According to The New York Times, and confirmed by the White House, President Trump is considering an order that would slap the Muslim Brotherhood with the “foreign terrorist organization” stamp, allowing the administration to hit the group with sanctions and other punishing restrictions.
The idea of making such a designation has been on Trump’s plate since the early days of his presidency, but his recent meeting with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi seems to have intensified the push. Egypt is continually besieged by the Brotherhood and their violence-tinted version of political Islamism. At the meeting, el-Sisi reportedly urged Trump to join Egypt in classifying the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization.
The Times article is full of the usual gloom and doom, but you knew that already. Career professionals this, strained diplomatic relations that, the whole nine. Trump could designate The New York Times the greatest newspaper in the history of humanity, and they would find a way to make it sound like the worst idea ever conceived by a president. Come to think of it, that article pretty much writes itself, so maybe it’s not the best example.
It would be more difficult for a Times writer to explain how the Muslim Brotherhood is NOT an Islamic terrorist organization. Certainly, they don’t directly carry out bombings and attacks (anymore), but their dirty money and influence is all over violent terrorist groups who do. They were founded in violence, and they are, to this day, driven by an ideology that calls for Islam to “dominate and impose its law on all nations.” Its founder, Hassan al-Banna, was particularly fond of a guy named Adolf Hitler. Thought he had some bang-up ideas.
The Muslim Brotherhood’s influence inside the U.S. is limited, but its tentacles can be found in some of the most prominent Islamic mainstream groups. For instance, the Council on American-Islamic Relations is little more than an outgrowth of the Brotherhood. It’s not clear what slapping this designation against the Brotherhood would do to outfits like CAIR (or to supporters like Rep. Ilhan Omar). We wouldn’t mind finding out, though.
Of course, the soft-brained liberals can only see this as Islamophobia.
Jordan Denari Duffner, the author of a book called “How Loving Islam Made Me a Better Catholic,” tweeted: “Getting Americans to consider the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist org has long been a strategy of anti-Muslim activists, who then use the idea to smear a vast range of US Muslim grps.”
Duffner did not explain why, if this was an anti-Muslim strategy, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain have already classified the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization. Guess it’s not one of those things you’re supposed to think about too deeply.
