Muslim Brotherhood Ties, Gaza Funds Divide Ireland’s ICCI

Mus­lim Broth­er­hood ties have caused deep divi­sion with­in the lead­er­ship of Dublin’s Islam­ic Cul­tur­al Cen­tre (ICCI), adding to con­tro­ver­sy over the man­age­ment of Gaza char­i­ta­ble funds. On 3 May 2025, The Jerusalem Post report­ed that a senior offi­cial at the ICCI was asked to step down for pub­lic inter­est rea­sons. The arti­cle begins:

An offi­cial at the Islam­ic Cul­tur­al Cen­tre of Ire­land is being encour­aged to step down over alleged ties to the Mus­lim Broth­er­hood. A senior offi­cial at the Islam­ic Cul­tur­al Cen­tre of Ire­land (ICCI) has been asked to step down over alleged ties to the Mus­lim Broth­er­hood, the Irish Times report­ed on Sat­ur­day. While the offi­cial remained unnamed, con­cerns were raised over alleged ties to the Mus­lim Broth­er­hood and the man­age­ment of char­i­ta­ble funds raised for Gaza. Con­cerns have been raised as far back as 2018 that char­i­ta­ble funds are not being record­ed or prop­er­ly banked, accord­ing to the report. Encour­ag­ing the offi­cial to step down The offi­cial was asked “to step down in favour of the pub­lic inter­est and to pre­vent fur­ther harm.” Dr Eid Zaher, the center’s Imam’s sec­re­tary, said the cri­sis at ICCI is “due to the intran­si­gence of a senior offi­cial in respond­ing to requests of the board of the Al Mak­toum Foun­da­tion – a foun­da­tion that for over 30 years has offered invalu­able ser­vices to Islam and Mus­lims in Ireland.

Read more: https://www.jpost.com/international/article-852440

Key Points

• Con­tro­ver­sy has led to calls for a senior ICCI offi­cial to step down for pub­lic inter­est reasons.

• The alle­ga­tions focus on improp­er han­dling and record­ing of char­i­ta­ble funds raised for Gaza by the Islam­ic Cul­tur­al Centre.

• The ICCI was tem­porar­i­ly closed after a phys­i­cal alter­ca­tion relat­ed to the ongo­ing dispute.

• Pre­vi­ous accu­sa­tions of Mus­lim Broth­er­hood links at the ICCI have been strong­ly denied by officials.

The Muslim Brotherhood in Ireland: Influence over Gaza Advocacy

From its ear­li­est days, the Broth­er­hood has inter­twined its ide­ol­o­gy with the Pales­tin­ian cause, orga­niz­ing mass ral­lies, “Pales­tine Days,” and protest cam­paigns to denounce Zion­ism and demand sol­i­dar­i­ty with Gaza. The Glob­al Mus­lim Brotherhood’s pres­ence in Ire­land, par­tic­u­lar­ly through fig­ures and orga­ni­za­tions linked to the Islam­ic Cul­tur­al Cen­tre of Ire­land (ICCI), is reflect­ed in ongo­ing col­lab­o­ra­tion with Hamas-aligned advo­ca­cy and sup­port net­works. Notably, Irish polit­i­cal fig­ures such as MP Richard Boyd Bar­rett have par­tic­i­pat­ed in pan­el events host­ed by the Pales­tin­ian Return Cen­tre, a group with doc­u­ment­ed ties to both Hamas and the Glob­al Mus­lim Broth­er­hood, high­light­ing the inter­sec­tion of Irish far-left activism and Broth­er­hood-linked pro-Gaza cam­paigns. This coop­er­a­tion extends to pub­lic recog­ni­tion of pro-Pales­tin­ian voic­es, as seen when Irish MPs and activists were hon­ored at Pales­tin­ian advo­ca­cy events orga­nized by groups con­nect­ed to the Mus­lim Broth­er­hood and Hamas, rein­forc­ing a pat­tern of mutu­al sup­port and ide­o­log­i­cal align­ment. The Mus­lim Broth­er­hood and its affil­i­at­ed groups have played a cen­tral role in shap­ing the glob­al dis­course on Gaza, lever­ag­ing advo­ca­cy, demon­stra­tions, and media cam­paigns to mobi­lize sup­port and influ­ence pub­lic opinion.

Exter­nal References:

• Turkey, the Glob­al Mus­lim Broth­er­hood, and the Gaza Flotilla
• Dan­ger­ous Legit­i­ma­cy: The Risks of Nor­mal­iz­ing Hamas As a Fun­da­men­tal­ist Ter­ror Group In West­ern Discourse
• The Mus­lim Broth­er­hood in Ireland

Dis­claimer:

The Glob­al Influ­ence Oper­a­tions Report (GIOR) employs AI through­out the post­ing process, includ­ing gen­er­at­ing sum­maries of news items, the intro­duc­tion, key points, and often the “con­text” sec­tion. We rec­om­mend ver­i­fy­ing all infor­ma­tion before use. Addi­tion­al­ly, images are AI-gen­er­at­ed and intend­ed sole­ly for illus­tra­tive pur­pos­es. While they rep­re­sent the events or indi­vid­u­als dis­cussed, they should not be inter­pret­ed as real-world photography.