The Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy Institute for Policy and Strategy Strategies of Muslim Brotherhood Ideologues Dr. Israel Altman Submitted to: DOD/ONA Islamist Strategies Project Institute for Policy and Strategy, Herzliya Hudson Institute, Washington DC Project Leader: Dr. Shmuel Bar May 1, 2007 Content Executive Summary............................................................................................................ 1 Shaikh Yusuf al-Qaradhawi................................................................................................ 7 Introduction......................................................................................................................... 7 The Islamic State................................................................................................................. 7 Apostasy and Takfir.......................................................................................................... 10 On the Shi’ah .................................................................................................................... 11 Jihad .................................................................................................................................. 13 Confronting Christianity................................................................................................... 15 The Global Islamic Movement ......................................................................................... 16 Muslims in Western States and Societies ......................................................................... 20 Hasan al-Turabi and the Sudanese Muslim Brotherhood ................................................. 23 Introduction....................................................................................................................... 23 Renewal of Jurisprudence................................................................................................. 23 The Islamic Order and the Islamic State........................................................................... 24 The Political System ......................................................................................................... 24 Non-Muslim Minorities .................................................................................................... 25 The Status of Women........................................................................................................ 26 A Territorial State or the Pan-Islamic One? ..................................................................... 26 The Strategies of the Struggle........................................................................................... 27 Rashid al-Ghannusi and the Tunisian Al-Nahdhah Party ................................................. 33 Introduction....................................................................................................................... 33 The Global View: Muslims and the West......................................................................... 34 The Movement’s Strategy................................................................................................. 36 Formal Objectives............................................................................................................. 36 Participation in Secular Democracy.................................................................................. 38 Between Da’wah and Siyasah........................................................................................... 38 Violence and Jihad............................................................................................................ 39 The Islamic State............................................................................................................... 41 Shura and democracy........................................................................................................ 41 Pluralism ........................................................................................................................... 42 The ‘Ulama`...................................................................................................................... 43 The Nation-State and Islamic Unity ................................................................................. 44 Muslims in the West ......................................................................................................... 44 Tariq Ramadhan................................................................................................................ 46 Integrated, Not Minorities................................................................................................. 46 Muslim Identity in Western Societies............................................................................... 47 Social Involvement and Political Participation................................................................. 48 Summary of Key Issues .................................................................................................... 50 The MB and the West ....................................................................................................... 50 Jihad .................................................................................................................................. 51 The Role of Muslims in the West ..................................................................................... 54 Responding to Western Detractors of Islam ..................................................................... 56 The Islamic State- Religious or Non-Religious? .............................................................. 56 Democracy and Pluralism in the Islamic State ................................................................. 57 Alternation of Power......................................................................................................... 59 The Islamic State- Territorial or Supra-National? ............................................................ 59 The way to power: Da’wah, Siyasah, Inqilab? ................................................................. 60 Forming Political Partnerships and alliances.................................................................... 62 Religious Minorities: Dhimmis or Citizens? .................................................................... 62 The Shi’ah......................................................................................................................... 63 Takfir and Apostasy.......................................................................................................... 63 Implications of recent Electoral Achievements ................................................................ 64 Executive Summary Most MB organizations, those in Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Palestine among them, are led not by highly authoritative spiritual leaders or outstanding religious scholars (‘ ulama ) but by politicians-organizers. In forming their ideological and political orientation they are influenced by or take guidance from several highly authoritative legal thinkers whose presence overarches the Arab and Muslim worlds. Shaikh Yusuf al-Qaradhawi is the most influential mainstream legal authority of the MB. Highly popular around the Muslim world, his legal opinions and rulings cover almost every important aspect of Muslim political, economic, social and cultural life. He embodies the classical Ikhwani School along the lines of al-Banna’s tradition, though he shares some elements with the new Ikhwan. Hasan al-Turabi and Rashid al-Ghannushi are both new Ikhwan and represent a different type of leader: Both of them are simultaneously political figures, founders and leaders of political organizations, and authoritative legal scholars in their own right. Turabi was even in power for several years. Tariq Ramadhan represents the third MB generation and the new reality of Western Muslims, whose origins and struggle are not in the old Muslim lands in Asia and Africa but in Western Europe and North America. All Ikhwani thinkers uphold the classical Ikhwani position which sees an existential struggle between Islam and the West , where the MB’s role is to liberate the Muslim lands from western domination in all its forms through jihad and da’wah. Al- Qaradhawi, like al-Banna and Sayyid Qutb, sees the West as inferior to Islam and Western civilization as decadent, lewd and drowned in materialism, and seeking to Christianize Muslims around the world. He sees the MB as a comprehensive Islamic movement working to establish Allah’s religion on earth; to convey Islam’s call to all the people in general and to the Muslims in particular; to liberate the Muslim homeland from any non-Islamic rule; to assist Muslim minorities everywhere; to seek to unite all Muslims in one nation; and to erect the Islamic state which will implement Islam’s rules. The presence of large Muslim communities in the West has led those thinkers who see those communities as their constituencies, or who belong to them, to adapt to the new needs the traditional classification of the world into d ar al-harb , d ar al-‘ahd and d ar al-Islam. Rashid al-Ghannushi went the farthest when he qualified the West as dar al- Islam: He argued that Western states have reached such levels of liberty and tolerance that a Muslim can live in them in safety and can safely and openly practice Islam, which, according to the Hanafi School of jurisprudence, are the criteria which qualify a land