You have commented 338 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
Middle East
Egypt’s Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya turns on militancy
2003-10-19
Yeah, really. That's what it sez, anyway...
With the publication of two new books, Egypt’s notorious Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya, the group behind the assassination of President Anwar Sadat, has cemented an historic peaceful reformation and launched an assault on Islamic militancy throughout the region. The Egyptian government recently released another 1,000 members of the once-militant organization, which in 1997 killed 58 tourists at a 3,400-year old temple in Luxor. Over 2,000 members of the organization have recently been freed, including three of its top leaders.
I guess their victims aren't dead anymore...
The release of Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya’s leaders will allow them to assume a more public role in combating extremist ideologies, analysts say. Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya’s two recently published books offer wide-reaching condemnations of violence in the name of Islam, and devote considerable space to rebukes of Osama Bin Laden, the Taleban, and Mullah Omar.

Throughout the 20th century Egypt has been the birthplace of militant Islamic ideologies. The Muslim Brotherhood, founded in the 1920s in the Suez Canal town of Ismailiya, would soon spawn similar organizations throughout the Middle East. The Egyptian writer Sayyid Qutb, who was executed by the government in 1966, provided the ideological underpinnings of groups such as Al-Qaeda and Islamic Jihad. Two of the masterminds behind the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks were Egyptian and bin Laden’s top lieutenant Ayman Al Zawahiri, was a Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya recruit.

Many hope that the reformed Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya can export peace, just as it, for years, exported violence. “They have proven that they are capable of doing something, but this time hopefully in a different way and for a different purpose,” said Mohammed Abu Layla, a professor of Islamic Studies at Al-Azhar University.
If that actually happens, maybe it won't be a first, but it won't be anything usual...
The first of the two books, Tafgirat al-Riyadh (The Riyadh Bombings), deals specifically with the recent bombings of foreign housing compounds in Saudi Arabia. The obligation to protect foreign guests is repeatedly stressed in the book. Only the state can declare Jihad and determine whether it is in the interests of all Muslims, Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya writes.
Islamic opinion seems to be split on the subject. Some say only the state can declare jihad, and other say any idiot can, which results in lots of idiots doing so...
In Nahr al-Zikriyat (A River of Memories), Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya’s leaders answer questions that were supposedly asked of them by their followers while in prison from 2001 to 2002. Imprisoned Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya leaders reportedly toured Egyptian prisons convincing their thousands of imprisoned followers to denounce violence as un-Islamic. Over one-third of the book is devoted to Sept. 11, 2001. Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya “considers what happened on Sept. 11, 2001, as a real catastrophe for Islam and for the Muslims and for the Islamic nation,” said Dia Rashwan, an expert on terrorism and political Islam with the Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies. Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya argues that the killing of women, foreigners and old people is wrong, and support their positions with passages from the Koran and the Hadith.

These are the fifth and sixth books Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya has released.
They released four books in January 2002 which were more theoretical than the two most recent books. Among those released from Egyptian prisons in the past two weeks, was Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya leader Karam Zohdi, who spent 22 years in jail for his role in the assassination of Sadat, and the subsequent uprising in the Egyptian city of Assiut. Those familiar with Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya expect Zohdi and other recently freed group leaders to play a public role in combating the ideology of violent Islamic extremism throughout the region. “Many of the region’s violent organizations took their ideas from the Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya,” said Mohammed Salah who, as the Cairo bureau chief for Al-Hayat, has extensive experience with Islamists in Egypt. “Now they have a peaceful role to play and they have more credibility with the other (extremist) organizations.”
Posted by:Fred Pruitt

#1  lobotomies must've taken, huh?
Posted by: Frank G   2003-10-19 6:12:23 PM  

00:00