"Who will stand up and say without equivocation [and declare]: I support the Pope"
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Like the Danish Cartoon insanity earlier this year, the current threats and violence against the Holy Father and Christendom in general have their source in the Muslim Brotherhood, specifically its spiritual leader, Sheik Yusuf Qaradawi. As the London Times notes:
The murderous Muslim Brotherhood was the first out of the blocks, demanding that all Islamic countries cut their ties with the Vatican. The “liberal and moderate” Islamic scholar Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi (pro death penalty for homosexuals, female circumcision, suicide bombings against Jews and other similarly tolerant stuff) has insisted the Pope must apologise. Soon the placards will be out, the effigies, the foam-flecked demonstrators and attacks by adolescent suicidal nutters.
The Brotherhood is still the radical Islamist organization they were when founder Hasan Al-Banna said
He who dies and has not fought (ghaza - literally: raided) and was not resolved to fight, has died a jahiliyah death." No movement can succeed, Banna insists, without this dedicated and unqualified kind of jihad.
The hyper-violent mau-mauing being perpetrated by mostly illiterate, ignorant Muslims, is a reaction manufactured by Qaradawi and his clerical leaders in Islamists mosques all over the world. It serves an important role in the Brotherhood's struggle for greater control of Islamic institutions throughout the Middle East.
Remember, the Brotherhood is still "persecuted" in most Middle Eastern countries. Membership is illegal, and its members are often jailed, their assets are often subject to seizures. I suspect that they are just as threatened by the American presence in Iraq and Afghanistan as is Al Qaeda and Iran. It would explain, in part, Qaradawi and the Brotherhood's role in these violent, global mau-mauing incidents. Most of which have happened since 2003. It's their way of flexing power through Western media.
In his Friday sermon, Sheik Qaradawi -- the most popular Muslim cleric in the world -- demanded an apology from the Pope. This started the ball rolling, and as images from Friday prayer protests began to filter through the Western media it all seemed so spontaneous, but there was nothing spontaneous about it.
Players in the global jihad politics -- men such as Sheik Qaradawi and the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia (a paid representative of the Saudi royal family) -- have decided to face down the Pope. This is not unexpected. For years leaders of radical Islamist movements like the Muslim Brotherhood have been hinting at a clash with "Rome." Qaradawi says as much in this fatwa:
In a fatwa posted on the website www.islamonline.net,[1] in response to a reader's question, Sheikh Al-Qaradhawi wrote of the "signs of the victory of Islam," citing a well-known Hadith: "… The Prophet Muhammad was asked: 'What city will be conquered first, Constantinople or Romiyya?' He answered: 'The city of Hirqil [i.e. the Byzantine emperor Heraclius] will be conquered first' - that is, Constantinople… Romiyya is the city called today 'Rome,' the capital of Italy. The city of Hirqil [that is, Constantinople] was conquered by the young 23-year-old Ottoman Muhammad bin Morad, known in history as Muhammad the Conqueror, in 1453. The other city, Romiyya, remains, and we hope and believe [that it too will be conquered].
"Rome" here can mean the West, as well as the seat of the Pope. Either through ignorance (Muslim societies generally do not permit comparative religion studies), or through radical Islamist supremacist world view, most Muslims do not understand the distinctions in Christian practice. We're all just Christians, and "Rome" is the center of Christendom.
On Saturday, a political leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Mohammed Habib, echoed Qaradawi:
"We want a personal apology (from the Pope). We feel that he has committed a grave error against us and that this mistake will only be removed through a personal apology," Muslim Brotherhood Deputy Leader Mohammed Habib told Reuters.
Expect more of this from MB leaders. If they can pressure the leader of Christendom to accommodate their authority, then their teaching and authority gain more legitimacy, and average Muslims will accept a greater role for the MB in spiritual and political life.
For the record, here is the Holy Father's speech. To be honest, with a few exceptions, probably no Muslim leader (or NY Times editor) has read this speech and understood it. The Holy Father is an erudite man, and he is teaching in a language of academic abstractions. This is the language of Western "dialogue," and has no meaning for our Eastern enemy.
NOTE: This is cross-posted at Making Sense of Jihad where I also ask another question...When will the US finally designate the MB a terrorist organization?
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