2024-03-16 17:49:17
The Brotherhood organization is facing difficult pressures within Europe related to the continued restrictions and controls on its activity and the drying up of its funding sources. It began years ago from Austria, then France, and finally Britain, which the organization considers its main stronghold.
On Thursday, London placed the Brotherhood at the top of the list of extremism, according to the criteria of the new government definition of extremism.
The new definition states that extremism “is the promotion or reinforcement of an ideology based on violence, hatred or intolerance, which aims to destroy fundamental rights and freedoms, undermine or replace Britain’s liberal parliamentary democracy, or deliberately create an environment for others to achieve those results.”
Regarding the possible effects of the decision on the future of the organization, Dr. Sameh Ismail, an academic and researcher specializing in political Islam and terrorism, told Sky News Arabia:
- The British decision to place restrictions on the Muslim League, which is affiliated with the Brotherhood, will have a significant impact on the group.
- These steps will restrict the organization’s movement within Europe.
- This effect will be an additional restriction on the organization’s movement, which has been greatly affected since 2020 with the spread of Covid and the prevention of gatherings inside mosques, which in turn negatively affected the fundraising movement for the organization.
- The organization’s financial appropriations were greatly negatively affected. Additionally, security confrontations succeeded in several European countries, such as Operation Ramses in Austria.
- And the ongoing confrontations with the organization in France, all of which led to reducing the organization’s activities within Europe and placing strict control on its movements.
- The security confrontation succeeded in controlling the religious arms of the Brotherhood and reducing funding sources, as well as monitoring the mosques that the Brotherhood considers to be primary hotspots of spread.
How does the Brotherhood deal with the restrictions?
The confrontation seems to have moved to Britain, which the Brotherhood considers their main incubator, according to Ismail, and then to other European regions, which prompted the European Muslim Council, the Brotherhood arm founded by the Brotherhood leader Yusuf al-Qaradawi, to begin a counter-confrontation by employing programs to confront Islamophobia and oppression. And also the recent crisis in Gaza in order to serve the organization’s interests and provide alternative financial resources for it.
In general, the organization is facing increasing pressure in most European countries, Russia, the Balkan countries, and also Turkey, which has led to a state of paralysis in the organization’s movement, and the future of the organization in Europe has become ambiguous and ambiguous, especially with the possibilities of Donald Trump returning to the White House.
The Brotherhood has now begun to search for safe havens in Malaysia, Singapore, Pakistan, or even Iran.
What are the motives for the British decision?
Muhammad Mukhtar Qandil, a researcher specializing in extremism and terrorism affairs at the Trends Research Center for Research and Consultations, refutes the motives for the British decision as follows:
First, Britain’s redefinition of extremism must be read in its context, which is the escalation of hate crimes against Jews and Muslims after the events of October 7 and the Hamas attack on Israel.
This definition is in line with British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s previous statements that Islamic extremists and far-right extremists are deliberately undermining democracy in Britain.
Qandil believes that, theoretically, some may exaggerate by saying that classifying groups linked to the Brotherhood carries within it a classification of the group.
However, a distinction must be made between the classification of groups supported or linked to the group, and the classification of the Muslim Brotherhood as a whole.
According to Qandil, Britain and some other European countries view the Muslim Brotherhood as a heterogeneous bloc, and for a cross-border group or organization to be classified as an extremist or terrorist organization, it must be a homogeneous bloc, which carries some logic.
Qandil believes that the British redefinition will not stop the activity of these organizations inside Britain, but rather the provision of government financial support to them will stop, while their activity and right to demonstrate will continue, even if their evaluation is proven to be extremist according to the new definition.
Qandil notes that the greatest benefit from redefining and labeling certain organizations linked to the Brotherhood as extremist groups is that it may contribute to reducing the popularity of their activities and demonstrations.
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