The Ikhwani have always stressed that they do not want to take power but rather wish that the ruler they are living under would apply Islamic laws correctly. This may in part be a reflection of the fact that the Ikhwan’s leadership has tended to come from the professional classes and has therefore been less inclined to engage in violent behaviour than some of the more radical groups.
The Brotherhood has emphasised this pacific stance particularly forthrightly in recent years, especially since 9/11, and has done its utmost to distance itself from any connection with violence. Former Murshid, Mehdi Akef, has explained that the Ikhwan only co-operates with other Islamist movements if they have the same comprehensive understanding of Islam as the Brotherhood, if they use the principle of shura and if ‘violence is not one of their methods’.8
Seizing on the radicalisation discourse that began doing the rounds in the West after 9/11, the brothers have even gone so far as to assert that they can teach people the ‘correct’ version of Islam, thereby decreasing support for more militant alternatives.
Yet whilst the Ikhwan is keen to present itself as a peaceful organisation and has proven itself to be largely pacific, it does have a history of getting involved in violence when the opportunity has presented itself. Right from the outset the concept of violence was enshrined in its famous motto, which remains the maxim today: ‘Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. Qur’an is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.’ At its inception, the Ikhwan attached a far greater importance to the concept of jihad in both its violent and non-violent sense than was the tradition in the Islamic circles of the day. This differentiated it from other Islamic societies and organisations.9 Moreover, the movement began engaging in violent acts during the very early days of its existence under Hassan al-Banna, through the infamous Nizam al-Khass. In the 1980s the Syrian Ikhwan had its own particular experience with violence, as explained in detail in Chapter Two. In addition, the brothers also believe that fighting jihad against a foreign occupier is a religious duty and have openly supported the resistance in places like Palestine or Iraq.
Moreover, the Brotherhood has a complex ideological relationship to the use of violence. Whilst its members broadly reject the idea of fighting against their own regimes, they do not entirely disown scholars such as Sayyid Qutb, who was one of the early proponents of violent struggle against un-Islamic Muslim governments in the contemporary context and whose ideas radicalised a generation and more. They might refute some of Qutb’s ideas but there is still a certain pride in him and they consider him as one of their most important martyrs. This gives the impression that there is still an ambiguity in their discourse on violence and that they do not come down on one side or the other.
Moreover, for all their refutations of al-Qa‘ida and terrorism, there have been occasions when such assertions appear unconvincing. For example, in June 2006 a group of Jordanian Ikhwani Islamic Action Front (IAF) deputies caused controversy when they attended the funeral of the Jordanian al-Qa‘ida in Iraq commander, Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, and paid condolences to his family. Zaki Bani Irsheid, head of the IAF, claimed that this was simply ‘part of our Muslim customs towards the family and it has no political dimensions’;10 nonetheless, the delegation’s actions provoked outrage in Jordan and beyond. Whilst this stance clearly represents the exception rather than the rule and many Ikhwani would reject the brutality of Zarqawi’s methods, the Brotherhood’s flexible approach and willingness to accept those with a range of stances invite suspicion. Over the years, this flexibility has meant that the Brotherhood has inevitably accommodated and absorbed a number of more militant elements within its ranks. Whilst in the past such differences of approach were hardly noticed outside of their own communities or societies, in the post 9/11 world the Ikhwani have had to think twice about how such elements might affect the image of their movement as a whole.
Sayyid Qutb and the Ideology of Violence
Although the Brotherhood was accused of perpetrating a number of acts of political violence during the days of Hassan al-Banna, it was through the figure of Sayyid Qutb that the movement really became associated with the ideology of violence. As explained in Chapter One Qutb emerged as a scholar at a time when relations between the Ikhwan and the Nasserite state were fast deteriorating. Hopes that the new regime could find a way to accommodate the Brotherhood had disappeared; as the era of imprisonment, torture and execution was ushered in, Qutb responded with a major shift in ideology that was to have enormous impact not just on the Ikhwan, but on the evolution of radical Islamist movements across the board.
Qutb was born in 1906 in a small village in Asyut and migrated to Cairo in search of education and employment as a young man. There is a well-known story about Qutb visiting America and being disgusted and radicalised at seeing what he described as a couple making love in a church. Yet his moral anxiety and malaise were already deeply implanted in him before his visit. When he arrived in Cairo he was repulsed by the city, believing that below the surface trappings lay a sick, ugly and miserable face.11 He joined the Ikhwan in 1953 and found himself arrested in the clampdown of 1954 and sentenced to fifteen years hard labour. Due to ill health, he spent much of this time in hospital. There he focused on his writing, which was smuggled out to those Ikhwani on the outside.12
Reflecting his frustration and the suffocating atmosphere of being imprisoned, Qutb’s thinking became increasingly radical. Inspired by the works of Indian scholars Abu Ala Maududi and Abu Hasan al-Nadwi as well as earlier thinkers such as Ibn Taymiyyah, Qutb argued that Egypt was once again in a state of jahiliya (pre-Islamic ignorance). The only way to surpass this was to submit to al-hakimiyya, the total sovereignty of God. In bringing together the al-hakimiyya concept articulated by Maududi and the jahiliya idea espoused by al-Nadwi, Qutb believed he could create a new ideological structure for the Brotherhood.13 As such his ideas constituted a rejection of the modern and a harking back to a morally ‘clean’ and innocent time that had not been sullied by materialism or un-Islamic practices. To achieve this state, one had to get rid of all the polluting non-Islamic influences and to take up the cause of jihad against those who got in the way. Qutb wrote that al-hakimiyya ‘will not be achieved merely by teaching and preaching, for those who inflict the yoke on the necks of the people and who usurp the authority of God on earth will not concede their position through such explanation and sermonising’.14 He was planting the seeds of takfiri (pronouncing others as heathen) thinking in his discourse and making it acceptable to struggle against Muslim leaders and governments, as well as wayward Muslim societies, in order to bring God’s rule to earth.
Qutb’s ideas represented a major shift from the traditional thinking of the Ikhwan and of Hassan al-Banna. While al-Banna viewed the imam or head of state as a civil ruler who takes his consensus from the jama’a, Qutb considered the imam to be a theocratic ruler who takes his authority directly from God. Moreover, whilst al-Banna was not opposed to the principle of the use of force and proved willing to engage in attacks against the colonising forces, he was far less comfortable with the idea of armed struggle against the Egyptian state. This may have been as much about not wishing to bring unnecessary retribution on his movement as it was about principles, given that jihad in its military sense was part of his overall vision for the Ikhwan, but he certainly tried to distance himself from the attacks that were carried out by the Nizam al-Khass against Egyptian targets. Qutb’s uncompromising ideology was far removed from al-Banna’s overriding pragmatism.
Yet Qutb’s ideas touched a chord within many Egyptian Ikhwani who felt betrayed by the fact that they were being abused and repressed by the Nasserite regime that they had pinned their hopes upon and who were increasingly frustrated at the movement’s gradual approach. The fact that Qutb was executed in prison in 1966 brought him the status of martyr and hero and gave him an even greater aura and authenticity. His ideology soon travelled beyond Egypt through figures such as the Syria
n Ikhwani Marwan Hadid, who identified with the feelings of anger and despair articulated by Qutb and who spread Qutb’s writings and ideas inside Syria. Similarly, Qutb ushered in a new era of radicalism within the Jordanian Ikhwan, in particular among the younger generation, something which prompted sudden outward displays of religiosity such as growing beards for men and wearing the hijab for women.15 As explained in Chapter Four, Qutb’s ideas also reached the Ikhwani in Europe, who were hungry for such new thinking. As Ayubi has argued, ‘Qutb’s ideas were to represent the main intellectual influence on the younger, militant Muslim Brotherhood.’16
While Qutb’s radical thinking was making waves in Islamic circles around the world, it also prompted a major crisis within the Brotherhood as the more traditional older generation rejected his new ideas, which rang alarm bells for them. According to Ashur Shamis, some of the brothers who were in prison with Qutb were not happy with his ‘separatist and confrontational’ ideas, believing that they undermined the philosophy of the Brotherhood.17 Yet given his status and importance, it was difficult to argue against him. The Murshid, Hassan al-Hodeibi, initially reacted well to Qutb’s work, declaring that Milestones had vindicated all the hopes he had placed in Qutb, who now embodied ‘the future of the Muslim dawa’.18
However, by the late 1960s al-Hodeibi was becoming increasingly concerned that Qutb was planting the takfiri seed within the Ikhwan. In 1969 he wrote his famous book Du’aa La Qadat (Preachers not Judges), primarily to refute the more militant ideas that were gaining currency within the movement. In the text al-Hodeibi argued against the idea that Egyptian society was in a state of jahiliya, asserting instead that it was in a state of juhl (ignorance) and simply needed to be educated in the tradition of the Ikhwan. Al-Hodeibi also argued against the ideas of Maududi, criticising his al-hakimiyya concept. Although there is a great deal of speculation surrounding this book and whether or not al-Hodeibi was pressured into writing it by the regime, the Ikhwan today uses it to demonstrate that the movement did not take up Qutb’s ideas wholesale.19
Nonetheless, the Ikhwani continue to have an ambiguous relationship to Qutb. They may reject the concept of fighting against the state and Qutb’s more radical ideas, but it seems they cannot relinquish him as a hero. He is considered one of the most important thinkers in the contemporary Islamic movement and as such there is a strong pride in him, all the more poignant because he died for his beliefs. Although there have been successive attempts by the leadership to distance themselves from his ideas – Omar al-Tilimsani in 1982 declared, ‘Sayyid Qutb represented himself alone and not the Muslim Brothers’20 – he continues to command huge reverence and respect within the movement. This even holds true for those of a more moderate bent. As Gilles Kepel has noted of Qutb’s famous work Milestones, ‘The most traditional of Muslim Brethren consider it a simultaneously fascinating and repellent text, some of whose assertions they consider admirable, others beyond the pale.’21
Yet another reason why the Ikhwan is so keen to somehow claim Qutb as its own is because he is essentially the only true scholar that the Ikhwan produced. Of course had he not been executed in 1966, Qutb might have gone on to separate himself from the Brotherhood, given that his ideas were so divergent from the original principles upon which the Ikhwan was founded. But as it stands, he is the only thinker whose ideas have really gone beyond the confines of the movement.
Many Ikhwani have tried to deal with this contradiction by claiming that Qutb’s more radical ideas were misunderstood and taken out of context. Others blame the extreme repression and circumstances that forced him into taking such a radical stance. Some have also sought to give the impression that he abandoned his militancy just before he died. Farid Abdel Khaliq, the former secretary of Hassan al-Banna, was in prison with Qutb just prior to his death. He asserts that Qutb came to regret what he had done and was full of remorse for the pains he had caused the movement.22
Regardless of how one looks at the Ikhwan’s relationship to Qutb, it is undeniable that his teachings ushered in a new wave of more militant thinking which served to radicalise not just the Ikhwan, but a whole generation of young militants. The Ikhwan’s increasingly radical agenda in the 1970s, which sought to better position the movement in its challenge against the regimes of the day, was driven in large part by brothers who had taken up Qutbist ideas and co-ordinated themselves as Organisation 1965. The increased radicalism was also in line with the spirit of the time, itself a response to ongoing disappointment with the nationalist states that were proving even more repressive than their predecessors.
As such, the 1970s were a time of radicalisation during which oppositional politics were increasingly articulated through the discourse of Islam. In the Egyptian case of course the 1970s were also a time when the Ikhwan was bolstered by the cadres from the al-Jama’at al-Islamiya, who were not averse to the principle of violence but concerned only with its timing and usage.23 The Ikhwan may not have taken the more extreme path of the many jihadist groups that began to flourish at this time (and that in some cases, such as al-Takfir wal-Hijra, were offshoots of the Brotherhood), but its whole outlook and discourse became more radical. The Ikhwan was just one of many opposition groups who sought an alternative to the state and a return to the mythical idea of a pure Islamist order, which they believed would act as a salvation to the deep-rooted problems of the day.
The Ikhwan in Afghanistan
Whilst the complexities surrounding Qutb and his ideas created divisions within the Ikhwan, the issue of war in Afghanistan following the Soviet invasion of 1979 was far more straightforward. This is because jihad is considered to be fard al-ayn (religious duty) when Muslims come under attack by an occupying power. The concept is enshrined in Islamic teachings and in the Qur’an. Reformist scholars of the late nineteenth century such as Muhammad Abdu and Rashid Rida, upon whose ideas the Brotherhood was based, argued that whilst peaceful co-existence was the normal state of affairs between Islamic and non-Islamic territories, jihad was still permissible as a defensive position.24 This idea was certainly supported by al-Banna who was equally committed to jihad and who once said ‘The umma is not frightened of death.’25
In the case of Afghanistan, a Muslim country under attack by a ‘godless’ communist force, the religious rulings were clear: fighting against the Soviet presence was considered a moral duty for many Muslims. Moreover, the conflict’s religious legitimacy was bolstered by the many fatwas issued at the time calling on people to join the jihad. Such fatwas were issued not only by individual scholars but also by official religious establishments like Al-Azhar in Cairo.26 Many of the Arab states tacitly supported the cause and some analysts have alleged that the Egyptian regime even released a number of radical Islamists from prison on condition that they continued their jihad in Afghanistan rather than at home.27 Some Algerians have also suggested that the Algerian regime encouraged their nationals to join up: ‘The government also helped send young Algerians to Afghanistan. Saudi Arabia paid for the tickets; they’d go to Mecca and then to Afghanistan.’28
The Ikhwan was as ready as any other group to support the Afghan jihad. Members of the Egyptian Ikhwan had developed ties with Afghan leaders decades before the conflict. During the 1930s the Afghan ambassador to Egypt entrusted the education of his children to the Ikhwan through the circles of Hassan al-Banna. One of the ambassador’s children, Sheikh Haroun al-Mujaddidi, became a well-known Muslim Brother who was imprisoned by Nasser in the 1954 clampdown.29 Relations between Egyptian brothers and Afghan leaders also developed during the 1960s and 1970s.
The brother who was to play perhaps the most crucial role in the Afghan jihad, however, was the Egyptian Kamel Sananiri, who was a key facilitator in the conflict despite being thrown into prison in 1981, where he is believed to have died under torture. A member of the Nizam-al-Khass, Sananiri was one of those who came out of prison in the early 1970s with great aspirations for the Brotherhood as an international movement. He went to Afghanistan shortly afte
r the Soviet invasion with the aim of co-ordinating the various Islamic groups operating there, and spent his time shuttling between Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan to provide a huge logistical support network for the fighters. His role was so great that al-Qa‘ida ideologue Ayman al-Zawahiri paid particular homage to him in his book Knights Under the Prophet’s Banner. Although generally dismissive of the Brotherhood, al-Zawahiri said:
We were preceded to Peshawar by Kamel al-Sananiri, may he rest in peace. We could see that he had left his mark wherever we went. He had played a pioneering role in establishing the hospital where we worked and whenever we met with mujahideen leaders, they would speak of his assistance to them and his efforts to unite them. Although I never met him, his actions and contributions demonstrated his generosity and beneficial services in the cause of God.30
It was Sananiri who first persuaded Sheikh Abdullah Azzam to join the jihad. Azzam had joined the Brotherhood in Palestine at a very young age. After graduating from Sharia College in Damascus in 1966 he spent time in Amman but also in Cairo, where he studied at Al-Azhar and became close to the family of Sayyid Qutb.31 Sananiri met with Azzam in 1980 whilst he was in Saudi Arabia; according to Dr Kamal Helbawy, who was also there at that time, Sananiri asked Azzam what he was doing there.32 Azzam replied that he had been forced out of Jordan and had come to teach in the King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah. Sananiri reportedly told him that rather than stay in Saudi Arabia he should go to work in a university in Pakistan and that whilst there he should give some of his time to the Afghans.
Azzam was clearly persuaded by the Egyptian brother, for he soon found a teaching post at the International Islamic University in Islamabad and began travelling regularly to Peshawar and on occasions into Afghanistan itself. He also began to receive people from the Islamic movement and embarked upon a series of tours to collect money for the cause, including in the US. In 1984 Azzam decided to dedicate all of his time to the Afghan jihad, quitting his post at the university and setting up the famous Maktab al-Khadamat that would provide logistical support for the mujahideen. Azzam would become one of the most iconic Afghan Arabs, dubbed the father of the jihad.
The Muslim Brotherhood Page 19