Global Muslim Brotherhood Conference Features Chief Advisor To Turkish President, Western Academic, Others

A 25 May 2021 vir­tu­al con­fer­ence orga­nized by Jamaat-e-Isla­mi Pak­istan has brought togeth­er a British Glob­al Mus­lim Broth­er­hood leader, for­mer high-lev­el politi­cians, a West­ern aca­d­e­m­ic, and the Chief Advi­sor to the Turk­ish Pres­i­dent. Accord­ing to a Face­book invi­ta­tion to the event:

A ground­break­ing event of a series ini­ti­at­ed by the forum. We bring togeth­er an amaz­ing pan­el, which is a diverse blend of emi­nent aca­d­e­mics and polit­i­cal ana­lysts, from the East and West.

Read the rest here.

The webi­nar, titled “Islam and the West: Nav­i­gat­ing the Way For­ward, “was host­ed by Glob­al Dia­logue for Peace (GDP), an edu­ca­tion­al research cen­ter head­ed by Jamaat-e-Isla­mi (JEI) Pak­istan leader Asif  Luq­man Qazi. JEI, Pakistan’s old­est and most influ­en­tial Islam­ic par­ty, had its ori­gins in the thoughts of Syed Maudu­di, the most impor­tant Islamist intel­lec­tu­al in the his­to­ry of South­east Asia. Maudu­di was also a major influ­ence on the  Glob­al Mus­lim Broth­er­hood (GMB), with whom the JEI has enjoyed close rela­tions. Among oth­er top­ics, the con­fer­rees were said to have dis­cussed Mus­lim per­cep­tions of the rela­tions between Islam and the West in a local and glob­al con­text and iden­ti­fied “key prac­ti­cal steps on the way forward.’

Par­tic­i­pants includ­ed Dr. John Espos­i­to, a long-time sup­port­er of the GMB and a pro­fes­sor of Inter­na­tion­al Affairs and Islam­ic Stud­ies at George­town Uni­ver­si­ty, where he acts as found­ing direc­tor of the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Cen­ter for Mus­lim-Chris­t­ian Under­stand­ing (CMCU). Espos­i­to, who has also act­ed as a for­mer US State Depart­ment advi­sor, has at least a dozen past and/or present affil­i­a­tions with GMB and Hamas orga­ni­za­tions and is known to have espoused views con­sis­tent with Broth­er­hood doc­trine. Accord­ing to its web­site, the fol­low­ing indi­vid­u­als, some of whom are tied to the GMB or oth­er Islamist move­ments, also par­tic­i­pat­ed in the event:

• Anas Al-Tikri­ti, leader of the GMB in the UK and CEO of the Cor­do­ba Foundation.

• Anwar Ibrahim, for­mer Deputy Prime Min­is­ter of Malaysia.

• Asif Luq­man Qazi, Direc­tor of For­eign Affairs at JEI Pak­istan and Exec­u­tive Direc­tor of GDP.

• Kur­shid Ahmad, Chair­man of the Islam­ic Foun­da­tion UK, close to both JEI and the GMB.

• Yasin Aktay, Chief Advi­sor to Turk­ish Pres­i­dent Erdo­gan and Deputy Chair­man of his rul­ing AK Party

• Ebrahim Rasool, for­mer South African Ambas­sador to the Unit­ed States

• Mushahid Hus­sain Syed, for­mer Sen­a­tor of Islamabad