The Muslim Brotherhood

Ideology, History, Descendants

Joas Wagemakers

Amsterdam University Press

This publication has been made possible by financial support from Dokumentationsstelle Politischer Islam.

Originally published as: Wagemakers, Joas, De Moslimbroederschap. Ideologie, geschiedenis, nakomelingen. Amsterdam university Press, 2021

Cover illustration: Getty Images. © László Mihály

Cover design: Mijke Wondergem

Lay-out: Crius Group, Hulshout

ISBN 978 94 6372 768 6

e-ISBN 978 90 4855 670 0

DOI 10.5117/9789463727686

NUR 717

© J. Wagemakers / Amsterdam University Press B.V., Amsterdam 2022

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the written permission of both the copyright owner and the author of the book.

Table of Contents

Preface

Acknowledgements

List of Abbreviations

Glossary

Note on Transliteration

Introduction

Islamism as a Concept and as a Phenomenon

The Muslim Brotherhood as an Object of Study

Overview

Part I Ideology

1. The General Ideology of the Early Muslim Brotherhood

Status Quo and Reforms in Islam After the Middle Ages

The Early Muslim Brotherhood’s Views on Egypt

The Early Muslim Brotherhood’s Views on the West

2. The Political Ideology of the Early Muslim Brotherhood

The State

Political Participation

Societal Rights and Freedoms

Part II History

3. Repression

Egypt: The Cradle

Syria: The Trauma

Saudi Arabia: Beyond the Safe Harbour

4. Participation

Kuwait: Political Participation in Relative Freedom

Jordan: From Favourite to Outcast

The Palestinians: Political Participation without a State

5. Power

Sudan: Islamist Ideals and Political Opportunism

Morocco: Under the Care of the Commander of the Faithful

Tunesia: Accepting the Loss of Power

Part III Descendants

6. Radicals

The Split-Offs: Hizb al-Tahrir and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad

The Revolutionaries: Al-Jama‘a al-Islamiyya and Tanzim al-Jihad

The Global Jihadis: Al-Qaida and the Islamic State

7. Liberals

Wasatiyya: The Foundation of Reforms

Post-Islamism: Beyond the Muslim Brotherhood

ZamZam: Post-Islamism in Practice

8. Europeans

The Muslim Brotherhood from the Middle East to Europe

The Muslim Brotherhood in European Countries

The Changing Ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood in Europe

Conclusion

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Preface

It happens every so often: accusing politicians or other prominent public figures of ‘supporting’ or ‘having ties to’ the Muslim Brotherhood. In America, perhaps the best-known example of this is Huma Abedin, who held several senior positions on Hillary Clinton’s staff, including as vice-chair of the latter’s 2016 presidential campaign. In 2012, several Republican politicians questioned Abedin’s loyalty and reliability because of her alleged ties – through family members and in other ways – to the Muslim Brotherhood and wondered whether she should receive security clearance. These claims were later debunked as conspiracy theories, however, and widely rejected by both Democrats and Republicans.

Such accusations are certainly not limited to America and can also be found in European countries. In the Netherlands, for instance, Kauthar Bouchallikht, a member of the GroenLinks (‘GreenLeft’) party elected to parliament in March 2021, was accused of having ties with the Muslim Brotherhood through her former position as vice-chair of the Forum of European Muslim Youth and Student Organizations (FEMYSO). Ihsan Haouach, a Belgian politician, found herself in a similar situation in July 2021 when it became known that she had given a talk, in 2019, to the European Forum of Muslim Women (EFOMW), another group supposedly tied to the Muslim Brotherhood. Both denied having connections to the organization.

Quite apart from the question of whether or not these politicians sympathized, or still sympathize, with this organization, these incidents made abundantly clear that many apparently see the Muslim Brotherhood as somehow undesirable. Politicians, journalists, commentators and people writing on social media frequently claimed that the Muslim Brotherhood is in favour of jihad and would like to (violently) impose the Sharia, sometimes with reference to the early ideologues of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. Even some of the people who defended those accused of having ties to the organization and who dismissed these charges as Islamophobic or conspiratorial thinking apparently took it for granted that the Muslim Brotherhood was, indeed, a group one would not want to be associated with.

What is the Muslim Brotherhood and what is so frightening about it? Does this organization actually incite violence through military jihad? Does it really want to impose its will on both Muslims and non-Muslims in the form of the Sharia? How does the organization relate to groups like Al-Qaida? Is there a difference between the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, where the organization was founded almost a century ago, and the situation in European countries? This book answers these and other questions. It does not seek to defend the Muslim Brotherhood, but instead to explain and contextualize it, as well as to provide nuance to a discussion in which this is often sorely lacking.

This is not an academic publication and, as such, it contains little new information that cannot also be found in other, scholarly works. This book, by contrast, is intended for a broader audience, particularly for people who are professionally interested in the Muslim Brotherhood, such as policymakers and students taking courses on history, the Middle East, religion and political science. I have therefore refrained from using Arabic sources as much as possible. Instead, this book seeks to address an apparent need for reliable information on the transnational Muslim Brotherhood. As such, it is intended as an introduction to those who know little about the organization, but – through the numerous references – it can also serve as a good starting point for research.

Acknowledgements

Although this book was written and translated in 2021–2022, it is based on research that goes back several years. It is rooted in a Veni research grant that I was awarded by the Dutch Research Council (NWO) in 2011 for a project that I started working on in 2012 and formally finished in 2016. The project focussed on Islamic activism in Jordan, which resulted in – among other publications – the book The Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan (Cambridge University Press, 2020) and which stimulated me to think about writing a book on the Muslim Brotherhood for a broader audience. I published the latter in Dutch as De Moslimbroederschap: Ideologie, geschiedenis, nakomelingen (Amsterdam University Press, 2021), of which the present book is the updated, slightly revised and translated version. I would like to thank NWO for the financial support it provided for a project of which this book is the latest – albeit indirect – product.

Under normal circumstances, this would be the place to thank my colleagues in the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Utrecht University for the collegial and friendly atmosphere they provided while writing this book. The truth is, however, that this book was not written under normal circumstances, but during the corona pandemic that has swept the world since 2020. This meant that I hardly saw my colleagues during the period in which I conducted research for and wrote this book, except via Teams or Zoom. Although I have recently been able to actually meet my colleagues and teach offline again, I can only hope that the world will be in better shape once this book is published than when it was written.

There are several people that I would like to thank personally. First, I thank Saskia Gieling at Amsterdam University Press for her faith in the Dutch version of this book. I would also like to thank her successor, Annelies van der Meij, for continuing Saskia’s work and supporting the translation of this book. Chantal Nicolaes guided the production process and Anna Yeadell-Moore was a great copy editor, for which I thank them both. The translation of this book was made possible by no-strings-attached financial support from the Dokumentationsstelle Politischer Islam in Vienna, for which I would like to thank Ferdinand Haberl and Lisa Fellhofer. Moreover, Mehdi Sajid, Brynjar Lia, Kiki Santing, Thomas Pierret, Stéphane Lacroix, Nina ter Laan, Sami Zemni, Roel Meijer, Pieter Nanninga, Martijn de Koning and Ellen van de Bovenkamp were kind enough to dedicate some of their precious time to commenting on parts of this manuscript or the original Dutch version of this book. Precisely because I know how busy they are, I greatly appreciate their contribution and would like to thank them here. Although the book has improved because of their insights, it goes without saying that all remaining errors are my responsibility.

Finally, while this book might have seen the light of day without the wonderful jazz that I surround myself with every day by listening to, for example, accujazz.com, it would certainly have been a much less pleasant experience. This is even more true, of course, regarding the support I received from my family during this project. Writing a book often means working long hours, at least if one wants to keep it going, and the months in which this book was written have been no exception. Fortunately, my wife was always patient and understanding whenever I was up late at night working on this project. She has also made an invaluable contribution to the manuscript by lending me her wireless keyboard when the letter ‘d’ on my laptop suddenly gave up. It is because of her patience – and because of the fact that, thanks to her, this book is not about ‘the Muslim Brotherhoo’ but about ‘the Muslim Brotherhood’ – that I dedicate this work to her. I hope she is as happy as I am that the long working days will be over for a while.

List of Abbreviations

The abbreviations below are given in the language of the abbreviation itself and, in the case of a non-English-language organization, in English translation.

AEIF Association des Étudiants Islamiques de France (‘Association of Islamic Students of France’), French

AIVD Algemene Inlichtingen- en Veiligheidsdienst (‘General Intelligence and Security Service’), Dutch

BMI British Muslim Initiative, British

CBSP Comité de Bienfaisance et de Secours aux Palestiniens (‘Charity and Relief Committee for Palestinians’), French

CDLR Committee for the Defence of Legitimate Rights, Saudi

CFCM Conseil Français du Culte Musulman (‘French Council of the Muslim Religion’), French

CGI Contact Groep Islam (‘Contact Group Islam’), Dutch

CPR Congrès pour la République (‘Congress for the Republic’), Tunisian

DMG Deutsche Muslimische Gemeinschaft (‘German Muslim Community’), German

ECFR European Council for Fatwa and Research, European

EIHS European Institute of Human Sciences, European

EFOMW European Forum of Muslim Women, European

EMF Étudiants Musulmans de France (‘Muslim Students of France’), French

Fatah Harakat al-Tahrir al-Watani al-Filastini (‘Palestinian National Liberation Movement’), Palestinian

FEMYSO Forum of European Muslim Youth and Student Organizations, European

FIO Federatie Islamitische Organisaties (‘Federation of Islamic Organizations’), Dutch

FIOE Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe, European

FJP Freedom and Justice Party, Egyptian

FOSIS Federation of Student Islamic Societies, British

GIF Groupement Islamique en France (‘Islamic Group in France’), French

Hadas Al-Haraka al-Dusturiyya al-Islamiyya (‘Islamic Constitutional Movement’), Kuwaiti

Hamas Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiyya (‘Islamic Resistance Movement’), Palestinian

IAF Islamic Action Front, Jordanian

ICE Islamic Council of Europe, European

ICF Islamic Charter Front, Sudanese

IFC Islamic Front for the Constitution, Sudanese

IGD Islamische Gemeinschaft in Deutschland (‘Islamic Community in Germany’), German

IGSD Islamische Gemeinschaft in Süddeutschland (‘Islamic Community in Southern Germany’), German

IS Islamic State, Iraqi/Syrian/international

ISB Islamic Society of Britain, British

ISI Islamic State of Iraq, Iraqi

ISIS Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, Iraqi/Syrian

JMF Jeunes Musulmans de France (‘Muslim Youth of France’), French

LFFM Ligue Française de la Femme Musulmane (‘French League of the Muslim Woman’), French

LIIB Ligue Islamique Interculturelle de Belgique (‘Intercultural Islamic League of Belgium’), Belgian

MAB Muslim Association of Britain, British

MCB Muslim Council of Britain, British

MIRA Movement for Islamic Reform in Arabia, Saudi

MPDC Mouvement Populaire Démocratique et Constitutionnel (‘Popular Democratic and Constitutional Movement’), Moroccan

MSS Muslim Students Society, British

MSV Muslim Studenten Vereinigung in Deutschland (‘Muslim Students Association in Germany’), German

MTI Mouvement de la Tendance Islamique (‘Movement of the Islamic Tendency’), Tunisian

MUR Mouvement de l’Unicité et de la Réforme (‘Movement of Unity and Reform’), Moroccan

MWH Muslim Welfare House, British

NIF National Islamic Front, Sudanese

PAIC Popular Arab and Islamic Congress, Sudanese

PJD Parti de la Justice et du Développement (‘Justice and Development Party’), Moroccan

PLO Palestine Liberation Organization, Palestinian

PNA Palestinian National Authority, Palestinian

SCAF Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, Egyptian

UOIE Union des Organizations Islamiques en Europe (‘Union of Islamic Organizations in Europe’), European

UOIF Union des Organizations Islamiques de France (‘Union of Islamic Organizations of France’), French

YMUK Young Muslims United Kingdom, British

ZMD Zentralrat der Muslime in Deutschland (‘Central Council of Muslims in Germany’), German

Glossary

Several terms that have been explained below have multiple meanings. I have chosen to focus only on the meanings used in this book. Less important terms, or those only used once in the book, are not mentioned here, but are explained in the text.

al-amr bi-l-ma‘ruf wa-l-nahy ‘an al-munkar – commanding right and forbidding wrong. This Koranic duty can take many forms, but to the Muslim Brotherhood it includes holding the ruler to account.

dar al-da‘wa – the abode of preaching. This term is used to signify non-Muslim countries where Muslims can profess their faith to emphasize the need for preaching in those countries and to legitimize Muslims’ settlement there. See also dar al-harb and dar al-Islam.

dar al-harb – the abode of war. This refers to the area with which the dar al-Islam (q.v.) is theoretically at war. To the present-day Muslim Brotherhood, this classical Islamic term is increasingly irrelevant. See also dar al-da‘wa.

dar al-Islam – the abode of Islam. This term signifies the area where Muslims are in the majority, where Islamic law is applied or where Muslims can profess their faith, depending on the interpretation used. Some in the Muslim Brotherhood claim that the entire world has become dar al-Islam. See also dar al-da‘wa and dar al-harb.

darurat – necessities. This term denotes matters that, despite perhaps being at odds with the Sharia, are necessary and therefore allowed. See also hajat, maslaha, taysir.

da‘wa – call (to Islam), preaching. This has long been an important activity of the Muslim Brotherhood.

dhimmi – a member of a protected minority. This term has long been applied to Jews and Christians who could live under Muslim rule as a protected minority under certain conditions (including payment of a poll tax (jizya, q.v.)). The Muslim Brotherhood has largely dropped this concept in its approach to non-Muslim minorities throughout the years.

fiqh – jurisprudence, the study and development of the Sharia. See also fiqh al-aqalliyyat.

fiqh al-aqalliyyat – jurisprudence of minorities. This was specifically developed for Muslim minorities in non-Muslim countries. See also fiqh.

hajat – needs. This term refers to matters that, despite perhaps being at odds with the Sharia, represent an important need among Muslims and are therefore allowed sometimes. See also darurat, maslaha, taysir.

hakimiyya – sovereignty. In the work of Mawdudi, Qutb and others, this term refers specifically to Gods sovereignty in all aspects of life, particularly legislation.

hisba – control, the application of al-amr bi-l-ma‘ruf wa-l-nahy ‘an al-munkar (q.v.), which can take multiple forms.

‘ibadat – matters pertaining to the worship of God. See also mu‘amalat.

ijtihad – independent reasoning on the basis of the Koran and the Sunna without necessarily remaining within the boundaries of a school of Islamic law. This has been an important instrument for the reform (islah, q.v.) of the Sharia.

infitah – opening. This refers specifically to the economic open-door policy of Egyptian President Anwar al-Sadat (r. 1970–1981).

islah – reform. This term has a positive connotation for Islamists, who see Islam as the source of reform.

jahiliyya – pre-Islamic period of ignorance. Qutb and others also use this term to describe the situation of Muslim societies today.

jama‘at (sing. jama‘a) – groups.

jam‘iyyat (sing. jam‘iyya) – associations.

jizya – poll tax. Only a dhimmi (q.v.) needed to pay this tax.

maqasid al-Shari‘a – purposes of the Sharia. This refers to the underlying purposes of Islamic law, not its specific judgements.

maslaha – interest. This concept can be used within fiqh (q.v.) to create exceptions in which matters that are forbidden may be allowed after all to serve the interest of the Muslim community. See also darurat, hajat, taysir.

mu‘amalat – matters related to relations between people amongst themselves. See also ‘ibadat.

sahwa – revival. This refers specifically to a movement that combines Wahhabism with the activism of the Muslim Brotherhood in Saudi Arabia.

salafi – ‘like the forefathers’. This word originally had a theological meaning and was used by modernists from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries who also influenced the Muslim Brotherhood. This should not be confused with modern-day Salafis, who have the same theological ideas as salafi modernists, but are not modernists themselves.

shura – consultation. Many members of the Muslim Brotherhood see this as the Islamic alternative to or the equivalent of democracy.

tajdid – renewal. This is an important term for Muslim reformers who have also influenced the Muslim Brotherhood.

takfir – excommunication, accusation of unbelief. Muslim Brothers sometimes use this, but are generally very hesitant in its application.

tariqa – order, referring to a Sufi order.

taysir – facilitation. This is part of fiqh al-aqalliyyat (q.v.) and intended to impose the least difficult rules on Muslims in difficult situations. See also darurat, hajat, maslaha.

ulama – scholars.

umma – Muslim community, nation.

usra – family. This refers to the smallest cell within the hierarchical structure of the Muslim Brotherhood.

wasatiyya – centrism. In the context of Islamism, this refers to the supposed golden mean that some scholars apply in fiqh (q.v.) between too much emphasis on texts, on the one hand, and too little attention for them, on the other.

Note on Transliteration

Arabic words used in this book are transliterated according to a simplified version of the system applied by the International Journal of Middle East Studies. This means that I do not use dots and macrons to indicate emphatic letters or long vowels, but that I do use an English transliteration, including for Arabic names and words that are often rendered into Latin script with, for example, a French transliteration. Concretely, this entails the transliteration of, for example, the name ‘Rachid al-Ghannouchi’ as ‘Rashid al-Ghannushi’. The apostrophe with the opening to the right (‘) and with the opening to the left (’) represent the Arabic letters ‘ayn and hamza, respectively. Arabic words that one can find in a good English dictionary (e.g. ‘Koran’, ‘Sharia’ and ‘jihad’) or well-known names (‘Saddam Hussein’, ‘Yasser Arafat’) are left unchanged. Slightly less well-known names (‘Burqiba/Bourguiba’, ‘Ibn ‘Ali/Bin Ali’) are first given in the correct transliteration and then in the more popular form. Names presumed unknown and without a popular spelling are rendered in the correct transliteration. The spelling of originally Arabic names of European Muslim Brothers depends on how they themselves spell them in Latin script.

Introduction

The Koran refers to Muslims as ‘brothers’ several times. Sura 3:103, for instance, states: ‘[…] remember God’s blessing upon you when you were enemies, and He brought your hearts together, so that by His blessing you became brothers (ikhwanan) […]’.1 This seems to be a reference to the pre-Islamic situation in the seventh century CE, in which inhabitants of the Arabian Peninsula often fought each other because of their tribal conflicts, but were unified through the arrival of Islam. This verse may suggest that the message of the Prophet Muhammad (570–632) brought about a period of harmony and peace in which his followers conducted themselves as ‘Muslim Brothers’, but this was often not the case in practice. Not only did internal conflict quickly rear its head after the death of the Prophet, but the various Islamic empires that succeeded each other throughout history were often also each other’s competitors.

Verses like the one mentioned above nevertheless seem to show that unity was the goal Muslims should strive for. The organization that is the focus of this book – the Muslim Brotherhood – may have wanted to hint at this ideal with its name.2 Ironically, however, the Muslim Brotherhood has turned out to be an important source of division: both among Muslims and non-Muslims, there is much resistance against its use of Islam as a politically and socially relevant ideology, its activism and its specific ideas, while the organization simultaneously has millions of supporters around the world. In addition, the Muslim Brotherhood itself – as we will see in the chapters to come – is also strongly internally divided on several issues. Finally, academics are not united in their analysis of the organization: some see the Muslim Brotherhood as a dangerous group that differs only marginally from terrorist organizations such as Al-Qaida, while others see it as a flexible, pragmatic and democratic club that can make a constructive contribution to the politics of the countries in which it operates.

To clarify these different academic positions on the Muslim Brotherhood, this introduction will first deal with the scholarly debate about Islamism, the trend that the organization is part of and that is known under various names. We will subsequently look at the different points of view that academics have with regard to the Muslim Brotherhood. Finally, I will give an overview of what the reader can expect in the chapters to come. The goal of this book is not just to give an overview of the various expressions of the Muslim Brotherhood in different Arab and European countries, but also to show that stereotypes about the organization do not do justice to the gradual, organic and ideological developments that it has gone through over the past decades.

Islamism as a Concept and as a Phenomenon

The term ‘Islamism’ refers to the idea that Islam, apart from being a religion of rituals, beliefs and texts, is also a politically and societally relevant ideology that forms the basis for activism. In practice, this is expressed in the idea that Islam should not just be applied in the religious sphere, but also in the political and societal spheres, mostly by implementing the Sharia. So, whereas Islam can be limited to the private sphere, Islamism is something that is, by definition, also related to the public sphere. For this reason, Islamism – much more than Islam itself – touches upon the lives of others.

The effects of Islamism on the public sphere and the possible tensions that emanate from them are probably also the reason that several labels for Islamism underline politics and society. One of these is ‘political Islam’, a term that emphasizes the politically relevant aspect of Islamism.3 Other terms more or less embody the activist aspect of Islamism: ‘Islamic extremism’,4 which is usually tied to violence (and is regularly used in the media), the more neutral ‘Islamic revival’,5 the less common ‘Islamic reformism/modernism’6 (because Islamism is a modern reformist movement), ‘militant Islam’7 or the often-heard ‘radical Islam’.8

Although none of these terms is perhaps entirely incorrect, each one of them is lacking in some respect: political Islam suggests that Islam itself is a-political, which is doubtful; extremism is rather a subjective term; revival is somewhat vague and may refer to a much broader phenomenon and is therefore less applicable; reformism/modernism is easily confused with more progressive trends within Islam; militant Islam seems to imply violence; and radical Islam does not take into account that Islamists often take a gradual approach and, in some contexts, have left the opposition and have attained power (and are therefore not so radical), as we will see in later chapters.

Academics are perhaps even more divided about the use of the term ‘fundamentalism’ in Islam as an alternative to Islamism. Apart from the fact that this term has a reputation for being associated with things like fanaticism,9 some researchers reject the term because it has roots in Protestantism and is not indigenous to Islam10 or because it seems to accept as true the claim that Islamists are the ones who go back to the ‘foundations’ or ‘fundamentals’ of the faith.11 Other academics do use the term fundamentalism with regard to Islam. They state that fundamentalism, with its rejection of ‘passive’ and ‘tainted’ conservatism in favour of an activist return to the ‘pure’ faith (perhaps linked to a specific historical period) and the political and societal application thereof, are typical of Islamism.12

Just like the latter group of scholars, I believe that the term fundamentalism – separated from its negative image and coupled with a specific approach to a religious tradition – can be applied to Islam, particularly if that also includes groups other than the Muslim Brotherhood.13 Still, the description of fundamentalism as given above does not entirely fit the Muslim Brotherhood’s gradual and flexible approach that we will see in the chapters to come.14 That approach is characterized much more by the image described before, of an ideological form of Islam that is applicable in politics and society; in other words: Islamism.15 Moreover, this book is not about Islamic fundamentalism in general, but only about the Muslim Brotherhood, an organization whose members label themselves Islamiyyun (‘Islamists’) in Arabic, to distinguish themselves from Muslimun (‘Muslims’).16 In this book, the term Islamism will therefore be used to indicate the broader ideological trend of which the Muslim Brotherhood is also part.

Yet Islamism is more than a concept. The word also represents a phenomenon about which academics wonder how exactly it should be interpreted. This, too, has led to division. Various approaches of reading Islamism can be distinguished, which we can roughly divide into three categories. A first approach is one that sees Islamism primarily as anti-modern and describes it as a phenomenon stemming from resistance to modern (Western) developments in the cultural, technological, political and societal spheres. Particularly when this is tied to secularization, Islamism is said to be a response to encroaching modernization in Muslim countries. Although scholars use (elements of) this approach, it has also been criticized because of its somewhat essentialist character and its apparent lack of attention for context.17

A second academic approach to Islamism is its treatment as a protest movement, such as those that also exist in non-Muslim countries. In this approach, Islamism may have its own, contextualized form, but it is simultaneously part of broader trends that are not limited to the Muslim world. As such, Islamism has been compared to communism and fascism,18 but it is sometimes also seen as the anticolonial movement that resisted British and French rule in the Muslim world in the twentieth century or that employs today’s reality in developing countries to turn against the West.19 A different perspective within this approach is to consider Islamism as an alternative to the economic, political and social crises that people find themselves in. Wherever (relative) poverty, repression and exclusion are prominently present, Islamism is said to be an alternative to the systems from which these emanated.20 Although this approach, unlike the first one, pays great attention to the contexts in which Islamism develops, it has been criticized for its lack of attention for the role of Islam.21

A third way academic scholars approach Islamism – based on the idea that it is a diverse phenomenon – tries to look at it from all the perspectives mentioned above. As such, Islamism is seen as a dynamic and heterogeneous movement that tries to offer solutions to both internal and external challenges22 and for whom both cultural resistance against (Western) modernity and socio-economic considerations can be important.23 In this approach, both contextual factors – for example, the extent to which people are able to mobilize or the political structure of a country – and ideological influences are taken into account by treating Islamic movements as social24 movements.25 Because of its complete and nuanced treatment, this book also follows this third approach.

The Muslim Brotherhood as an Object of Study

Just like Islamism in general, the Muslim Brotherhood as a specific organization has also been the subject of academic study for decades. Partly related to the positions on Islamism given above, we can also see different trends here. We can roughly distinguish four different approaches. The first of these clearly draws a connection between the Muslim Brotherhood, on the one hand, and terrorist organizations like Al-Qaida, on the other. The attempts by American and European politicians to criminalize the Muslim Brotherhood or to have it listed as a terrorist organization by their governments have gone on for years,26 but a similar tendency can also be discerned in academia. As such, some researchers portray the Muslim Brotherhood as an organization that is bent on grabbing power and merely refrains from using violence out of tactical considerations.27 Others point to the alleged ideological similarities between the Muslim Brotherhood and Egyptian terrorist groups28 and Al-Qaida,29 paint the organization as a terrorist wolf in sheep’s clothing,30 as a group that cooperates with terrorist organizations31 or even as a group that ‘has operated as a terrorist entity for almost a century’.32

The second approach in the academic analysis of the Muslim Brotherhood, which can somewhat overlap with the first, sees the organization mostly as an unchangeable group for which a strict reading of the Koran and the Sunna and a severe application of the Sharia are and will remain decisive.33 One element that is often discussed in this approach is the allegedly fundamentally undemocratic character of the Muslim Brotherhood.34 Another theme we encounter among adherents to this view is that the organization wants to establish an Islamic theocracy on the basis of the Sharia in individual countries or even the entire world.35

The third trend does not actually represent an academic point of view, but is nevertheless important to mention because it can frequently be seen in media sources about the Muslim Brotherhood and sometimes even in books professing to be serious. This concerns the idea that the Muslim Brotherhood is an international conspiracy against the West and that the organization has a secret agenda, which it has cunningly concealed. These types of accusation against the Muslim Brotherhood in popular and media sources have been analysed in various academic publications36 and still occur, for example in a Dutch newspaper article about the alleged influence of Islamists in local politics in Rotterdam. This article labels one of the persons involved ‘a spider in the Islamic web’ and refers to the ‘tentacles’ of the Muslim Brotherhood that ‘reach into the town hall’,37 suggesting that we are dealing with a central and controlling power. The organization is described in similar fashion in a recent book, which explicitly calls the Muslim Brotherhood a ‘conspiracy’.38 Thus, some groups ‘have taken on different names in order to conceal their links to the leading organisation in Egypt’.39 Moreover, the author views the Muslim Brotherhood as a dangerous organization that – through guidance from Qatar and Turkey – extends its ‘tentacles’ and whose presence in the West is labelled a ‘beachhead’ and a ‘Trojan horse’.40

The fourth and by far the most common approach among academics who have done research on the Muslim Brotherhood is one that starts from the idea that the organization has a pragmatic, dynamic and flexible character. This expresses itself in, among other things, its ability to adjust to the systems of the countries in which it is active, its acceptance of the rules of the political game, its urging of regimes to adopt democratic and constitutional reforms and its susceptibility to the wishes of the peoples from which it sprang. Within this academic trend, this conclusion has been drawn with regard to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt,41 Jordan,42 Morocco,43 the Palestinian territories,44 Syria45 and Tunisia,46 to name just a few countries that will be dealt with in this book. This is not to say that adherents to this trend believe the Muslim Brotherhood has become a liberal-democratic organization, but that they acknowledge the actual, organic, intensely discussed and ideologically underpinned changes within the Muslim Brotherhood. This book has also been written on the basis of this approach.

Overview

As indicated before, this book is intended for professionally interested readers, not for academic specialists of the Muslim Brotherhood, and provides a detailed overview, be it as an introduction or as the basis for further research. For that reason, this book is overwhelmingly based on secondary literature and the number of Arabic sources has consciously been kept to a minimum. As a result, the book enables the broadest possible audience to actually look up the works cited in the notes and use them for further study. At the same time, this book is structured in a way that facilitates readers looking up specific information on, for instance, the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria or learning something of the relationship between the organization and Al-Qaida, but that also sketches the development of the Muslim Brotherhood in general and deals with related debates.

The book is divided into three parts. Part I deals with the theme of ‘Ideology’ and delves into the earliest ideas of the Muslim Brotherhood in two chapters. Chapter 1 has the general ideology of the organization as its subject and it analyses where the Muslim Brotherhood’s ideas come from and how they are rooted in nineteenth-century reformist thought. It subsequently deals with the organization’s ideas on Egypt and the view of the West among the earliest ideologues of the Muslim Brotherhood. Chapter 2 deals with the ideology of the organization regarding three themes that will recur throughout this book, namely, the state, political participation and societal rights and freedoms; or, to be more specific about the latter, the position of religious minorities, women’s rights and civil liberties.

Part II (History) deals with the historical development of various Muslim Brotherhoods in a series of nine Arab countries, divided into three themes, each of which has a dedicated chapter. Chapter 3 has ‘Repression’ as its theme and deals with three countries in which this was an important part of the Muslim Brotherhood’s history: Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia. The theme of Chapter 4 is ‘Participation’ and it deals with the Muslim Brotherhoods in Kuwait, Jordan and the Palestinian territories, precisely because those have been given the space to participate in the political system. Finally, in this part, Chapter 5 examines the theme of ‘Power’, and features analysis of the Islamist organizations that have actually attained power in, respectively, Sudan, Morocco and Tunisia.

Part III of this book delves into what I refer to as ‘Descendants’ of the Muslim Brotherhood: groups and trends that, strictly speaking, are no longer part of the Muslim Brotherhood, but that somehow – directly or indirectly – stem from or are connected with the organization. Chapter 6 zooms in on the ‘radicals’, who strive for drastic political and societal changes: the transnational Hizb al-Tahrir; the Palestinian Islamic Jihad; Tanzim al-Jihad and Al-Jama‘a al-Islamiyya from Egypt; as well as Al-Qaida and the Islamic State. Chapter 7, by contrast, deals with the ‘Liberals’: those who have shown a greater ideological flexibility than the Muslim Brotherhood itself has often done. In this chapter, I deal with, respectively, the wasatiyya-trend, post-Islamism and an example of the latter – the so-called ZamZam-initiative. Finally, the focus of Chapter 8 is the Muslim Brothers as ‘Europeans’ and analyses the migration of the Muslim Brotherhood from the Middle East to Europe, the expressions of the organization in five European countries (Great Britain, France, Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands) and how these developments have been ideologically justified.

In the conclusions of each of the chapters in Part II and III, I will deal with one of the alternative approaches to the Muslim Brotherhood as they have been distinguished above. Concretely, this means that I will examine the view of the Muslim Brotherhood as a (potential) terrorist organization in Chapters 3 and 6, analyse the image of the group as theocratic and anti-democratic in Chapters 4 and 7 and I return to the idea of the Muslim Brotherhood as an international conspiracy in Chapters 5 and 8. That way – and in the conclusion of the book as a whole – it not only becomes clear why I have chosen the fourth approach to the Muslim Brotherhood myself, but also why this is the only one that does justice to the ideological, historical and geographical development that the organization has undergone over the past century.

Part I

Ideology

1. The General Ideology of the Early Muslim Brotherhood

The ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood is rooted in Islam or, more precisely, in the ideas of an Islamic reform movement that arose in the nineteenth century and which itself was rooted in earlier reforms. The desire to reform was a response to the established order of that time. This was an order that took shape after the death of the Prophet Muhammad in 632 around the so-called caliphate, a political system whose leader was seen as the successor (khalifa; ‘caliph’) of the Prophet. This succession did not pertain to the prophetic gifts of Muhammad – who is, after all, seen by Muslims as khatim al-anbiya’ (‘the seal of the prophets’) – but to his duties as a ruler of Muslims, which was underlined by the title the caliph bore in the following centuries: amir al-mu’minin (‘the commander of the faithful’). The latter showed the politico-religious character of the caliph’s leadership. In practice, this was mostly expressed through the application of the Sharia and the organization of the Friday prayers. The process of developing and shaping the Sharia is called fiqh (‘jurisprudence’), which was led by the ulama (‘scholars’) and particularly the fuqaha’ (‘legal scholars’), who had specialized in this subject through their studies, in the centuries after Muhammad’s death.1

Various Islamic empires came into existence after the death of the Prophet Muhammad, partly on the basis of the idea of the caliphate. With respect to this book, the most important of these was the Ottoman Empire (1299–1923), which provided the context for the nineteenth-century reform movement that the Muslim Brotherhood grew out of ideologically. In this chapter, I will deal with the attempts at religious renewal that arose after the Middle Ages and how a reform movement that – ideologically speaking – can be seen as the cradle of what later became the Muslim Brotherhood grew out of this in the nineteenth century. I subsequently analyse the ideological development of the early Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood (1920s–1970s) by focussing on the ideological background of Hasan al-Banna, the organization’s founder, its ideas about what was wrong in Egypt and why and how Islam could provide an answer to this. Finally, this chapter deals with the early Muslim Brotherhood’s views on the West, particularly in the context of the British colonial rule under which Egyptians lived in the early twentieth century.

Status Quo and Reforms in Islam After the Middle Ages

The Ottoman Empire, which had Istanbul as its capital and which (at its territorial peak) stretched from Europe to Iraq, was still a powerful and largely centrally led entity in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. As was the case in other Islamic empires, the ulama also played an important role in the Ottoman Empire. These scholars legitimized the authority of the sultans in Istanbul, as it were, and, in return, were given room to fulfil their Islamic-legal duties in relative freedom. In the Ottoman Empire, scholars worked under the supervision of the state, but this also allowed them to assign a greater role to the Sharia in politics.2

Although Islamic scholars had an important position in the Ottoman Empire, a considerable part of religious life within this context was constituted by Sufism, which existed partly – but certainly not entirely – separate from the ulama’s sphere of influence. This mystical trend within Islam was organized through tariqas (‘orders’) that were concentrated around a master (pir, shaykh), who sometimes had a large number of followers. Due to their major spiritual and religious authority – partly based on their experiences with earlier masters that formed a silsila (‘chain’), which sometimes reached all the way back to the Prophet Muhammad himself – popular rituals would often develop around these masters, particularly after their deaths. They were seen as being able to ensure blessing, fertility or healing and, consequently, their graves sometimes became sites of pilgrimage.3

The spread of Sufism was partly facilitated by the claim that the mysticism of the Sufi masters did not clash with the Sharia of the legal scholars, but rather complemented and perfected it.4 Thus, partly because of the previously mentioned claims of indirect connection with the Prophet, Sufism became acceptable to the ulama. This acceptance of Sufi orders did not create a greater legitimacy for the practices around the graves of Sufi masters described above, however, which the scholars often viewed as contrary to the Sharia.5 Because of the popularity of Sufism, the connecting structure that the Sufi orders offered and the widespread piety that they brought with them, such great support for these practices developed that scholars often did not speak out against them.6

Although there had also been opponents of certain forms of Sufism in the Middle Ages who saw them as incongruous with the Sharia (as well as the theological and legal trends that often accompanied them), this remained limited. This was because Sufi orders were sometimes tied to scholars, who, in turn, enjoyed state support in the Ottoman Empire. As such, this situation was partly maintained by means of the authorities. This changed somewhat in the seventeenth century, when some scholars from the Middle East, but also from India, expressed fierce criticism of what they saw as unacceptable Sufi ideas or rituals that involved dancing and music. They also sometimes did their best to push these allegedly bad practices back into a Sharia-compliant form.7

Reforms in the Eighteenth Century

The ability to express criticism of the religious and political establishments was strengthened by political developments that occurred in the Ottoman Empire in the eighteenth century. The first of these was a clear decentralization, at the expense of Istanbul’s authority. This decentralization was tied to increasing competition from European economies, which sometimes offered favourable prices for the goods of local traders in the Middle East. As a result, the export – over which the central authority had little control – increased. This coincided with a rise in power and autonomy among local rulers who were unwilling to cede these to the sultan again.8 Therefore, centrally led reforms to re-establish Istanbul’s grip on the situation were often not structural in nature because they were opposed by local rulers, bureaucrats, army officers and even religious scholars who refused to give up their own autonomy.9 Thus, some ulama or local politicians, like those in Egypt or in the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, gained more and more power at the expense of the sultan.10

A second eighteenth-century development that strengthened opposition against the religious and political authorities was the weakening of the Ottoman Empire by Russian and Western European influences. This was tied, on the one hand, to the military losses that the Ottoman Empire suffered at the edges of its territory, for example because of Russian military invasions in the Caucasus and the Balkans in the second half of the eighteenth century and the French occupation of Egypt in 1798. On the other hand, this was related to the increasing economic wealth that particularly Christians amassed as a result of the foreign protection they enjoyed. In the sixteenth century, France had already arranged that it would manage the interests of Roman Catholics in the Ottoman Empire. The agreements about this arrangement, the so-called capitulations, allowed France to privilege Roman Catholic Christians, which Russia also did later with Orthodox Christians.11

The Ottoman Empire thus weakened both from the inside and from the outside in the eighteenth century. More or less simultaneously, a reformist trend could be discerned in various places in the empire, one which strove for a return to the Koran, the Sunna, the Sharia and the practices of the earliest Muslim community, albeit expressed differently in different areas.12 This built on the seventeenth-century criticism of certain ‘problematic’ aspects of Sufism mentioned earlier and this trend therefore influenced some tariqas. Because Sufi orders functioned partly outside of official Ottoman circles of scholars, they could serve as the basis of opposition movements against the existing religious and/or political establishment.13 As a result of this return to the textual basis of Islam, which was not limited to the Ottoman Empire, reformist movements came into existence that challenged the authorities in various places.14

The Islamic reform movements that emerged in the eighteenth-century Muslim world varied from Wahhabism on the Arabian Peninsula to revivalist developments in Africa, India and Southeast Asia.15 This geographical span shows that this was a diverse phenomenon that occurred beyond the boundaries of the Ottoman Empire. It is therefore important to emphasize that the roots of these reformist movements differed.16 Within the Ottoman Empire, these movements continued into the nineteenth century and gave impetus to a new generation of reformers.

Reforms in the Nineteenth Century

The Ottoman Empire of the nineteenth century was partly characterized by the same challenges as those of the eighteenth century. Among others, the European threat caused the empire to adopt military, political and administrative reforms once again, this time with greater success. This was partly expressed in the increase of modern education. Whereas traditional education used to be based on the authority of the teacher (and his own teachers) and was often limited to religious subjects, new education was less traditional and placed greater emphasis on profane subjects. This different type of education resulted in the ulama and the Sufi orders that were tied to them being partly side-lined. Moreover, these educational developments led to the rise of a new elite, who had enjoyed a modern education, which, in turn, catalysed a new reformist movement. This movement started forming what may be described as an intellectual alternative to the ulama and did not object to opposing the religious authorities.17

The new elite of modern-educated reformers emerged at a time when European involvement in the Middle East did not limit itself to economic influence or control of parts of the Ottoman Empire, but also expressed itself in the colonial occupation of various areas. Algeria became a French colony in 1830, for example, and Egypt came under British colonial control in 1882. Apart from the ensuing military and political consequences, the European cultural influence that emanated from this was interpreted differently by nineteenth-century reformers: whereas secular reformers embraced it, believing that true reform could only happen by adopting European cultural norms, modernists took a different view. While they strove for religious reform, they also wanted to accept modernity through the prism of Islam. In other words, they wanted to modernize Islam rather than abolish it as a politically and societally relevant religion, as many secularists wanted.18

This partial acceptance of European cultural insights expressed itself among modernists in the continuation of the above-mentioned eighteenth-century reforms aimed at a return to the Koran and the Sunna (and undermining the power of the religious authorities), although this was done in different ways. Some reformers strove for renewal that was tied to specific theological ideas about how the Koran should be read, which they referred to as salafi (‘like the forefathers’). Examples of this included the Syrian Jamal al-Din al-Qasimi (1866–1914) and the Iraqi Mahmud Shukri al-Alusi (1856–1924); other thinkers shared these scholars’ broad, modernist, reformist agenda but did so outside of the framework of salafi ideas. Examples of the latter included the Iranian Jamal al-Din al-Afghani (1838–1897)19 and the Egyptian Muhammad ‘Abduh (1848–1905).20 The word ‘salafi’, however, was also used in the twentieth century to denote the broad, modernist, reformist movement as a whole (even though this was, strictly speaking, incorrect).21 Hence, ‘salafi’ came to be seen by many as simply meaning ‘reformist’ and in a limited way it has also entered the discourse of the early Muslim Brotherhood as such, as we will see later on.22

Salafi or not, these modernist thinkers partly had the same reformist ideas. On the one hand, they shared a critical attitude towards the ruling religious authorities and certain ‘problematic’ Sufi practices with those espousing renewal in the previous century and they also pursued a Sharia-compliant form of Sufism.23 On the other hand, within a more generally anti-colonialist framework, they also had a broader agenda of religious tajdid (‘renewal’) and islah (‘reform’), terms that Islamic reformers have used throughout the centuries.24 Concretely, this meant that, unlike what they saw as the rigid ulama elite or those they viewed as superstitious ‘extreme’ Sufis, the modernists accorded rationalism a major role in their way of thinking and preferred direct interpretation of the sources (ijtihad) to following legal precedents (taqlid) drawn up by the schools of Islamic law (madhahib, sing. madhhab).25 They also reinterpreted old Islamic concepts such as shura (‘consultation’) and ijma‘ (‘consensus’) in such a way that they could be used to embed ideas like popular representation in Islam.26

Apart from the above-mentioned representatives of this modernist Islamic reform movement from the nineteenth century, the most important exponent of these ideas is possibly the Lebanese scholar Muhammad Rashid Rida (1865–1935), who had salafi sympathies but was also closely associated with people like ‘Abduh.27 Rida was not just a modernist reformer who developed ideas in various spheres of life and published them in his magazine Al-Manar (‘The Lighthouse’), but he was also a staunch proponent of Islamic unity. Possibly bitter about the West – as were other reformers sometimes28 – which became increasingly present as a colonial power in the Middle East after World War I, Rida became closely connected to the (not at all modernist) Wahhabi movement on the Arabian Peninsula. He believed its leader – the later king of Saudi Arabia, ‘Abd al-‘Aziz Ibn Sa‘ud (1876–1953) – to be capable of bringing about Islamic unity.29

Apart from this tendency to emphasize Islamic unity, Rida also had a strongly politicized discourse, which dealt with politics in the region and, at the time of the abolition of the caliphate in 1924, he openly pondered about how a new form of the caliphate could take shape in these changed circumstances.30 Given this emphasis on unity and on political issues, it was perhaps not surprising that Rida’s publications drew the attention of and had a major impact on Hasan al-Banna (1906–1949) and on the Muslim Brotherhood as a whole.31 Al-Banna and his organization, for instance, published the magazine Al-Manar after Rida’s death.32 Although the relationship between Rida and al-Banna should not be exaggerated, and it has been correctly pointed out that the latter was also influenced by others, Rida does constitute one of the links between the Muslim Brotherhood and the broader reform movement of the nineteenth century.33 The concrete ideas that this generated form the subject of the next two sections.

The Early Muslim Brotherhood’s Views on Egypt

The Muslim Brotherhood was founded by Hasan al-Banna in Egypt in 1928, based on the same idea that had driven so many reformers in the years before, namely, that the Muslim world was threatened from the inside as well as from the outside. Although existing traditions can change and, therefore, can also be the source of renewal,34 many nineteenth-century reformers argued against the traditional Islam of the Ottoman Empire, whose structures and ideas they considered rigid, impure or backward. In a sense, the Muslim Brotherhood started as the activist and populist expression of this reformist thought.

Whereas traditional Islam – embodied by the Ottoman state scholars with their time-honoured beliefs that have been handed down through the generations – was expressed within existing frameworks, made use of existing institutions and changed its positions only slowly, reformers had an entirely different approach. They – and particularly the Islamists that were partly inspired by them – stepped outside the existing frames of reference, had less structural ties with existing institutions and wanted direct change. While traditional Islam is characterized by what we may call institutionalized conservatism and is, as such, perhaps less interested in (and less susceptible to) threats, Islamism – including the Muslim Brotherhood – does not refrain from confronting challenges.35

Hasan al-Banna’s Ideological Background

An important difference between the nineteenth-century reform movement and the Muslim Brotherhood was that the former was an ideological trend directed by intellectuals. The Muslim Brotherhood, on the other hand, directed its attention towards ordinary people and was much more geared towards activism. This can be seen in the early activities of Hasan al-Banna himself, who had been educated as a teacher.36 In the 1920s and 1930s, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood visited coffee houses to preach his simple message of a return to Islam.37 He used to educate people about, for example, the way to ritually cleanse themselves and how to perform prayers,38 based on a vision that he would later describe as ‘a pure (naqiyan), clear (safiyan), simple (sahlan), total (shamilan), complete (kafiyan), perfect (wafiyan) understanding’ of Islam.39

Al-Banna’s simple message was embedded in a broader religious background. As we have seen already, he had been influenced by Rida and he was also interested in other modernists with a salafi bent.40 Al-Banna also shared theological ideas typical of salafis,41 although he paid relatively little attention to theology in his writings42 and ‘salafi’ possibly meant ‘reformist’ to him. At the same time, al-Banna had been raised with Sufi rituals43 and he had already been involved in social activism in a Sufi context prior to founding the Muslim Brotherhood.44 This diverse religious background also partly explains why he would later call the Muslim Brotherhood ‘a salafi call (da‘wa salafiyya) […], a Sunni path (tariqa sunniyya) […] and a Sufi truth (haqiqa sufiyya)’.45

Al-Banna’s ideological background was as broad as it was diverse, which meant that his message appealed to Muslims with wide-ranging ideas. Instead of emphasizing sectarian differences, al-Banna – like Rida before him – was known for his desire for unity and brotherhood, as well as his willingness to cooperate with other Muslims on the basis of what they had in common and to compromise where they differed.46 For the same reason – and because he was not a trained scholar – al-Banna avoided discussions about theological details.47 Although this may sound tolerant and perhaps even ecumenical, in al-Banna’s case this resulted in a message that was not always very clear and sometimes seemed contradictory, perhaps in an attempt to keep the members of the organization together. The discourse of the Muslim Brotherhood’s later leaders is sometimes characterized by a similar ambiguity.48

Criticism of Egypt

The challenge that nineteenth-century reformers had constituted to the religious and political authorities of their time was expressed in al-Banna’s and the early Muslim Brothers’ work through their criticism of the political system in Egypt. The Muslim Brotherhood fiercely opposed the British colonial occupation of Egypt – to which we will return in the next section – but believed that beside this al-isti‘mar al-khariji (‘foreign imperialism’) there was also al-isti‘mar al-dakhili (‘internal imperialism’) in the country. The latter consisted of internal Egyptian forces that – consciously or not – aided the British occupation or kept it in power, thereby supposedly contributing to the corruption of Islam in Egypt and the country in general. This was particularly problematic because the early Muslim Brotherhood saw Egypt as a country that, as one of the oldest civilizations in the world and with its long history as a Muslim country, had a unique relationship with Islam and should also be a pioneer in restoring that connection with the religion.49

The early Muslim Brotherhood expressed relatively little criticism of the Egyptian royal family, which descended from a ruling family that had been in power in Egypt since the early nineteenth century and governed the nominally independent country under British colonial rule until the military coup in 1952. Perhaps the Muslim Brotherhood adopted this attitude because al-Banna remained loyal to the monarchy or perhaps it was because the organization feared being banned.50 In any case, much more criticism was directed at the political rulers below the level of the king: ministers, members of parliament and party leaders. These people were not only said to be corrupt and in politics to serve their own interests, but their lack of concrete plans and non-representative character led to accusations that they were primarily an instrument in the hands of the colonial powers.51

The early Muslim Brotherhood also viewed economic relations through the lens of colonialism. It tied British rule to the presence of foreigners, who were said to exploit the country as tools of imperialism. According to the Muslim Brotherhood, this happened in cooperation with major landowners in a capitalist system in which supporters were more interested in money than in the country’s interests. Moreover, they supposedly failed to pay their taxes, while they had the government represent their interests. Apart from the economic consequences that this would have for the people, this system weakened the country, robbed the population of its dignity, corrupted the character of the country, deprived people of their security, made communism more attractive and was also contrary to Islam.52

Finally, the Muslim Brotherhood expressed fierce criticism of the societal developments that took place in Egypt as a consequence of Western influence. It lamented British control, not just as a military occupation, but also as a source of cultural influence, with all that this entailed. It believed, for instance, that family life was undermined by the supposedly evil message that emanated from cinematic films (seen as filthy) or by some types of popular music. It also criticized the presence of ‘naked’ women in the streets and connected this with the moral problems Egyptian youngsters were suffering from. Lastly, the Muslim Brotherhood stated that people were starting to lead split lives – Islamic and Western – in which some Egyptians turned out to be even more Western than Westerners themselves. This was supported by a dual educational system, in which one track turned pupils into religious scholars while another was completely detached from this and concentrated only on profane subjects.53

From the above, it becomes clear that the Muslim Brotherhood did not believe that politicians in Egypt would change this situation. The organization was equally pessimistic about the extent to which other forces in society would be capable of doing this. Although al-Banna himself, for example, was influenced by Sufism, he was also critical of this trend and the parts within it that he considered extreme.54 In his view, these were not just inherently detrimental to society, but the large number of Sufi orders also created division within the Muslim community. In addition, al-Banna was ultimately also sceptical about the extent to which Sufi orders could shape the general political reforms that he strove for.55

Al-Azhar University, a renowned institute that had produced Muslim scholars for centuries, was also unable to turn the tide of decline in Egypt, according to the Muslim Brotherhood. Although al-Banna personally respected the ulama, was friendly towards them, and some Al-Azhar students also joined the Muslim Brotherhood,56 he and the organization were highly critical of Al-Azhar University as an institute. On the one hand, they blamed the scholars for their alleged lack of passion for Islam, which had supposedly become a dead religion in their hands, instead of a living faith. It was claimed that the ulama emphasized only the memorization of texts and paid no heed to rationalism or modern methods. As a result, al-Banna believed Al-Azhar only produced people who were religiously literate, but who could not function as spiritual leaders.57 On the other hand, the Muslim Brotherhood saw Al-Azhar scholars as people who collaborated with corrupt rulers and major landowners, instead of rebelling against them or resisting British colonial rule.58

Thus, the criticism of the Muslim Brotherhood directed at the Egyptian state and society in the first half of the twentieth century strongly resembled that of the earlier reformers from the nineteenth century, but applied to a local situation. Just like the earlier reformers, it was critical of the rulers, the interpretation of Islam used by – among others – certain Sufis and the way in which traditional scholars dealt with this, but then applied specifically to Egypt. The Muslim Brotherhood presented itself not just as a contemporary and activist alternative for all of these, but also had a message that was very different from what Egyptians had been used to.

‘Islam is the Solution’

The Muslim Brotherhood offered an alternative to the malaise that it experienced in the Egyptian state and society, beginning with the idea that Islam encompasses all spheres of life. According to al-Banna, Islam had:

[A] broad meaning (ma‘na wasi‘), unlike the narrow meaning that most people understand it to have. We believe that Islam has an all-encompassing meaning (ma‘na shamil) that organizes all of life’s affairs. It gives a legal judgement on every matter and provides it with a precise, solid system (nizaman muhkaman daqiqan).59

This does not just apply to the religious aspects of life. Al-Banna explicitly states that:

[T]hose who think that these teachings only deal with the worship-related or spiritual side [of Islam], without [dealing] with others, are wrong in thinking this. Islam is creed and worship (‘aqida wa-‘ibada), homeland and nationality (watan wa-jinsiyya), religion and state (din wa-dawla), spirituality and work (ruhaniyya wa-‘amal), Koran and sword (mushaf wa-sayf).60

This shumuliyya (‘universality’, ‘comprehensiveness’) also explains why ‘al-Islam huwa l-hall’ (‘Islam is the solution’) became the Muslim Brotherhood’s most important slogan: in the organization’s view, Islam offers tools to deal with problems in all aspects of life and, as such, the slogan epitomizes the activist (and populist) character of the Muslim Brotherhood. Later ideologues of the organization, such as the Egyptian Sayyid Qutb (1906–1966),61 confirmed this in their own writings62 and the Muslim Brotherhood as a whole has continued to use the slogan until today.63

The words ‘Islam is the solution’ not only indicate that all answers can be found in religion, but also imply that Islam has a positive effect on and forms the basis of life. According to Qutb, perhaps the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood’s most important ideologue during the 1950s and 1960s, Islam functioned as a dynamic force that, on the one hand, had a constant and unchanging core, but, on the other, could also be adapted to different situations and manifest itself in various ways. Although the latter meant that Islam was broadly applicable, the constant core ensured that people would not drift away from the truth too much and also gave life direction. Thus, Islam does not just act as a barrier against unwanted influences, but also functions as a criterium on the basis of which all things in life can and must be judged.64

That Islam should be used as a criterium was obvious to the early Muslim Brotherhood, which saw this religion as better than all other systems, partly because it was believed to encompass the best of all of them. Moreover, Islam was claimed to conform to the principles of the Egyptian people – the overwhelming majority of whom were Muslims – and a return to that religion would confirm people’s identity and thereby provide hope, perseverance and national self-respect.65 The early Muslim Brotherhood also believed that the necessity of confirming Islam was clear from their reading of history, i.e. that the problems in the Muslim world – both in the distant past and in the twentieth century – stemmed from a deviation from ‘true’ Islam. To rise from the crisis in which Egypt found itself, it was therefore necessary to return to the Koran and the Sunna, so that the religion, as well as the Muslim world, could be restored.66 According to the Muslim Brotherhood, this version of Islam to which one should return was not represented by Al-Azhar or a different actor in Egyptian society, but by the organization itself.67

In the hands of Qutb, al-Banna’s message, which seemed to be especially directed at Egypt, became a universal declaration of Islam as a liberating force. Qutb believed that by returning to Islam, people could throw off the yoke of their oppressors and replace it with a better alternative. As such, submission to the rule and laws of God was not a new yoke, but actually a liberation for humankind,68 which – as Qutb explicitly indicates – not only applies to Arabs, but to everyone.69 It is in this context that we should see the Muslim Brotherhood’s views on the application of the Sharia, which we will encounter regularly in the pages to come: whereas among many people in the liberal-democratic West, Islamic law conjures up images of cutting off hands and stoning adulterous women and, as such, embodies a lack of freedom, Muslim Brothers see the Sharia entirely differently. To understand this, it has to be borne in mind that the Muslim Brotherhood was founded and developed in a period of foreign repression through colonialism and – later – internal repression through dictatorship, the latter of which remains prevalent in Egypt and the Arab world. In such a context, where people’s rights are often partly dependent on the whims of what many see as unjust rulers, the Sharia is seen as an alternative to repression and a sign of freedom, precisely because it is viewed as deriving from a fundamentally just God. As such, it is no coincidence that ideas such as Qutb’s are sometimes compared with Latin American Christian liberation theology.70

Although the Muslim Brotherhood’s specific political philosophy will be dealt with in Chapter 2, it is important to note here that the view of Islam as an ideology of liberation was given concrete form in Egypt. The organization strove for the Islamization of Egyptian legislation under the slogan ‘the Koran is our constitution’, which was intended to affect various aspects of political and societal life, such as parliament, corruption, the civil service and the army. It is not surprising that the Muslim Brotherhood, precisely because it viewed Islam as an all-encompassing ideology, resolutely rejected criticism from others in Egypt and elsewhere of its interference in these wide-ranging issues.71

The subject of the economy was also not left untouched by the Muslim Brotherhood, although this was initially not a priority for al-Banna. The organization’s economic vision was characterized by the idea of economic independence, which it saw as the basis of true, political independence, and the improvement of the plight of the many poor people in Egypt. In this context, the Muslim Brotherhood called for industrialization, the nationalization of the National Bank of Egypt, land reforms and social security, among others. As such, the Muslim Brotherhood’s economic vision was an extension of its political views on independence and standing up for the people’s interests.72

With regard to social changes, the Muslim Brotherhood primarily spoke about educational reforms. Starting from the idea that children are the future, it neither strove for purely religious education – such as that provided at traditional institutes like Al-Azhar –nor did the Muslim Brotherhood only want to see profane subjects taught in schools. Instead, the organization believed that Egyptians should become proficient in secularism in order to overcome it. Partly for this reason, al-Banna argued in favour of modern, academic education in which religious schooling was harmoniously integrated.73 The Muslim Brotherhood could play a part in this through its emphasis on da‘wa (‘call [to Islam]’, ‘preaching’), an important means for the organization to direct the Egyptian people towards the alleged need to embrace Islam.74 Moreover, the organization viewed da‘wa as a duty for all Muslims (also in later years), so that Egyptians themselves could contribute to reforming the country.75

The Early Muslim Brotherhood’s Views on the West

According to the Muslim Brotherhood, every Muslim should engage in the task of preaching. The message of this preaching was strongly influenced by the British colonial occupation as well as the Arab-Israeli conflict, which took shape in the first half of the twentieth century and has remained an important topic for the Muslim Brotherhood until today. This, in turn, influenced how members of the organization viewed the West in general and how they placed it in a religious framework. That way, the Muslim Brotherhood’s da‘wa carried a message that was relevant with regard to both domestic and foreign affairs and contributed to the general worldview of those who were influenced by it.

The West as a Political Problem

To the early Muslim Brotherhood – and to Hasan al-Banna in particular – ‘the West’ was first and foremost a concrete political problem that manifested itself in the form of the British colonial occupation of Egypt. After the rise of the nationalist Wafd Party in 1918 and a popular uprising against British rule in 1919, Egypt became officially independent in 1922. The conditions on which this took place, however, were such that the colonial rule partially remained intact, Egypt did not become truly independent and the British army remained present in the country. The agreement underpinning independence was renegotiated by an elected Egyptian government in 1936, but retained certain privileges for the British – troops in the Suez Canal Zone and partial responsibility for Egypt’s foreign policy – which ensured that there was still no real independence.76

Although al-Banna was still a teenager when the uprising against British rule took place in 1919, this event and its aftermath seem to have had a great impact on him. Later, he claimed that he and his classmates had been involved in protests and that he had vivid memories of the demonstrations against British control that had taken place during his childhood. This not only left a lasting influence on the young al-Banna, but it was also the beginning of his growing political consciousness.77 This was underlined in 1927, when he left for Isma‘iliyya, a city in the Suez Canal Zone, where he went to work as a teacher and where he was directly confronted with the major differences in wealth and lifestyle between the colonial rulers, on the one hand, and the local population, on the other. To al-Banna, his stay in Isma‘iliyya confirmed how wrong the British military dominance in Egypt was.78 In his later writings, he blames the British for repressing Egypt and states that the agreement that the country had with Great Britain is ‘a chain (ghull) around Egypt’s neck and a shackle (qayd) around its hand’.79