“Political and religious terrorism began with the birth of the Muslim Brotherhood…” — Farag Foda, Egyptian intellectual murdered by Islamists in 1992, in Terrorism [al-Irhab]
Islamist movements have different tactics… but their goal is always the same: Get in and impose sharia law to establish an Islamic state.
The problem is not so much the Muslim Brotherhood as the schizophrenia of governments that one day condemn them and the next day work with them.
“What I think is important about the Muslim Brotherhood,” British Prime Minister David Cameron said on April 1, while announcing a long-overdue investigation of the activities of Muslim Brotherhood in the UK and its involvement in February’s terror attack at the Egyptian resort of Taba, “is that we understand what this organisation is, what it stands for, what its beliefs are in terms of the path of extremism and violent extremism, what its connections are with other groups, what its presence is here in the United Kingdom. Our policies should be informed by a complete picture of that knowledge. It is an important piece of work because we will only get our policy right if we fully understand the true nature of the organisation that we are dealing with.”
“The objective, then, is to strike terror into the hearts of God’s enemies, who are also the enemies of the advocates of Islam…” — Sayyid Qutb, chief ideologue of the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1950s and 1960s.
The Egyptian Brotherhood’s reaction, published on its English website, was immediate:
The Muslim Brotherhood has always had a perfectly reputable and verifiable history record and a correct understanding of religion ever since it was founded, more than 86 years ago. The group is ready and willing to cooperate with all efforts to understand its beliefs, policies and positions. It also denounces all media campaigns that try to demonize the group and link it to violent incidents which it condemned in no ambiguous terms at the time, the most recent of which was the attack on a tourist bus in Taba (in Egypt’s Sinai peninsula) in February 2014.[…]
The Brotherhood’s press release also pointed out the long-standing relationship between the Muslim Brotherhood and the UK:
First: The Brotherhood was surprised at the latest remarks, since all successive British governments had always been the most expertly informed about the group’s positions and peaceful approach. The group has not and will not change its principles or approach no matter how big or small it becomes, notwithstanding all the injustice it suffers, the cold-blooded murders and arbitrary arrests of its members.
Second: The group’s principles and ideology, which it has been teaching its members for more than eighty years in all parts of the world, from East to West, have been announced, published and thoroughly researched and studied by many Muslim and non-Muslim scholars, researchers and research centers all over the world – all of which affirmed, time and time again, that the group’s approach is perfectly peaceful and that all its methods are non-violent.