Harry's Place

Unfortuately, Hassan al-Banna’s grandson and apologist, the mercurial Tariq Ramadan, begins today a new post as Professor of Islamic Studies at Oxford. Right at the heart of the British Establishment.

Some would say that he is an anti-semitic bigot who supports religious fascism (such as that practised in Tehran). Who are we to comment?

Historically, present day Gaza was a big centre of Muslim Brotherhood activity– long before the state of Israel was established.

It’s no accident that Hamas got so deeply rooted there.

Tariq Ramadan’s Chair was bankrolled by Qatar, funders of Al-Jazeera. And as far as I can see, it’s a tenured chair. So we’re stuck with him. What a disaster. And Gordon Brown who seems to have been so very absent over the last four or five weeks, came up to Oxford to celebrate the establishment of the Chair (before Ramadan got appointed to it)

Tariq Ramadan appears on Press TV the Iranian regime’s propaganda station. Ain’t that grand? Think of all those highly open-minded PhDs he’ll be helping to turn out.

Great article Raziq!

Very interesting and informative.

Good Post.

Hassan al-Banna was not a scholar but a school teacher. Therefore he had no real understanding of Islam himself. That’s why his group: the Muslim brotherhood keep messing up.

OT: No post about today, Sept. 1st being the 70 anniversary of Hitler’s Invasion of Poland?

‘Members of the MB translated Hitler’s book ‘Mein Kampf’ into Arabic, calling it ‘My jihad’ ‘

Or My Resistance.

Dodgy Emirates in the Middle East buying up Chairs at Oxford for Islamists is revolting. For the sake of academic freesom we should have limits placed of foreign funding of universities, imposing strict democratic criteria which no current Arab state would meet, however much money they’ve got. Bloody hell we need energy diversity and we need it NOW.

Interesting post, thanks Raziq.

In the aftermath of the Arab defeat in 1948, Hasan al-Banna and the Muslim Brotherhood might well have succeed in overthrowing the noteriously corrupt King Farouk of Egypt had not al-Banna been assassinated in 1949. Instead with the MB left without an inspiring leader, Farouk was overthrown by seculiar Arab Nationalists led by Colonel Nasser and his fellow officers .

Jihad in arabic literally means struggle/resistance

Al Banna was influenced by another scholar, Al Afghani.

Al Afghani was active in Egypt in the 1880s and 1890s and his views on Islamic revival were not dissimilar to Al Banna’s. There was a feeling at that time that Islam had decayed and was corrupted by European contact. The idea that an invigorated and purer form of Islam would shake of colonial shackles has a long history. There have been periodic revivals throughout Islamic history.

I wish I could remember the source of it but I do remember reading an article about a year ago in an academic journal written over 20 years ago, about the connections between masonry and Al Afghani. Apparently he joined a lodge in Cairo with the aim, I think, of penetrating the inner core of the European establishment.

I thought that was interesting, and wonder if the secret brotherhood idea that lay behind the Muslim Brotherhood was in fact not an Arab or an Islamic construct at all.

Raziq,

Can you be specific – please quote an utterance of al-Banna’s which expresses his support for Nazism or Hitler. That is something along the lines of “Hasan al-Banna said ‘Hitler is a great man’” or “Nazism is my inspiration”. I think your argument would be credible if you did this.

Since Michael Rosen is hanging around I expected some sort of juvenile taunt from him in the thread, something equating Nazis with Israelis some such.

God it goes on and on.

Johng, it’s sad that we discriminate against your allies just because they’re Nazis. How could we be so cruel???!!!!!!!

Oh stop acting like Jews, John wept!

The article would be more complete with a discussion about all the Muslim Brotherhood groups in the United States and their infiltration into U.S. politics, national security, military establishments, policy making, etc.

Qutb also has a history in the U.S. (Greeley, CO – where sharia law has been imposed on a meat packing plant recently).

Great information, sadly this post could actually be a book there is so much information, disturbing at that, available.

I would highly recommend the short book “Occidentalism” on this subject. They authors cover it in some detail:

http://www.amazon.com/Occidentalism-West-Eyes-Its-Enemies/dp/0143034871/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1251859717&sr=8-1

Saeed- so the MB translating Mein Kampf into Arabic isn’t enough of a smoking gun for you?

Its interesting and informative!! Very Great article….

Raziq,

Can you be specific – please quote an utterance of al-Banna’s which expresses his support for Nazism or Hitler. That is something along the lines of “Hasan al-Banna said ‘Hitler is a great man’” or “Nazism is my inspiration”. I think your argument would be credible if you did this.

He only had sex with Hitler. He didn’t necessarily talk about it.

Raziq,

Can you be specific please and provide direct quotes from al-Banna lauding Hiter and Nazism?

For Al-Banna’s admiration for the German experiment, see:

Hasan al-Banna’s Epistles to the Young

The epistle lays out, under the six clauses of his slogan (”God is our goal; the Prophet is our guide; the Qur’an is our constitution; struggle is our way; death on the path of God is our ultimate desire; God is great, God is great”),

the five stages of his program:

The creation of a:

1. A properly Muslim individual person, in thought and belief;

2. A properly Muslim family;

3. A properly Muslim people or community;

4. An Islamic state;

5. The resurrection of the ancient Islamic Empire.

which al-Banna describes by referring admiringly to what he calls the “German Reich” and to Mussolini’s dream of a resurrected Roman Empire, though naturally al-Banna regards his own resurrected Islamic Empire as vastly preferable and theologically more legitimate than anything Mussolini could have contemplated.

From Paul Berman’s ‘Who’s Afraid of Tariq Ramadan, section 2.

http://docs.google.com/View?docid=ah6sxjndq9qq_315dwk7qn

So there is no direct lauding of Hitler or Nazism? – there is simply what you interpret as “referring admiringly” of the German Reich and Mussolini.

If you what you say is correct then al-Banna’s reference to Mussolini is not unique to al-Banna. Churchill admired Mussolini and in the early years of Mussolini’s party he allowed Jews to join his party and be fascists.

Raziq, also you say that:

“At the outbreak of WW2 Banna also appealed to Nazi Germany for help in fighting against the British backed monarchy in Egypt.”

Once again where is your source for this assertion. Can you actually back this up or is this simply more mumbo jumbo.

This one is for you, Saeed, youtube clip of DAF – Der Mussolini.

Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olU40fxAXZs

Timothy,

I’ve just a look at the Paul Berman link and there doesn’t seem to be any direct lauding of Hitler or Nazism there.

Raziq, where are you?

Timothy,

From defending mumbo-jumbo to posting Mussolini music videos. What’s wrong with you? Get a grip!

Hasan al-Banna’s Muslim Brotherhood also overlapped significantly with the ‘Young Egypt’ movement which was explicitly modelled on fascist movements in Italy and Germany – even to extent of having a para-military wing called the ‘Green Shirts’ which went around beating up and intimidating people who they did not agree with.

@Saeed@ 12 years before the Jewish state was established in May 1936 MB led by Al-Banna called for the boycott of Egyptian Jews. Already at that time MB made anti-Jewish propaganda in pamphlets, tracts and speeches. They combined traditional Islamic images of Jews as opponents of Mohammed and of Muslims with well-known stereotypes drawn from European antisemitism.
The brotherhood’s anti-Jewish rhetoric became increasingly violent. The president of the Tanta branch delivered a speech in 1944 in which he said it was necessary for Muslims to unite in jihad to destroy the Jews like “dirty dogs”. He referred to them as “the world’s parasidetes” and even echoed the blood libel, saying that they “dip their matzah at passover in the blood of Muslims and Christians.” A year later, verbal attacks gave way to physical violence. On Balfour Day (November 2, 1945), demonstrations in Cairo and Alexandria, organised by MB deteriorated into rioting that resulted in the pillage of Jewish and foreign-owned businesses, the torching of the Ashkenazi synagogue of Cairo and five Jews murdered in Alexandria.

I accept that the MB is anti-semitic. And it was anti-semitic in the 20’s and 30’s and 40’s. There is nothing new here. Most Europenas were anti-semitic in this period. Anti-semitism is not the sole preserve of the MB in this period.

However, to return to the original posting. I would like to know where I could find al-Banna expressing unvarnished admiration of Nazism and Hitler. Secondly the author claims that, “At the outbreak of WW2 Banna also appealed to Nazi Germany for help in fighting against the British backed monarchy in Egypt.”

I’m sorry but this author does not seem able to support his assertions.

For more:

“The Muslim Brotherhood’s Conquest of Europe”

(by Lorenzo Vidino):

http://www.meforum.org/687/the-muslim-brotherhoods-conquest-of-europe

Ali
1 September 2009, 10:42 pm

Good Post.

Hassan al-Banna was not a scholar but a school teacher. Therefore he had no real understanding of Islam himself. That’s why his group: the Muslim brotherhood keep messing up.

———

Whereas ‘true’ versions of Islam elsewhere (Iran, Afghanistan, SWAT province, Aceh in Indonesia – anyone got any more to offer?) have managed to ‘get it right’, creating heaven on earth for both their followers and those of others faiths.

Mash’allah!

I don’t have any specialised knowledge, but I do find johng and Saeed’s contributions trying to claim that the Islamic political hierarchy had no contact with Nazism rather silly. Isn’t this infantilizing the Islamic political movement? For some reason they seen to think that it was not possible for the leaders of these groups, many of whom probably were educated in Europe or along European lines, were unable to think, to acquire ideas, to be influenced by world events. it’s like Islam just existed or exists in a vacuum. Is it something to do with Divine Revelation? Can they explain WHY they think that the most conscious members of the political community in the Middle East woudl NOT be aware of political developments in Europe and would NOT forge alliances in the expectation that tehy would one day take power in their own countries? Aren’t they treating Egyptians, Palestinians, Lybians, Tunisians as mere children who only know the playroom?

It’s bloody Romanaticism, that’s what it is. Sheik of Araby type nonsense.

Saeed, see below for Matthias Kuntzel’s thoughts on your question.

In terms of leadership of the Arab world at that time, Amin al Husseini is a much more important figure, and it is to him (and the likes of von Leer) that al Banna and the MB owe the synthesis of ancient Islamic and modern European antisemitism that drove the growth of the MB as a mass movement.

From Jew Hatred and Jihad:

Despite common misconceptions, Islamism was born not during the 1960s but during the 1930s. Its rise was inspired not by the failure of Nasserism but by the rise of Nazism, and prior to 1951 all its campaigns were directed not against colonialism but against the Jews.

It was the Organization of the Muslim Brotherhood, founded in 1928, that established Islamism as a mass movement. The significance of the Brotherhood to Islamism is comparable to that of the Bolshevik party to communism: It was and remains to this day the ideological reference point and organizational core for all later Islamist groups, including al Qaeda and Hamas. It is true that British colonial policy produced Islamism, insofar as Islamism viewed itself as a resistance movement against “cultural modernity.” The Islamists’ solution was the call for a new order based on sharia. But the Brotherhood’s jihad was not directed primarily against the British. Rather, it focused almost exclusively on Zionism and the Jews.

Membership in the Brotherhood shot up from 800 to 200,000 between 1936 and 1938, according to the research of Abd Al-Fattah Muhammad El-Awaisi for his book The Muslim Brothers and the Palestine Question 1928-1947. In those two years the Brotherhood conducted only one major campaign in Egypt, and it was against Zionism and the Jews. This campaign, which established the Brotherhood as a mass movement, was set off by a rebellion in Palestine directed against Jewish immigration and initiated by the notorious grand mufti of Jerusalem, Amin al—Husseini. The Brotherhood organized mass demonstrations in Egyptian cities under the slogans “Down With the Jews!” and “Jews Get Out of Egypt and Palestine!” Leaflets called for a boycott of Jewish goods and Jewish shops, and the Brotherhood’s newspaper, al-Nadhir, carried a regular column on “The Danger of the Jews of Egypt,” which published the names and addresses of Jewish businessmen and allegedly Jewish newspaper publishers all over the world, attributing every evil, from communism to brothels, to the “Jewish danger.”

The Brotherhood’s campaign against the Jews used not only Nazi-like tactics but also German funding. As the historian Brynjar Lia recounted in his monograph on the Brotherhood, “Documents seized in the flat of Wilhelm Stellbogen, the Director of the German News Agency affiliated to the German Legation in Cairo, show that prior to October 1939 the Muslim Brothers received subsidies from this organization. Stellbogen was instrumental in transferring these funds to the Brothers, which were considerably larger than the subsidies offered to other anti-British activists.”

At the same time, the Muslim Brotherhood was the first modern organization to propagate the archaic idea of a belligerent jihad and the longing for death. In 1938, Hassan al-Banna, the Brotherhood’s charismatic founder, published his concept of jihad in an article entitled “The Industry of Death.” He wrote: “To a nation that perfects the industry of death and which knows how to die nobly, God gives proud life in this world and eternal grace in the life to come.” This slogan was enthusiastically taken up by the “Troops of God,” as the Brothers called themselves. As their battalions marched down Cairo’s boulevards in semi-fascist formation they would burst into song: “We are not afraid of death, we desire it. . . . Let us die to redeem the Muslims!” The death cult that became a hallmark of modern jihadism was laced with Jew-hatred from the very beginning.

Moreover, this attitude sprang not only from European influences; it also drew directly on Islamic sources. First, Islamists considered, and still consider, Palestine an Islamic territory, Dar al-Islam, where Jews must not run a single village, let alone a state. At best, in their view, this land should be judenrein; at the very least, Jews there should be relegated to subservient status. Second, Islamists justify their aspiration to eliminate the Jews of Palestine by invoking the example of Muhammad, who in the 7th century not only expelled two Jewish tribes from Medina, but also beheaded the entire male population of a third Jewish tribe, before proceeding to sell all the women and children into slavery. Third, they find support and encouragement for their actions and plans in the anti-Jewish passages of the Koran.After World War II it became apparent that the center of global Jew-hatred was shifting from Nazi Germany to the Arab world.

In November 1945, just half a year after the end of the Third Reich, the Muslim Brothers carried out the worst anti-Jewish pogroms in Egypt’s history, when demonstrators penetrated the Jewish quarters of Cairo on the anniversary of the Balfour Declaration. They ransacked houses and shops, attacked non-Muslims, and torched the synagogues. Six people were killed, and some hundred more injured. A few weeks later the Islamists’ newspapers “turned to a frontal attack against the Egyptian Jews, slandering them as Zionists, Communists, capitalists and bloodsuckers, as pimps and merchants of war, or in general, as subversive elements within all states and societies,” as Gudrun Krämer wrote in her study The Jews in Egypt 1914-1952.

In 1946, the Brotherhood made sure that Heinrich Himmler’s friend Amin al-Husseini, the former grand mufti who was being sought as a war criminal by Britain and the United States, was granted asylum and a new lease on political life in Egypt. As leader of the Palestine National Movement, al-Husseini had been a close ally of both the Muslim Brotherhood and the Nazis. Based in Berlin from 1941 to 1945, he had directed the Muslim SS divisions in the Balkans and had been personally responsible for blocking negotiations late in the war that might have saved thousands of Jewish children from the gas chambers. All this was known in 1946. Nonetheless, Britain and the United States chose to forgo criminal prosecution of al-Husseini in order to avoid spoiling their relations with the Arab world. France, which was holding al-Husseini, deliberately let him get away.

For many in the Arab world, what amounted to amnesty for this prominent Islamic authority who had spent the war years broadcasting Nazi propaganda from Berlin was a vindication of his actions. They started to view his Nazi past with pride, not shame, and Nazi criminals on the wanted list in Europe now flooded into the Arab world. Large print-runs of the most infamous libel of the Jews, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, were published in the following decades at the behest of two well-known former members of the Muslim Brotherhood, Gamal Abdel Nasser and Anwar Sadat. Both the Muslim Brothers’ unconditional solidarity with al-Husseini and their anti-Jewish riots mere months after Auschwitz show that the Brotherhood did not object, to say the least, to Hitler’s attempt to exterminate the Jews of Europe.

I accept that the MB is anti-semitic. And it was anti-semitic in the 20’s and 30’s and 40’s. There is nothing new here. Most Europenas were anti-semitic in this period. Anti-semitism is not the sole preserve of the MB in this period

We’re no longer in the 30s and 40s. And what proof do you have for your assertion thatmost>/b> Europeans were anti-semitic during that period?

The CAIR organisations here in North America, self-styled “human rights” organisations, are also fronts for the MB and it’s about time that academics, gov’t and community groups ceased doing business with them. They should be marginalised and even ostracised for bigots they are.

Raziq: did you actually write this post? I ask because someone possibly named shokat.saleem also claims to have written this post.

Lbnaz,

I wrote the article – Shokat.saleem has merely posted it on his site.

Saeed,

Al-Banna and Nazism

The growth of the Muslim Brotherhood was accompanied or caused in part by the fact that Al-Banna associated it with the German Nazi party and the Third Reich. From the ideological point of view, the Jew hatred, authoritarianism, addiction to violence and desire to defeat the British of both the Muslim Brothers and the Nazis were quite enough to make the two movements find common cause.

The Brotherhood’s political and military alliance with Nazi Germany blossomed into formal state visits, de facto ambassadors, and overt and covert joint ventures. The Muslim Brotherhood transformed Nazi anti-Semitism into a Muslim version, providing Arab translations of Mein Kampf (translated into Arabic as ‘My Jihad’) and other Nazi anti-Semitic works, including Der Sturmer hate-cartoons, adapted to portray the Jew as the demonic enemy of Allah rather than the German Volk.

When World War II broke out, al-Banna worked to firm up his alliances with Hitler and Mussolini. He sent them letters and emissaries, and urged them to assist him in his struggle against the British and the westernized regime of Egypt’s King Farouk. The Intelligence Service of the Muslim Brotherhood vigorously collected information on the heads of the regime in Cairo and on the movements of the British army, offering this and more to the Germans in return for closer relations.

Source:http://www.mideastweb.org/Middle-East-Encyclopedia/hassan_al-banna.htm

Thanks for that guys. Consider me corrected. But in future please provide clear evidence.

The fact that they translated Mein Kempf into Arabic is enough for me.

Great article Raziq…looking forward to the next expose on Islamist ideologues

So why do/did the Swiss, Germans, Austrians [etc.,] give these awful people asylum and passports?

Why doesn’t a Saudi-paid assassination squad wipe out the vile Dr Masaari in London?

Saeed,
“Most Europenas were anti-semitic in this period.”

Could you give us your source for this statement?

Let’s assume, that this was the case, does it justify Hamas (a branch of the MB) to incite children against Jews?

If you want to read more on the afinity between MB and nazis during the 30ies and 40ies :
Mitchell, Richard Paul: The Society of the Muslim Brothers, Princetown 1959, London 1969

Great post Raziq -very informative.

Great post Raziq -very informative; thanks.

Raziq,

I want evidence and sources. Not this:

“The growth of the Muslim Brotherhood was accompanied or caused in part by the fact that Al-Banna associated it with the German Nazi party and the Third Reich.”

Show me a quote where al-Banna expressed an admiration and sympathies for Nazism and Hitler? Please!

And where are your sources for this:

“When World War II broke out, al-Banna worked to firm up his alliances with Hitler and Mussolini. He sent them letters and emissaries, and urged them to assist him in his struggle against the British and the westernized regime of Egypt’s King Farouk.”

However, you originally said this:

“At the outbreak of WW2 Banna also appealed to Nazi Germany for help in fighting against the British backed monarchy in Egypt. ”

Please, when you write something make sure that you can back it up. This is what modern political analysis (rooted in the Enlightenment) is all about.