Editor's Note: This is part two of a two-part column. Read "Banning the Muslim Brotherhood: A Good Start, Part 1" here.
There are many questions surrounding banning the Muslim Brotherhood and designating it and its affiliates as terrorist organizations. What does the designation mean? What impact will it have? And what could be the possible roadblocks ahead? Why has the Muslim Brotherhood not yet been outlawed more broadly, and what needs to be done to do so?
It's critical to expose the avenues that the Muslim Brotherhood has exploited to breach the West. They have been surprisingly successful in identifying weaknesses in the freedoms (which the West celebrates as its strengths) of the West to use against these very countries. This includes infiltration of the highest levels of government and policymakers, the legal system, academia, and the media.
In addition to this, the Brotherhood has a scary and surprisingly vast economic influence, which is also global. A trusted source and expert shared that the Brotherhood is a global network of 300K+ scholars and a global network with "legitimate" front companies that have created their own alternative economy. They then work together to control markets and industries. It is not only college campuses and academia, or the political sphere. They are experts in obtaining soft power and forcing society into the mold they desire.
Leaders and institutions on the Left and the Right are both at least guilty of ignorance, but some are complicit and have their own fingerprints on the Brotherhood's wide expansion.
Two additional Muslim Brotherhood "strengths" have allowed them to invade the West. One is the shape-shifting that it does, distracting those who ought to care by appearing to change or rebrand in name, but not ideology. The other is the Islamic principle of "taqiyya," which proscribes lying to infidels, anyone who is not a Muslim. Between lying, rebranding, and pervasive ignorance, if leaders do not pay attention, the very people and entities meant to be targeted can escape the bans.
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In Israel, the threat is external, but also domestic. For anyone who thinks Israel is an apartheid state, this one fact debunks that notion completely. There is an Israeli Arab political party, Ra'am, which is the Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated party in the Israeli parliament. Under the previous Israeli government, Ra'am was even part of the governing coalition. Following Trump's executive order, they claim to have broken ties with the Islamic movement. They have ostensibly opened their party to Jewish members as well. But is this all just a lie, a big fake-out, to prevent them from getting banned while following the same ideology?
A clear U.S. example is CAIR, the controversial Council on American Islamic Relations, a thinly veiled Muslim Brotherhood outpost with growing influence. Brandishing people as "Islamophobic" is one of its tools, its superpower, to shut down opposition and criticism to its nefarious goals. Americans cower at the thought of being branded as such. But to beat the ban, all CAIR needs to do is rebrand, change its name, and magically, it could be immune.
These are examples of why it's critical to ban the ideology, not just the "chapters" by name. And to apply that ban broadly, even if it means upsetting so-called "allies" like Qatar and Turkey.
As the Brotherhood is banned, it's important that Arab and Islamic countries and institutions that also support the ban step up and fill the void with a moderate ideological alternative. Islam has never had a reformation. Now is the time. If indeed "only" 10 percent of two billion Muslims in the world are extremists, this is the time for the 90 percent to take the reins. If they are not motivated to do so because the Muslim Brotherhood is bad to the core, then this must happen because of the threats they pose to the rest of the Arab and Islamic world. Failure to do so will see a void gleefully filled by other bad actors that claim to have no Brotherhood affiliation but have the same ideology and goals.
Trump's executive order says that within 30 days, the secretary of state and the secretary of the treasury shall "submit a joint report to the president, through the assistant to the president for national security affairs, concerning the designation of any Muslim Brotherhood chapters or other subdivisions, including those in Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt, as foreign terrorist organizations consistent with 8 U.S.C. 1189, and specially designated global terrorists consistent with 50 U.S.C. 1702 and Executive Order 13224." That date has come and gone. This is too urgent a domestic and global issue to let any more time pass. Anyone who cares must encourage their leaders to instill the sharpest and biggest teeth into this ban, as broadly as possible, including Qatar and Turkey, to eliminate the Muslim Brotherhood once and for all.
There are widespread investigations taking place to identify and expose the Brotherhood and its influence, virtually assuring that the issue will not die, and the sooner the Brotherhood dies, the better off we all are. Organizations like the VALOP Group are doing exceptionally hard work at mapping the Muslim Brotherhood networks that exist around the world, and revealing how they hijack economic, social, and political narratives and ecosystems to twist into a new modern form of Sharia-based Islamic rule.
The Genesis 123 Foundation will host a webinar, "Banning the Muslim Brotherhood & the Future of the Middle East," with noted experts Yisrael Ne'eman and Mudar Zahran, on Thursday, January 15, at 8:00 PM Israel time, 1:00 PM ET U.S. Advance registration is required and is free.
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