By Joel C. Rosenberg
JoelRosenberg.com
The Obama administration is playing with gasoline near an open flame. As lawlessness and violence continues to spread through Cairo and other cities, senior White House and State Department officials are inexplicably indicating that they are now interested in welcoming the Muslim Brotherhood and other “non-secular” groups into whatever new government is created once Hosni Mubarak leaves office, as he has indicated he is now willing to do.
- The Los Angeles Times reports,
“The Obama administration said for the first time that it supports a role for groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood, a banned Islamist organization, in a reformed Egyptian government…. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said that a reformed government ‘has to include a whole host of important nonsecular actors that give Egypt a strong chance to continue to be [a] stable and reliable partner.’”
- The New York Times reports:
“White House staff members ‘made clear that they did not rule out engagement with the Muslim Brotherhood as part of an orderly process,’ according to one attendee [to a meeting of Mideast experts with three officials of the National Security Council], who like others interviewed for this article spoke on condition of anonymity because he did not want to talk publicly about the meeting. The Muslim group had been suppressed by Mr. Mubarak, and Bush administration officials believed it was involved in terrorist activities. It renounced violence years ago. Several times, two other attendees said, White House staff members said that Mr. Obama believed that Egyptian politics needed to encompass ‘nonsecular’ parties: diplomatic-speak for the Muslim Brotherhood.”
The Muslim Brotherhood’s stated mission is as follows:
“Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. The Qur’an is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.”According to a blue-ribbon group of national security experts that include former CIA Director James Woolsey, former Delta Force commander Lt-Gen (ret) Jerry Boykin, and former Defense Dept. official Frank Gaffney, a group convened by the Center for Security Policy and called ”Team B-II”:
“The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in Egypt in 1928. Its express purpose was two-fold: (1) to implement shariah worldwide, and (2) to re-establish the global Islamic State (caliphate). Therefore, al Qaeda and the MB have the same objectives. They differ only in the timing and tactics involved in realizing them.”Meanwhile, Mohammed ElBaradei continues to prove he is a wolf in sheep’s clothing by continuing to deny that the Muslim Brotherhood is an extremist Radical group intent on building an Islamic caliphate. Instead, he says they are a peaceful group and should be included in national politics in Egypt just like evangelical Christians are including in the U.S. and Orthodox Jews in Israel.
In an interview picked up by Politics Daily, ElBaradei “said the Muslim Brotherhood, which had the largest organized opposition to the government, did not pose the threat of turning Egypt into another Iran.
‘This is totally bogus,’ ElBaradei said. ‘They are no way extremists. They are no way using violence. They are not a majority of the Egyptian people. They will not be more than maybe 20 percent of the Egyptian people. You have to include them like, you know, new evangelicals, you know, groups in the U.S., like the orthodox Jews in Jerusalem.’”
Related Links
Obama’s Brotherhood Moment - FrontPageMagazine.com (Robert Spencer)
Muslim Brotherhood says Jordan's new PM must step down - AP
Obama quietly builds ties with Muslim Brotherhood - WorldNetDaily (Aaron Klein)
Egyptians want more Islam in politics - poll - Reuters
Egypt protests: Israel watches anxiously - BBC
Obama Is Failing on Egypt - FOX News
Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, Etc. - Moriel Ministries (Jacob Prasch)