Muslim background. Naëm Bestandji, a French-Tunisian author, has argued that Islamism is a quintessentially far-right ideology but that the movement has understood that working with the progressive Left is its most promising tactic and that “infiltrating anti-racist circles is therefore essential.” “For that,” he argues, “you have to transform a religion into a ‘race.’ Any criticism of their ideology, presented as just Islam, would therefore be an attack on individuals. It is the creation of a blasphemy specific to Islam by the diversion of the fight against racism. This is the art of the term ‘Islamophobia.’ The religious fight and the fight against racism are then intertwined. The second serves as a pretext for the advance of the first. It’s a masterstroke.”

An alternative way of looking at this is to interpret it not as a calculated ploy but as a genuine phenomenon that can be described as the Westernization of Islamism. It can be argued that we are witnessing a generational process that leads new, Western-based Islamist actors to shed some aspects of traditional Islamism and honestly embrace aspects of other ideologies. That could potentially further lead to a dilution and an atomization of Islamism, as various activists could embrace different ideological strands and embark on different pathways.

Of course, these are purely hypothetical theories and scenarios which are difficult to prove and they assume the trend will continue and that it will be adopted by the mainstream of Islamist movements in the West. But irrespective of whether it is tactically or genuinely embraced, Islamist wokeism has become a concern for many. Apprehension about the implication of the dynamic have been well framed by Belgium-based activist Dyab Abou Jahjah. Abou Jahjah has a background that makes his views particularly interesting. Born in Lebanon in 1971, he fought with Shia militias before moving to Belgium in 1991. There, he founded the Arab European League, an activist group that became particularly controversial in the years immediately following the September 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States, as Abou Jahjah expressed veiled support for the attack and other anti-Western views, earning him the nickname of Belgium’s “public enemy number 1.” He has since left activism and works as a teacher, but he has remained a keen observer of Belgium’s Islamist and Muslim scenes.

“This new woke Islamism,” writes Abou Jahjah on his blog, “along with the rest of the extreme progressive movement (often called ‘woke’), dreams of an archipelago of ‘Safe spaces’ that interact in justice and equity. It is in this colorful and beautiful utopian painting of society that the toxic nature of European Islamism resides today. Along with the other woke trends, the woke neo-Islamists deconstruct ‘universalism’ in favor of the ‘intersectionality’ of exceptions. Thus, one day, all exceptions may eventually become the rule.” 

“The fact that a large proportion of Islamists now embrace ultra-progressive politics is better than that they embrace jihadist fascism,” he adds. “Nevertheless, the attack on modernity and most of its values, including secularism, is carried out in a more refined and efficient manner and within a broad alliance with serious potential to mobilize. This strategy is not aimed at creating an Islamic state, but it can lead to a fragmentation of society along identity lines so that everyone can ‘be themselves’.” “When exceptionalism,” he concludes, “not universalism, becomes the cornerstone of citizenship, who will then dare to challenge calls for separate tribunals and even separate laws?”

It is difficult to say whether Abou Jahjah’s prediction of the evolution of woke Islamism is correct. What is clear, as this article has aimed to summarily describe, is that there is a growing trend within Western Islamist circles to adopt ultra-progressive/woke issues and language and to forge alliances with entities in that milieu. The questions over this relatively new development are plentiful, from whether it is authentic or tactical; whether it could determine splits within Islamist ranks, as some of the most conservative cross-sections might be uncomfortable with embracing various ultra-progressive causes; and whether some progressive circles will not embrace woke Islamists. These dynamics might play out in different ways in different circumstances and different countries. But it is clear that the trend of woke Islamism is one that deserves being followed.

Article first published on Hudson Institute. Refer to the original article for references.

Lorenzo Vidino is the Director of the Program on Extremism at The George Washington University.

Maududi’s views continue to influence thousands of Islamist militants worldwide.

The 29^th of August 1966, a man who had the most significant influence on modern Jihadism and the one who considered Sayyid Abul-Ala Maududi to be a ‘great Muslim’, was executed for ‘plotting to overthrow’ the Egyptian regime. Syed Qutb was not the only prominent Muslim to hold Maududi in such high regard. From kings and head of states to the board scholars and thinkers, Syed enjoyed respect and support, but also suffered persecution and lengthy imprisonments. This article will look at controversies of his legacy. And whether he can be held morally responsible for crimes committed in the name of the Ideology he defended all his life.

Like other Muslim thinkers, Maududi was born to a middle-class Muslim family settled in Hyderabad, part of British controlled India. He started his learning journey from homeschooling where he excelled in Arabic language and entry-level Islamic disciplines. By the age of 11, he was able to translate fine modern Arabic literature into Urdu. One of his early influencers was Iranian Philosopher Mulla Sarda, including the concept of the necessity of Sharia to the bettering of individual Muslims and societies, (Hasan, 1984).

By the age of 16, when his father passed away. He interrupted his learning and moved to Delhi, where he enhanced his reading and built up only multidisciplinary education he had between Aurangabad and Hyderabad. Maududi adopted a comparative approach showing interest and appreciation for the rise of Europe. Attributed in his opinion to the work of the philosopher, and blaming Muslim scholars for not doing enough to enlighten the Ummah.

He restored his studies and obtained a license in Islamic studies, yet he never sees himself a scholar:

He said, “I do not have the prerogative to belong to the class of Ulema. I am a man of the middle cadre, who has imbibed something from both the systems of education, the new and the old; and has gathered my knowledge by traversing both paths. By virtue of my inner light, I conclude that neither the old school nor the new is totally in the right”.

Before returning to Hyderabad in 1928, he worked as editor of the influential and anti-British Al-Jamia newspaper. In his native district, he witnessed what he described as the decline of Islamic moral and inclination towards secularism. This fear probably shaped his politics and the way he perceived the need for change. Undoubtedly, Maududi was a sincere and humble person who witnessed enormous political and social changes taking place in India and the Islamic world. Not even the creation of Pakistan satisfied his eagerness to see Islam’s might as he read about it in the book of History.

His frustration in seeing the non-Muslim West progressing in science and humanism, compared to the Muslim world’s decline into poverty and political volatility. It was probably behind his reaching out to the broad Muslim world where he taught and learned theories about Islam, philosophy and politics. However, Maududi was never regarded as a man of peace. Years after his death, his views are said to be behind most of the political and violent Islam in modern days.

In one of His books called: A reminder for the caller to Islam, Maududi laydown his views in both spiritual and operational guidance for modern Islamic militancy. Setting objectives for his global view of Islam’s awakening, the book is not for a general audience. It could be not very easy to comprehend even for an educated Muslim who doesn’t believe in political and religious activism. The book calls for ‘migration to Allah’ a concept embraced by all Islamic groups in modern days from Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt to The Islamic State group in Iraq, Syria and elsewhere, (Faruqi, 1968).

This ‘doctrine takes its routes from Historical migration of the Prophet Mohammed PBUH, from Mecca to Medina to flee persecution and preserve the faith. Mawdudi builds on that event and its wisdom, considering that everything the Prophet PBUH did or said, is a source of knowledge and guidance for every Muslim.

The migration doesn’t take place necessarily by moving from a location to another, as in verse: “And I will leave you and those you invoke other than Allah and will invoke my Lord. I expect that I will not be in invocation to my Lord, unhappy.” (Quran, 19:48). Prophet Ibrahim tells his father about his intention to isolate himself from his people, for disagreement with their beliefs.

Calling Migration to Allah is perceived as one of the stages in the struggle for the call to Islam. In a liberal society, this can be seen as a matter of personal choice. However, this type of isolations in communities where families and friends play the central role in Muslim’s lives. The implications can bring the militant to spend more time segregated with other members who have the same ideology, which leads to more radicalization.

When Jamaa replaces family and tribe, loyalty to the group likely to take priority over the society and the country. Two extreme examples of how this doctrine can lead to disasters are:

• Al-Takfīr was al-Hijrah: Where the word migration explains half of its ideology. Members of this group ended up believing anyone who is not joining them is an apostate, who’s life money and relatives become the lawful target. Isolating themselves from society without physically leaving the country (Encyclopedia Britannica, 2020).
• The Islamic State in Iraq and Syria: After they fled incarceration, founders of this group called for every Muslim to practice the duty of ‘Hijra’. Migrate to the territory under their control, this call was according to the binding to every Muslim which misled thousands to join them, 

In another instance, Maududi praised Japanese Kamikazes telling his audience of Islamist militants and students that that was the spirit they needed to serve the cause of Dawaa better. The words of the scholar known for his opposition to violence against innocents did set another controversial expansionist agenda for his concept of the Islamic state.

Maududi wrote: “Islam wishes to destroy all states and governments anywhere on the face of the earth which are opposed to the ideology and programme of Islam, regardless of the country or the nation which rules it. The purpose of Islam is to set up a state on the basis of its own ideology and programme, regardless of which nation assumes the role of the standard-bearer of Islam or the rule of which nation is undermined in the process of the establishment of an ideological Islamic State. Islam requires the earth—not just a portion, but the whole planet…. because the entire mankind should benefit from the ideology and welfare programme [of Islam] … Towards this end, Islam wishes to press into service all forces which can bring about a revolution and a composite term for the use of all these forces is ‘Jihad’…. the objective of the Islamic ‘jihad’ is to eliminate the rule of a un-Islamic system and establish in its stead an Islamic system of state rule”.

Maududi’s views continue to influence thousands of Islamist militants worldwide, his scholarly competence was compromised by changes to geopolitics during and after his lifetime. He may have had noble intentions in serving Islam, Muslims and humanity in his time and beyond. Unfortunately, he didn’t take into consideration that his work can be taken out of context (Robinson and Nasr, 1998).

Jassem Tamim is originally from Morocco, settled in United Kingdom. He holds MA degree in Terrorism and Security from King’s College London. He is currently doing PhD research in Digital Counter-Radicalization.

The terrorist suspect responsible for Amess’ death also belonged to the same clan, and may have been influenced by those terrorist figures from his same tribe.

It was a Friday evening when the shocking news broke out in UK media about the horrific murder of the Southend West conservative MP Sir David Amess. On October 15, Amess was visiting his constituency Belfairs Methodist Church in Leigh-on-Sea, when a man in his mid-20s, later found to be of British-born Somalian heritage, attacked him with a knife inflicting multiple stab wounds.

Police and paramedics, including Counter-Terrorism firearm units and an air ambulance, reached the scene. The paramedics later announced the MP’s death and the suspect, who was waiting and voluntarily handed himself over to police, was arrested. 

Police immediately transferred the suspect into a secure police station for further questioning and next day announced the attack as an Islamist-linked terrorism event, angering the entire nation as well as plunging the United Kingdom’s political community into intense grief. Police found Islamist extremist-related material from his phone and began conducting a search of his properties in North London.

The slain MP was a faith-friendly person who treated every constituent equally regardless of race, colour, ethnicity, religion and language. He attended local Muslim weddings, visiting mosques and the launch of the town’s first Muslim Scouts Fellowship. The entire Muslim community of the Southend condemned the devastating killing of their beloved MP, calling Amess an “upstanding friend to our Muslim community”. 

The Jewish community is also in grief as they not only lost a friendly MP but also a strong supporter of the Jewish community and the campaign against antisemitism. In a Parliamentary speech on Holocaust Memorial Day, he stated: “Although I myself am not a Jew but a Catholic, there is Jewish blood in each and every one of us. I would certainly have been proud to have been born a Jew, and I stand shoulder to shoulder with our local Jewish community.” He was very active in his local Southend synagogues.

Sir David Amess was not only a strong supporter of the UK Jewish community but also an unconditional supporter of the state of Israel, including in its wars against the terrorist organisation Hamas. In previous years, he also served as an honourary secretary of Conservative friends of Israel. 

His killing is already being tied to his efforts for the Jewish community across the country and his unconditional support for Israel. In a recent interview, Anjem Chaudry, head of the former terrorist organisation, Al-Muhajiroun, said that the MP may have been targeted due to his stance on Israel.

The assailant suspect was named as Ali Harbi Ali, a 25-year-old British-born Somalian man who was a few years ago referred to the counter terrorism prevent program, a voluntary program he ultimately left without completing. The suspect received a special appointment to attend the church to meet with the Conservative MP.

Ali stabbed Amess 17 times so that there was no chance of survival and this was his entire task: to eliminate MP completely. The UK authorities believe that the suspect was a “lone wolf” and no others were involved in this attack, but it is highly likely that Ali Harbi Ali was radicalised towards Islamist extremism via the internet. 

The UK media has interviewed his father, Harbi Ali Kullane, who they describe as a communication advisor to the Prime Minister of Somalia. According to direct sources from the Somalian government, he served as a director of communication between 2015 to 2016 under PM Omar Abdi Rashid. This is also mentioned on Kullane’s Twitter profile.

According to direct Somalian sources the terrorist suspect Ali Harbi Ali’s uncle is Awale Ali Kullane, who is currently serving as the Somalian Ambassador to China. 

The suspect was brought up in a highly educated, moderate and political Somalian family who served the country their entire life, and it’s worth noting that the family belongs to the Somalian tribe of Habar Gidar and subclan Sacad. Two prominent figures from Habar Gidar served as Prime Ministers for the country, Abdullahi Issa Mohamud and Abdiqasim Salad Hassan.

The country of Somalia is politically and religiously influenced by local power tribes and clans just as Saudi Arabia, and the two most important and powerful clans are the Habar Gedir and the Abagal, which are dominant in the capital Mogadishu. 

People belonging to Habar Gidar clan joined Al-Shabab and Islamic State, terrorist organisations who exert Islamist influence over young Somalians who were radicalised and recruited by those organisations.  

The world has not forgotten the atrocities of the Somalian War Lord, Mohamed Farrah Aidid, whose militias killed thousands of people in the Somalian civil war in the early 1990s. Mohamed Farrah and his militias had fought against the US forces and killed 19 US soldiers in 1992. Mohamed Farrah belonged to the same clan of Habar Gidar. 

The famous Somalian Al-Qaeda affiliated Al-Shabab leader, Aden Hashi Ayro, who was killed by the US military drone in central Somalia on 1st May 2008, also belonged to the same clan, according to direct Somalian sources.

The terrorist suspect responsible for Amess’ death also belonged to the same clan, and may have been influenced by those terrorist figures from his same clan/tribe such as Aden Hashi Ayro who was a prominent Al-Shabab leader till his death in 2008.

Every single Somalian, whether living in Somalia or abroad, has compulsory Islamic knowledge learned from local Mosques and a majority are very much religious, with some being easily drawn into Islamist extremism. 

The UK government is looking to provide police protection to all MPs and also considering to implement a law for background screening of people who want to meet with their local MPs. This killing has further highlighted how vulnerable UK MPs are as they are not protected by the local police, while attacks continue. There are still vivid memories of the Labour Party’s Helen Joanne Cox, who was attacked and killed by a right wing terrorist in July 2016. Labour MP Stephen Timms survived a knife attack by an Islamist terrorist in 2010.

The list of deadly attacks on British MPs has been steadily growing over the decades, and taking measures such as police protection have yet to be addressed. The British people are raising questions that if Parliament members aren’t safe against a tiny group of religiously and politically motivated terrorists, how can the nation be safe?  

Noor Dahri is the Executive Director of Islamic Theology of Counter Terrorism (ITCT) in London and can be reached on twitter: @dahrinoor2.

The Muslim Brotherhood association with the Qatari regime helped accelerate the MB plans, thanks to the limitless funds by Qatar.

The 9/11 attacks of September 2001 were not a single secluded event, the attacks tie into past and present events, and the players who believe in the extremist Islamist ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood and Sayed Qutb.

Among the strongest believers in the teachings of the Muslim Brotherhood was the Iranian Supreme leader Imam AlKhomeini.

The image below shows the love and cooperation between Sayed Qutb and Mahabati Nawab Safawi who was one of the most important players in the Khomeinist revolution.

Now you can see that the Sufi Muslim Brotherhood and the Shiite Iranian regime were never enemies, in fact they were best of friends, unlike how they are shown to be in the main stream media.

The Pan Arab Baathism, PLO, Mufti Husayni’s Arab Nazis and Socialist all are linked to the Muslim Brotherhood in very complex ways and relationships of power structures that are built on hate and ideas of racial, religious and sectarian supremacy.

By early 1999, Al-Qaeda was already a potent adversary of the United States, but since the early 90s both Saudi Arabia and Egypt who are America’s allies in the Middle East were the main targets of this terrorist group in the Middle East.

Osama Bin Laden and his chief of operations, Abu Hafs al Masri, also known as Mohammed Atef, occupied undisputed leadership positions atop Qaeda’s organizational structure.

Within this structure, Qaeda’s worldwide terrorist operations relied heavily on the ideas and work of enterprising and strong-willed field commanders who enjoyed considerable autonomy.

To understand how the organization worked and to introduce the origins of the 9/11 plot, I briefly examined three of these subordinate commanders: Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) 9/11, Riduan Isamuddin (better known as Hambali) Bali bombing, and Abd al Rahim al Nashiri USS Cole.

We will focus on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the so-called chief leader of the “planes operations”. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, no one exemplifies the model of the terrorist fanatic leader more clearly than Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. The principal architect of the 9/11 attacks.

KSM followed a rather tortuous path to his eventual membership in Al-Qaeda. KSM a highly educated and equally comfortable in a government office job in Qatar and a terrorist asset to the Qatari regime at the time.

KSM applied his sick and twisted imagination, technical aptitude, and administrative skills to hatching and planning an extraordinary array of terrorist schemes.

These ideas included conventional car bombing, political assassinations, aircraft bombing, hijacking, reservoir poisoning, smuggling Al-Qaeda key members into other countries using Qatari passports and, ultimately, the use of aircraft as missiles guided by suicide soldiers.

Like his nephew Ramzi Yousef (three years KSM’s junior), KSM grew up in Kuwait but traces his ethnic lineage to the Baluchistan region straddling Iran and Pakistan. Raised in a religious family, KSM joined the Muslim Brotherhood at age 16.

KSM and Ramzi both became enamored of violent jihadist ideology at youth camps in the Kuwaiti desert organized by the Muslim Brotherhood of Kuwait in the early 80s.

KSM left Kuwait to enroll at Chowan College, a small Baptist school in Murfreesboro, North Carolina. After a semester at Chowan, KSM transferred to North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University in Greensboro, which he attended with Yousef’s brother.

KSM earned a degree in mechanical engineering in December 1986. Although he apparently did not attract attention for extreme Islamist beliefs or activities while in the United States. KSM plunged into the anti-Soviet Afghan Jihad soon after graduating from college.

Visiting Pakistan for the first time in early 1987, he traveled to Peshawar, where his brother Zahid introduced him to the famous Afghan Mujahid Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, head of the Hizbul-Ittihad El-Islami (Islamic Union Party).

The Hamas Connection—Sayyaf became KSM’s mentor and provided KSM with military training at Sayyaf’s Sada camp. KSM claims he then fought the Soviets and remained at the front for three months before being summoned to perform administrative duties for Abdullah Azzam.

KSM then took a job working for an electronics firm that catered to the communications needs of Afghan groups, where he learned about drills used to excavate caves in Afghanistan.

Between 1988 and 1992, KSM helped run a non-governmental organization (NGO) in Peshawar and Jalalabad, sponsored by Sayyaf. He was finally in, as a man the Islamists can trust and invest in his ambitious and successful business practices.

NGO’s play a significant role in the financing and logistics support for terrorist organizations. NGO’s is a tool in the arsenal of terrorism that yet to be successfully controlled by world governments fighting terrorism because of how complex they tend to be.

The NGO, KSM worked for was designed to aid young Afghan mujahideen. In 1992, KSM spent some time fighting alongside the mujahideen in Bosnia and supporting that effort with financial donations. After returning briefly to Pakistan, he moved his family to Qatar.

The rise of the new terrorist dynamic, Qatar, Iran and Muslim Brotherhood Europe setup for the domain of the Middle East and the world

KSM finally found his calling and moved to Qatar at the suggestion of his good friend the former minister of Islamic affairs of Qatar, Sheikh Abdallah bin Khalid bin Hamad al Thani who saw the huge potential of KSM as a power piece to further expand the Qatari influence.

KSM took a position in Qatar as project engineer with the Qatari Ministry of Electricity and Water, in what was a clear cover job for KSM. KSM engaged in extensive international travel during his tenure at the ministry much of it in furtherance of terrorist activity.

KSM used his position to expand the Qatari network of “NGO’s” and would hold his position there until early 1996, when he fled to Pakistan with the aid of the Qatari government to avoid capture by U.S. authorities.

After Hamad Bin Khalifa assumed role in Qatar a huge spike in terrorism around the Middle East and the world spiked, the Muslim Brotherhood association with the Qatari regime helped accelerate the MB plans, thanks to the limitless funds by Qatar.

The first attack on American soil was carried by the Palestinian 69-year-old Palestinian immigrant Ali Hassan Abu Kamal opened fire on the observation deck of the Empire State Building killing a Danish musician and injuring six other people before committing suicide.

The Mostar attack that was carried out by Al-Qaeda, and targeted Croatian civilians and policemen as retribution against the Croatian Defence Council (HVO), which had fought Muslim forces for control of the city during the Bosnian War.

In Deir el-Bahari, Egypt, six Islamist gunmen from the MB military arm Gamaat Alislam Iya massacred 58 foreign tourists and four Egyptians at the Temple of Hatshepsut.

Uyghyr separatists bombed three buses in Ürümqi, killing nine people, including three children, and injuring 74. Another bomb was found at Ürümqi’s main railway station but was defused.

Coimbatore bombings took place in 1998 in India. 13 bombs exploded over the course of two hours in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, killing 58 people. The bombs were planted by Islamic extremists Al Ummah organization and were meant to target Hindus as well as Hindu nationalist leader L.K. Advani.

Two United States Embassies in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania were bombed by members of Al-Qaeda and the Egyptian Islamic Jihad an Muslim Brotherhood affiliate. 224 people were killed in the blasts (213 in Nairobi, 11 in Dar es Salaam) and over 4,000 people were wounded.

According to the Federal Security Service, the bombings utilized a mechanical mixture of Aluminium powder and Ammonia nitrate as the explosive.

Hezbollah’s favorite bombing method and one of their most commonly used to carry on attacks.

The terrorists have received instruction in training centers run by Khattab and Basayev in Chechnya.

1999 Tashkent bombings: Six car bombs targeting government buildings and Uzbek president Islam Karimov exploded over the course of an hour and a half.

1999 Jessore bombings: Islamist group Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami used two time bombs to attack Bangladesh Udichi Shilpigoshthi, killing 10 people and injuring another 150.

The paradigm shift in terrorism, the Muslim Brotherhood worldwide efforts are aligned: The target is America

In December 1999–January 2000. Hambali accommodated KSM’s requests to help several veterans whom KSM had just finished training in Karachi Pakistan.

They included Tawfiq bin Attash, also known as Khallad a handler who organize, recruit and carry on directive and administrative roles for Al-Qaeda attacks, he later would help bomb the USS Cole, and the future 9/11 hijackers Nawaf al Hazmi and Khalid al Mihdhar.

A three-day-long meeting was held in the hotel room of Yazid Sufaat, a former Malaysian Army captain and businessman, in a hotel in Kuala Lumpur.

The summit’s purpose was to plan future attacks, which included the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole and the 11 September 2001 attack plot. The attendance consisted of Arab veterans of the Soviet–Afghan War.

Among the most notable was Hambali a Pakistani senior leader of Al-Qaeda, Ramzi bin al-Shibh a Yemeni, and a “key facilitator for the September 11 attacks”, Nawaf al-Hazmi a Saudi fighter, Khalid al-Mihdhar a Yemeni-Saudi fighter, and Tawfiq bin Attash a handler for Al-Qaeda.

Before the meeting, the United States intercepted a telephone call to Yemen by al-Mihdhar concerning arrangements for the trip. Osama bin Laden had called that number dozens of times.

On request of the CIA, the Malaysian authorities videotaped the meeting, but no sound recordings were made. Are you frigging kidding me?

The men were also photographed when they came out of the meeting. American investigators did not identify these men until much later. That Bin al-Shibh attended the meeting, and it was discovered by the investigators by looking into his credit card records.

Sufaat was later arrested, but he denied that he knew any of the men and said that Hambali had arranged the meeting.

Do look at the facts, the planner of the 911 attack was a Pakistani with ties to Qatar KSM, the facilitators were Yemanis Attash and AlShibah, and the recruiting was done by a German Syrian Mohammed Haydar Zammar who was part of the Hamburg cell.

The German Connection

On November 1, 1998, future-hijackers Mohamed Atta an Egyptian member of Al-Qaeda and the leader of the hijackers, Marwan al-Shehhi an Emarati hijacker-pilot of United Airlines Flight 175, and Ramzi bin al-Shibh a Yemeni facilitator for AlQaeda moved into an apartment together on Marienstraße.

Here they formed the secretive Hamburg cell, which also included other participants in the 9/11 plot including Mohammed Haydar Zammar who recruited the hijackers.

They met together three or four times a week to discuss their strategy and the anti-American and anti-Israeli views that enabled them to recruit foot soldiers.

The 9/11 Commission Report notes in Chapter 5 that, “According to Bin al-Shibh now in U.S. custody, a chance meeting on a train in Germany caused the group to travel to Afghanistan instead. An individual named Khalid al Masri (or Khalid al-Masri) approached bin al-Shibh and Shehhi (because they were Arabs with beards, bin al-Shibh thinks) and struck up a conversation about jihad in Chechnya.

“When they later called Masri and expressed well in going to Chechnya, he told them to contact Abu Musab in Duisburg. Abu Musab turned out to be Mohamedou Ould Slahi, a significant Al-Qaeda operative who, even then, was well known to U.S. and German intelligence, though neither government apparently knew he was operating in Germany in late 1999”.

For me, that’s the load of non-sense as the sequence of events shows it was planned. Moreover, it makes no sense since Abu Musab is a key player and leading figure of Al-Qaeda who is well recognized since the med 80s, he was also on the most wanted lists of Saudi, Egyptian and American intelligence agencies at the time.

9/11 Hijackers and the Recruiter

Zammar’s family moved to Germany when he was 10, and he first tried to participate in armed conflict in 1982, far earlier than has previously been reported.

He traveled to Jordan in an attempt to enter Syria to join the armed wing of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Fighting Vanguard, which was engaged in an earlier uprising against the ruling Assad family.

He was turned back by the Jordanian authorities, but on the trip he met a man who would play a big role in his future: Mohammed al-Bahaiya, known as Abu Khaled al-Suri, who would later become a key figure in the current Syrian war.

Over the next decade, Zammar moved through the militant-Islamist circuit, traveling regularly to Afghanistan, volunteering for a stint with al-Qaeda-affiliated militants in the war in Bosnia and visiting London where he befriended the Jordanian Palestinian preacher Abu Qatada, a prominent figure long suspected by the United States of having links to Al-Qaeda.

Meanwhile, Zammar was developing a circle of followers at Hamburg’s al-Quds mosque, which had become a magnet for young Muslims in the city and eventually the hub of radicalization of young men and recruiting them as cannon fodder in the service of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Zammar says he failed to qualify as an imam or preacher at the mosque because he was unable to memorize the Koran, but he held regular gatherings with small groups of the men who went there to pray, seeking to convince them that they had a duty to wage jihad on behalf of Muslims worldwide and to travel to Afghanistan for military training.

The first member of the Hamburg cell, he remembers meeting Ramzi Binalshibh a known facilitator that outrank Zammar. Next he met Mohamed Atta, the hijackers’ ringleader, who piloted the first of the two planes that struck the World Trade Center towers.

Zammar recalls Atta as a “good guy” with “high moral standards”. Then came the others: Marwan al-Shehhi, a citizen of the United Arab Emirates who steered the plane that struck the second tower. Ziad Samir Jarrah, the Lebanese who piloted the plane that crashed in a Pennsylvania field after passengers overpowered the hijackers, and four others from the group whom Zammar also persuaded to travel to Afghanistan.

Zammar says, “It was not easy. It took time. They were studying at the university”, he said. “I was telling them, for example, someone is going to attack you, your honor, your property, while you cannot even use a pistol. There is no country in the world that does not have an army to defend itself, while we Muslims do not”.

Notice his words are that aligned with the creed of the Muslim Brotherhood. Zammar claims he didn’t know, obviously he is lying.

The hijackers arrival to the United States and the attacks of 9/11 zero hour

The first hijackers to arrive in the United States were Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi, who settled in San Diego County, California, in January 2000.

They were followed by three hijacker-pilots, Mohamed Atta, Marwan al-Shehhi, and Ziad Jarrah in mid-2000 to undertake flight training in South Florida.

The fourth hijacker-pilot, Hani Hanjour, arrived in San Diego in December 2000. The rest of the “muscle hijackers” arrived in early- and mid-2001. Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi were both experienced and respected jihadists in the eyes of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

As for the pilots who would go on to participate in the attacks, three of them were original members of the Hamburg cell (Mohamed Atta, Marwan al-Shehhi and Ziad Jarrah).

Following their training at Al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan, they were chosen by Bin Laden and al-Qaeda’s military wing due to their extensive knowledge of western culture and language skills, increasing the mission’s operational security and its chances for success.

The fourth intended pilot, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, a member of the Hamburg cell, was also chosen to participate in the attacks yet was unable to obtain a visa for entry into the United States. He was later replaced by Hani Hanjour, a Saudi national.

Mihdhar and Hazmi were also potential pilot hijackers, but did not do well in their initial pilot lessons in San Diego. Both were kept on as “muscle” hijackers, who would help overpower the passengers and crew and allow the pilot hijackers to take control of the flights.

In addition to Mihdhar and Hazmi, thirteen other muscle hijackers were selected in late 2000 or early 2001. All were from Saudi Arabia, with the exception of Fayez Banihammad, who was from the United Arab Emirates.

The Root of all Evil

Please watch this video for the conclusion of what all I said. The root of all evil are Iran and Qatar.

It’s very evident and quite obvious that, a Muslim Brotherhood or popularly known as Ikhwanul-Muslimeen in the Arab world was the back-bone in terms of ideological upbringing and the armed-support of the terrorists and terrorist organizations. The international communities have to wake up to this reality and collectively defeat this ideology in order to defeat modern terrorism.

Khaled Homoud Alshareef holds PhD in Business and he earned Masters in Philosophy. He often writes about Islamism, Islamist factions and modern Terrorism. He tweets under @0khalodi0.

The webinar focused on some of the key-points such as: Abraham Accords, Israel-Pakistan relations, the rise of Islamism in Middle-East, the latest reforms taking place under Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the constant attacks Saudi Arabia has to face from the western media, etc.

The live video had technical issue from 3:40 – 4:20. Please use the YouTube link as a substitute.

Guests

1 – Lt. Col. Anthony (Tony) Shaffer. He is a Senior Fellow and President of the London Center for Policy Research, and he served as Defense Intelligence Officer for 28 years. He was also Advisory Board Member of Trump2020 campaign. Lt. Col. Shaffer has appeared on Fox News, CNN, and other major TV and radio programs, and has been interviewed by The New York Times and other publications on pre-9/11 operations focused on Al Qaeda. He is the author of Operation Dark Heart, and the novel The Last Line.

2 – Ahmed Quraishi, who is a journalist, commentator, and author, with presence in the media of the Middle East and Pakistan. He covered the Afghanistan war for Aljazeera (Arabic), and was embedded with U.S. military in Iraq. He has hosted foreign policy related television talk shows. He covered events in Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, Syria, and Iraq. Mr. Quraishi has participated in academic exercises involving Pakistani and American militaries (2006); joined in a Sino-Pakistani academic exchange in Beijing (2005); and sat in closed-door academic discussions organized in Kuwait City by U.S. and Gulf institutions on strategies for post-Saddam Iraq (in 2000, before the war).

3 – Dalia Ziada, who is an Egyptian author/writer, and award-winning blogger. She is the author of “The Curious Case of the Three-Legged Wolf – Egypt: Military, Islamism, and Liberal Democracy”. She currently works as the Director of the Liberal Democracy Institute, a think tank advising policymakers in Egypt and the Middle East. Dalia’s story and struggle for liberal democratization in Egypt is profiled in American best-selling books such as: Robin Wright’s “Rock the Casbah: Rage and Rebellion across the Islamic World”. Ziada worked as the Executive Director of Ibn Khaldun Center for Democratic Studies; and regional director for The American Islamic Congress. Currently, she leads the Liberal Democracy Institute. In addition, Ziada is a board member of the Foreign Affairs Committee at the National Council for Women in Egypt.

4 – Khaled Homoud Alshareef, who is a Saudi political analyst. Khaled holds PhD in Business and he earned Masters in Philosophy. He often writes about Islamism, Islamist factions and modern Terrorism.

5 – Mohammed Abbasi, who is Director of Association of British Muslims. He worked as a peace activist and conflict resolution specialist. He is part of Football for Peace Global, and he advises sports for peace organizations internationally. He has met Prime Ministers and Presidents including British, Pakistani and Indonesian. Abbasi also speaks on military strategy such as the Chinese Art of War which is used by many military academies around the world and also speaks on mind mapping, memory skills and coaches on meditation and mindfulness.

Moderator

The webinar was moderated by Zahack Tanvir, who is a Saudi-based Non Resident Indian (NRI). He is professionally an ERP Consultant. He also holds Diploma in Journalism from London School of Journalism. Tanvir founded The Milli Chronicle in September 2018, and he’s been working on a non-commercial basis to publish the works of notable researchers and Think-Tank groups, mainly focused on exposing the Islamist and other extremist factions.

Islamists quietly infiltrating democratic institutions and normalizing their ideas are the real threat that must be recognized and addressed.

After the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) defeat in the Middle East, the MB quickly made use of the west’s political correctness and repositioned their foothold in European Union (EU) through one of their offshoots — The Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe (FIOE)—it was founded by the Muslim Brotherhood in 1989.

FIOE subsequently created the European Council for Fatwa and Research, a pan European Muslim Brotherhood organisation which provides guidance to Muslims in Europe.

The Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe (FIOE) lead the Muslim Brotherhood plans of creating a “parallel social structure” in Europe, aided by “political elites and social justice advocate groups” making it impossible to criticise Islamist groups in fear of criticism
MB aims to organise Islamist followers politically across the Europe and slowly bring their own members into the political spheres of Europe.

The group has set its eyes on Sweden as the current political leaders are obsessed with political correctness, inclusion and diversity.

The European far right’s racist and extremely unpopular sentiment is playing into the hands of the MB as more and more people with good intentions will support the MB false message of “tolerance”, “diversity” and “inclusive society”.

The Swedish arm of the MB is the Islamic Association of Sweden (IFIS) state on their website state that they are members of the Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe (FIOE) which is listed as terrorist organization by the Arab Quartet.

When a debate started in 2014 on making it illegal for Swedish citizens to travel to other countries to participate in Jihad i.e. terrorism, the Muslim Human Rights Committee claimed that such a law would be racist.

Furthermore, they argued that people who fought in “Jihad” (ISIS fighters) abroad were not even a threat against Sweden.

In my opinion—Islamists quietly infiltrating democratic institutions and normalizing their ideas are the real threat that must be recognized and addressed.

Former IFIS chairman Abdirizak Waberi represented the second largest party, the Moderate Party, in parliament between 2010 and 2014—more like him will follow as they take over the parliament and then completely control the legislative branch of government.

Islam and Islamic teachings are not Islamist, while Islam is the faith of 1.4 billion people.

Islamism is not a form of the Muslim faith or an expression of Muslim piety, it is a political group that seeks power through political manipulation, infiltration and extremist agendas.

Khaled Homoud Alshareef holds PhD in Business and he earned Masters in Philosophy. He regularly tweets under @0khalodi0.