The Montreal Gazette

Tariq Ramadan, the darling of the world Islamist establishment is back in Montreal. This time however, the Swiss scholar who usually camouflages his Islamist agenda under the niqab of ambivalent doublespeak, is going to do away with ambiguity that allows him to escape serious scrutiny.

Until now, Ramadan has cleverly deflected allegations of his affiliation to the Muslim Brotherhood by arguing that it was his grandfather, Hassan Albanna who founded the Brotherhood, not him. And that he cannot be held responsible for his grandfather’s philosophy or his father’s actions who too was a brotherhood operative.

However, this time Tariq Ramadan is being hosted in Montreal by an organization that makes no secret of its affiliation with the ideology of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood–The Muslim Association of Canada (MAC).

MAC says on its website that its “roots can be traced to the Islamic revival of the early 20th century, culminating in the movement of the Muslim Brotherhood.” If the reader is left with any doubt about MAC’s links with the Muslim Brotherhood, their website makes it abundantly clear:

“MAC adopts and strives to implement Islam . . . as understood in its contemporary context by the late Imam, Hassan Albanna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood.”

One has to marvel at the audacity of MAC to endorse Hassan Albanna in Canada and to promote the man’s call to jihad and martyrdom. Albanna claimed, “Jihad is obligatory on every Muslim,” and that martyrdom in the name of Allah is better than life on earth.

Tariq Ramadan has so far deflected criticism of his Muslim Brotherhood agenda by claiming he cannot be his grandfather’s keeper. According to Ramadan his own ideas are very different from those of the Muslim Brothers. But are they?

The French socialist writer Yves Coleman suggests otherwise. In an article titled, “40 reasons why Tariq Ramadan is a reactionary bigot,” Mr. Coleman highlight the Islamists doublespeak. He writes:

“When asked what he thinks about the political ideas of his grandfather, Ramadan is unable to express precise criticisms, “Hassan al-Banna has resisted colonization and founded schools, but he has also used slogans which could be wrongly understood, and structured an organization whose rules and mechanisms have sometimes suppressed reflection and initiative.” Do you understand what he means ?”

No matter how one tries to corner Ramadan, like a slippery eel, he manages to slide away from any grip. For example, in 1998 Ramadan wrote a foreword to a collection of fatwas by the Muslim Brotherhood cleric Yusuf al Qaradawi.

According to this book, a husband, “has the right to forbid his wife to visit another woman, if he thinks this visit may cause a prejudice to his wife, his children or his marital life”, and a “woman should not take the initiative to talk to men she does not know”. A woman, “should not play with children who are dancing”. And the book goes on with themes like, “Should a Muslim woman use a credit card?” Or, “Should she cut her hair without her husband’s authorization?” And this book declares abortion illegal.

When Ramadan was asked about this foreword and his “deep respect” for such a reactionary jihadi theologian, his longwinded answer left the reader simply unable to understand him. Ramadan said:

“I quote [Qaradawi’s work] when I find it interesting. I also express criticisms or distance myself from some of his positions, which can be explained by the fact that he does not live in Western society. He develops social, political and geostrategic analyses which belong to him, and which I don’t always share.”

As recent as February this year, the same Sheik Qaradawi published a call to Muslim Canadians through the Arabic language monthly magazine in Calgary Al-Ummah to convert non-Muslims to Islam, reminding them that such an effort was not a bed of roses. The magazine carried a message from the newly formed “League of Al Qaradawi disciples,” in the Qatari capital Doha. In the message to his followers, the league says:

“The sheikh [Qaradawi] advised his brothers and followers to set up a “Dawa” campaign [to convert non-Muslims to Islam]. He added that the path of “Dawa” is not strewn with flowers and perfumes, but sometimes with corpses and blood.”

Well, tomorrow evening Tariq Ramadan will get a chance to explain his association with the Muslim Brotherhood, sheik Qaradawi and whether he is willing to distance himself from the doctrine of armed jihad that his grandfather and the MAC honour in Canada. Perhaps he may even want to explain the notion of “blood and corpses” that Qaradawi invokes.

Ramadan reflects the new sophisticated arm of the worldwide Islamist movement, which sees the West as the right place to wage a cultural and intellectual jihad. It preys on Muslim youth who are tired of the old guard; men in beards and long frocks, frothing as they denounce the evil West. The new technique is to undermine the West from within, like parasites and termites, with the host society never knowing what hit it, until it is too late. UK is one example.

I close with the words of French Muslim journalist Mohamed Sifaoui that every Canadian and Quebecer must pay heed to:

“Tariq Ramadan is an Islamist. He is among those who want political Islam, the European version of the Muslim Brotherhood, to infiltrate institutions, society, associations, parties, the media and so on, in order to pressure these same societies, to ‘reform’ them from inside, to Islamize them or re-Islamize them, the better to pervert them, to progressively bring them to accept a medieval vision of the Muslim religion.”

And as a Muslim Pakistani-Canadian, I have this message for Tariq Ramadan:

Brother Tariq, your father Said Ramadan came to my birthplace Pakistan in 1948 as a Muslim Brotherhood emissary and was instrumental in turning a secular Muslim country into a hotbed of Islamic extremism. I will not let the son of Said Ramadan come to my adopted home Canada and do the same, without a fight. Your Islamist father ruined my birthplace; I will not let you ruin the place where I will die.

© Copyright (c) The Montreal Gazette

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