Brother Tariq: The Doublespeak of Tariq Ramadan
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Violence? What violence?
Tariq Ramadan vehemently denies that his grandfather had anything to do with the ever-increasing recourse to violence in the name of Islam. In his eyes, Hassan al-Banna is "by no means the `father' ofthat `modern Islamism characterized by violent demonstrations and simplistic, obtuse anti-Western prejudice."52 Listening to him, one tends to forget that al-Banna founded a movement that intended to raise high the flag of Islam by whatever means, even if this meant "death on the road to God": "Despite the portrait given of him by the British colonizers (who, in Egypt and elsewhere, have always accused their opponents of the worst violence and the most horrible crimes) al-Banna never killed anyone or arranged for a political assassination," declared Ramadan in Questioning Islam53-even at the cost of escalating from revisionism to negationism.
Hassan al-Banna was quite explicit in his praise for the armed jihad that he considered to be the highest form of courage. In 1940, he described, for the benefit of the Muslim Brotherhood, what holy war entailed: "What I mean by holy war (jihad) is the duty that must be obeyed until the day of resurrection and which God's messenger sets down in these words .... The first stage in the sacred war is to expel evil from one's own heart; the highest stage is armed combat in the service of God. The intermediate stages are waging war with one's voice, one's pen, and one's hand, and by words oftruth addressed to unjust authorities."54 This glorification of armed combat as the supreme degree of the jihad was not a vain formula. In the months that followed, the Brotherhood decided to create a secret armed section, the Special Organization. Its mission was to prepare a selected number of militants for armed resistance. Tariq Ramadan does not deny the fact, but he describes it as a way of preparing for self-defense, an understandable concern when they were up against the British, who might well decide "to physically elim inate their opponents"-or in case "they refused, after repeated urgings, to leave the country."55 The truth of the matter is that the Special Organization was primarily engaged in sending militants to fight in Palestine. Even before the creation of Israel in 1947, the Brotherhood sent armed squads to track down the Jewish immigrants. Tariq Ramadan takes pride in recounting these events: Al-Banna provided assistance to the Palestinians by sending them an advisor and a specialist in military training, raising funds to buy weapons, and setting up training camps that he ran jointly with members of the Special Organization. Volunteers came to Palestine in groups to support the resistance."56 Later on, another armed group in Palestine was to claim close links to the Brotherhood-Hamas. Its very existence suffices to refute the idea that the Brotherhood's ideology has nothing violent or fanatic about it. But Ramadan takes pains to explain that, in Palestine, violence has nothing violent about it, since it is legitimate: "Hassan al-Banna was opposed to violence and approved of the use of arms only in Palestine as a way of resisting Zionist colonialism. "57
Tariq Ramadan was well aware of the fact that his grandfather had called for a jihad, but he vindicated him by explaining that the call was strictly limited to situations of "legitimate defense" or "resistance in the face ofinjustice"58- two criteria that are highly subjective. On this basis, violence was legitimate when it was a question of facing up to Nasser, just as it was in opposing British occupation. Or just as it will be every time that any obstacle threatens to block the Muslim Brotherhood's quest for domination. Ramadan is brazen enough to claim that the association has never been responsible for acts of violence. Yet in March 1948, for example, a judge was assassinated for having condemned a Muslim Brother. And on December 28 of the same year, before al-Banna's death, the Brotherhood claimed responsibility for the assassination of Prime Minister Nuqrashi Pasha.59 These deaths could not have occurred without the Guide's knowledge.
Hassan al-B anna had, on occasion, barred activists who were in too much of a hurry to go into action, as he did in 1938-39, not because he repudiated the idea of an armed jihad, but because he felt the time was not ripe. During this period, his movement was gaining ground among the people. He was intent on consolidating his political influence, and therefore sought legitimacy. If the Brotherhood were to be condemned for illegal acts, for assassinations or for setting off riots, it would disrupt the evolution of his campaign. In 1948, the Brotherhood went too far; another assassination tipped the scales and the organization was dissolved by military decree. On November 15, a demonstration organized by the Brotherhood to honor their "martyrs" degenerated into a riot, in which two British officers were killed in their jeep. Those in charge often lost control of the young activists that they had fanaticized. Despite what Tariq Ramadan has said, the organization that his grandfather created was bound to produce fundamentalists who-when it appeared that indoctrination alone would not suffice-would be tempted, sooner or later, to take up arms in order to achieve their objectives. However, the fact that violence was a last resort is considered by Hassan al-Banna's grandson to be proof of great moderation in their choice of tactics. He turns the cool and calculated radicalism of his grandfather into something more spiritual. By way of example, he cites one of al-Banna's speeches, in which the latter tells his followers to weigh the pros and cons of using force carefully, but to take responsibility for whatever course is deemed necessary. "The Muslim Brotherhood will use force only as a last resort, when there is no other choice, and when they are convinced that they have achieved total faith and union. And if they must employ force, they will be dignified and sincere, they will give advance notice and wait for a reply; only then will they advance with nobility and pride, prepared to bear the consequences of their decision with confidence and calm."6° In other words, the Muslim Brotherhood has no intention of calling for an armed revolution, but they will be forced to do so if they dorit get their own way. This it what Tariq Ramadan, fascinated by the rhetoric, calls the Muslim Brotherhood's "clear perception."
An army of martyrs
It scarcely comes as a surprise, then, that, armed with such "clear perception," certain Brothers should have called for an armed jihad once they realized that victory by propaganda alone was not to be theirs. The death of alBanna served to make them even more radical. He was shot dead on February 12, 1949, coming out of the headquarters of the Association of Young Muslims, where he had just taken part in a "reconciliation meeting" with the government in power-that is to say, the throne. The Brothers immediately denounced it as a political murder. Tariq Ramadan even takes it a step further: "The assassination of Hassan al-Banna was planned jointly by the British, the French, and the Americans."', It is hard to imagine the three powers reaching a common agreement on this assassination at a time when the independence movements and the communists were of far greater concern to the Americans and the British than the Islamic movements, but Ramadan's version has the advantage of making al-Banna a martyr not only in the struggle against the colonizers, but in the struggle against all Western powers. In Egypt, the death of al-Banna was taken as proof of the fact that coming to power via the institutional route was impossible. It was therefore necessary to advance to the next stage. Shortly before death put an end to his career, al-Banna himself had predicted that the Brothers were going to have to enter this second, far more radical phase. Every time Tariq Ramadan evokes al-Banna's speech, which his father had heard with his own ears, his voice cracks. He quotes al-Banna almost word for word in his lecture: "I want to read this passage to you, it will take up some of our time, but you must listen to it because he [al-Banna] has a clear premonition of what will happen after his death." In his speech, the Guide warns his companions: once their true objectives are revealed, they must be prepared to withstand the counterattack. "I want to be honest with you; your message is not widely known, but once it becomes known, once they realize what your objectives and your aims are, then you will encounter determined opposition and they will be relentless in their efforts to stop you." The rest is incredible. Hassan al-Banna gives a list of the misfortunes that await the Muslim Brotherhood-a list that amounts to a litany of the injustices and slanders to
come:
Governments will rise up against you and attempt to confine your sphere of action by blocking you in any way they can. Usurpers will stop at nothing to keep you from growing stronger and will seek to extinguish the light that your call sends out. To do so they will utilize ineffectual governments and will promote immorality; they will put these impotent governments under intense pressure and submit you to humiliation and hardship. They will contaminate your message by spreading infamous rumors and unjust suspicions, and make use ofyour slightest failing to portray you in despicable terms, relying on their superior power, their money, and their influence. No doubt you will then be caught up in the cycle of experience and adversity. You will be arrested, imprisoned, deported, and tortured.,
The most surprising thing is not that Hassan al-Banna was able to predict that his plan to subjugate the world under Islamist totalitarianism was going to provoke adverse reactions, but that his grandson should consider these reactions to be profoundly unjust! Tariq Ramadan, who claims to be non-violent and who denies having any connection with the Brotherhood, makes use of al-Banna's speech in the courses he gives for his followers as if it were an arcane last will and testament, proving that his grandfather knew, through divine intuition, of all the misfortunes that were-most unjustly-to strike him and his brothers.
Those close to him, and in particular my father, were in the habit of saying: "But what was wrong with what we were doing? I didn't understand what he [al-Banna] was getting at-we were calling for reform, we were doing social work and he was talking to us about the gallows" .... In fact, he knew that his non-violence and his pursuit of deep-rooted reform were more dangerous than any kind of radicalism or revolution.63
One thing is certain: alBanna could continue with his deadly, fundamentalist liberty-denying work without having to call openly for a jihad. On the other hand, one is left speechless when Tariq Ramadan asserts that the Muslim Brotherhood did nothing to provoke a crackdown. In his eyes, the Brotherhood's turn to radicalism was not the consequence of their ideology, but was due solely to the fact that they encountered resistance: "The radicalization of segments of the Muslim Brotherhood was the consequence and not the cause of Nasser's repression," he explained to the press.64 It is time to take a closer look at the historical record.
Al-Banna's death left the Muslim Brotherhood disorganized and divided. Some were in favor of continuing at the same pace, others wanted to speed things up. The Secret Organization was supposed to have been dissolved. In actual fact, it continued to exist and even served as a back-up force for the military putsch launched on July 23, 1952 by army officers headed by General Neguib and Gamal Abdel Nasser. One ofthe officers' emissaries, Anwar Sadat, met frequently with al-Banna to try to reach an agreement on a joint program, but without success. The officers were mistrustful, and suspected that the Muslim Brotherhood was playing a double game with the king.65 Contact was re-established only after al-Banna's death. From then on, Sadat and other members ofthe Revolutionary Command Committee (RCC) developed close links with the Brotherhood. It was even rumored that Nasser himself had been one of their militants. One thing is certain: both Nasser and the officers sought the support of all the mass movements-be they communist or the Muslim Brotherhood-that could help in organizing a popular uprising that would legitimate their seizure of power. The Islamists, therefore, joined in with the growing number of Cairo students who were staging demonstrations in support of the general's coup d'etat. But straight away things broke down. The Brothers wanted to be rewarded for their contribution: they asked the officers to set up a judicial system based entirely on the sharia, intimating, with their habitual rhetorical skill, that this would be the sole means of creating a fair balance between the benefits and penalties promised by Islam. Nasser was disconcerted by their demands. For a while, he tried to go along with them by appointing a number of their leaders to key posts; but they were never satisfied. Sayyid Qutb, in charge of the Brotherhood's propaganda, refused, in particular, to back the "Rally," the alliance that was to serve as Nasser's single party. Not that Qutb objected to a single-party system, which al-Banna himself had approved of, simply, he accepted the idea of a single party if-and only if-it served an Islamist government. Nasser thus found himself in the very same position as the Arab governments which, years later, were unsure how to stem the rise of the Islamists. After having made a good number of concessions, he concluded that it was not possible to negotiate with the fundamentalists. As early as 1954, he explained: "I have met several times with the Supreme Guide of the Brotherhood, who overwhelmed me with his demands. The thing he first asked for was for the government to ordain that women be veiled. Subsequently he made other demands, such as closing the cinemas and the theaters and other things as well that would make life gloomy and sinister. It was, of course, impossible to do such things."66 Other evidence, emanating from the Brothers themselves, points to the same conclusion: the Brothers wanted to establish an Islamist regime. Nothing else would do. Nasser was prepared to make use of Islam in order to consolidate his power base, but his social project was nonetheless far more modern. On the other hand, he can hardly be described as an outstanding democrat. After having survived a period of intense colonialism, Egypt saw its future played out in an aggressive confrontation between nationalist dictators and fanatics. The nationalists were to win the first battle. Eight days after the signing of the Anglo-Egyptian treaty that the Muslim Brotherhood's Guide had denounced, a Brother fired eight shots at Nasser, who survived unscathed. The Brotherhood claimed that it was a set-up. At any rate, the failed assassination attempt resulted in the dissolution of the movement on October 29, 1954. From then on, Nasser embarked on a policy of bloody repression that made of the Brothers "an army of martyrs" in Olivier Carre's terms. Between 1954 and 1970, several thousand Muslim Brothers were arrested, imprisoned, tortured and, in certain cases, executed. They were not the only ones. Nasser's repression was also to take a heavy toll of the communists, the socialists, and the Wafdists, but the Brothers were the only ones to make use of their martyrdom as a posteriori justification of their own violence. Among them, Sayyid Qutb, the second prominent leader of the movement after al-Banna, called openly for an armed jihad and for the assassination of the "apostate tyrants."
Sayyid Qutb "initiates a perceptible shift... "
Sayyid Qutb is the theoretician that most Islamists engaged in terrorist acts consider their mentor. His career parallels that of al-Banna: he was born in the same year and also studied to be a schoolteacher. His hatred of what was modern stemmed not from experience with city life, but from an encounter with American society: he spent two and a half years in the United States as a trainee teacher. Before that, he published several books in which he tried to reconcile socialism and Islam, books such as La justice en Islam [Islamic Justice]. On his return, he published a book that was decidedly more Islamist and anti-capitalist than his previous works: Le Combat entre l'Islam et le capitalisme [The Struggle between Islam and Capitalism]: "Let us not be dupes of the struggle between the East and the West, which gives every appearance of being hard-fought and bitter. Both of them have in common a materialistic philosophy of life .... The real struggle is between Islam on the one hand, and the East plus the West on the other. 1167
Qutb joined the Brotherhood movement in 1951, and quickly rose in the hierarchy until he was put in charge of propaganda. He became one of the most prominent leaders after al-Banna's death, and therefore one of the first to be imprisoned when Nasser unleashed his repressive campaign against the Brothers. It was from prison that his influence was to spread more than ever. He was released and re-imprisoned several times. Each time, despite being tortured, he vehemently denied intending to conspire against Nasser. Once back in his cell, however, he set to work on another book, Signes de pistes [Trail Markers], in which he called in no uncertain terms for Nasser-whom he called an apostate-to be overthrown: "The present governments of the Muslims are in a state of apostasy. They feed at the table set ou
t for them by the imperialists, be they Crusaders, Communists or Zionists .... Apostasy must be eliminated even if it is not strong enough to wage war."68 Qutb described Egyptian society as living in a state of jahiliyya, the term used in the Koran to describe polytheist and pre-Islamic barbarity. The cult of Nasser was, according to him, but a new form of idolatry. He incited the Brothers to resort to any means in order to put an end to such decadence: "The establishment of an Islamic state is a categorical obligation." And he added: "If such a state can only be established by means of war, then war becomes our duty."69
Qutb was hanged on August 26, 1966, thus becoming the second martyr of the Brotherhood. His political testament spread like wildfire. A series of murders followed. The two most important, those that have changed the course of history and for which we are still paying the price today, were the assassination of the Algerian President Boudiaf on June 29, 1992 and the assassination of Anwar Sadat in October 1981. In both cases, the killers claimed to have been inspired by Qutb. Sadat had, however, established a truce with the Muslim Brotherhood and released most of them from prison, but he made the mistake of establishing diplomatic relations with Israel. One of the members of the group that had plotted Sadat's execution, an Islamist engineer, had brought out a book in which he called for the execution of "the apostates of Islam, who have fed at the table set out by the Zionists and the imperialists." 7°