If you’d like to know who all the major Muslim Brotherhood and MB-sympathetic players in politics today are, you couldn’t do much worse than have a look at the programme of a two day conference, to be held next month on London.
The conference has been organised by the Muslim Brotherhood front organisation, the British Muslim Initiative. Unsurprisingly, it has been put together with the help of the Conflicts Forum, which sees its mission as mainstreaming and institutionalising the Muslim Brotherhood. Depressingly, it has also been co-sponsored by Demos, the soft-and-fluffy ex-Eurocommunist outfit.
Saturday 12th July
Political Islam: historical and intellectual origins; major schools and trends
Dr. Basheer Nafi, Lecturer in Islamic Studies, Birkbeck College
Professor John O. Voll, Professor of Islamic History and Associate Director of the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, Georgetown University
Egypt: between oppression and participation
Dr. Kamal El-Helbawy, Former spokesman of the International Organisation of the Muslim Brotherhood in the West
Dr. Robert Leiken, Director of the Immigration and National Security Program, The Nixon Center
Dr. Barbara Zollner, Associate Lecturer in Islamic Studies, Birkbeck College, University of London
Pakistan: Islamists in opposition
Abdulghafur Aziz, Jama’at e islami Pakistan
Turkey: Islamists in power
Prof. Ibrahim Kalin, Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at the College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA
Dr. Basheer Nafi, Lecturer in Islamic Studies, Birkbeck College
Palestine: Islamists, political participation and resistance
Dr. Azzam “Kaboom” Tamimi, Director, Institute of Islamic Political Thought, London
Alistair Crooke, Founding Director of Conflicts Forum
Sunday 13th July
Islamism and Extremism: A Western Preoccupation (Sponsored by Demos)
Session Chair: Jamie Bartlett
Robert Lambert, Research Fellow, University of Exeter; co-founder and former head of the Metropolitan Police Muslim Contact Unit
Anas Altikriti, President, The Cordoba Foundation
Dr. Robert Leiken, Director of the Immigration and National Security Program, The Nixon Center
Dr. Tahir Abbas, Director of the Centre for the Study of Ethnicity and Culture, University of Birmingham
Political Islam: Key Issues and Themes
Islamism and Democracy
Prof. John O. Voll, Professor of Islamic history, Georgetown University
Dr. Rafik Abdessalam, Researcher, Al Jazeera Centre for Studies
Islamism and Women
Dr. Merve Kavakci, Lecturer of International Affairs at the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University
Soumaya Ghannoushi, Researcher, School of Oriental and African Studies
Islamism and human rights
Prof. Tariq Ramadan, Professor of Islamic Studies at the Faculty of Theology, Oxford University
Sheikh Rached Ghannouchi, head of the Tunisian Harakat an-Nahdah (Renaissance Movement)
Islamism and the west: conflict or dialogue?
Prof. John Esposito, Professor of Islamic Studies and Founding Director of the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, Georgetown University
Dr. Mounir Shafiq, General Coordinator, Islamic National Pan-Arab Conference
Roundtable discussion – The future of political Islam: where do we go from here?
Chair: Dr Abdelwahab El-Affendi, Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Democracy, University of Westminster
Prof. John Esposito
Dr. Basheer Nafi
Dr. Robert Leiken
Dr. Azzam “Kaboom” Tamimi
I can tell you what the message of this conference will be. It will be that the Muslim Brotherhood is a diverse organisation, that you shouldn’t take its anti-democratic and demogogic rhetoric at face value, that it is moving towards reform, that is represents the best alternative to Al Qaeda, that it is an idea whose time has come, that it represents a genuine expression of the political soul of the Muslim Ummah, that it is a people’s resistance movement, and – above all – partnering with it should be at the heart of sensible Governmental policy, both abroad, and at home.
This conference is likely to be attended by policy makers, academics and activists, who will be encouraged to put this message into practice.