[via oldadam] Baptist Press and Catholic News Agency are both reporting that the Egyptian government has arrested 155 people for publicly eating food during Ramadan. The implication is that those crazy Islamic fundamentalists are persecuting secularists again. The reaction in the Western media is very predictable:
Look at what happens when you let these crazy religious fanatics take over government! Next thing you know, you’ll be in a concentration camp facing genocide!
However, the truth is precisely the opposite. The arrests in Egypt were conducted by the secular government, and those arrested were members of the fundamentalist Islamic party who seek to influence the upcoming elections. The secular Egyptian government has stated that they conducted these arrests to “simulate” what it would be like if the fundamentalists took over, to educate the people in advance of the elections.
In other words, the pro-Western secular powers are religiously persecuting fundamentalist Muslims, and the Christians are opportunistically seizing upon this to claim that fundamentalist Muslims are bad. This would be exactly the same as if the Obama administration were to arrest and imprison members of Westboro Baptist Church (the “God Hates Fags” guy), as a way of “simulating” what it would be like if the Baptists took over government.
As much as we disagree with fundamentalist Muslims, or with the Westboro Baptist Folks, this is not the way to combat them. By seizing on lies and deceit, Christians cheapen and diminish themselves. The idea that Christians would use these arrests to smear Islam is disgusting and reprehensible, and does not help Christianity.
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The arrests were conducted by the secular Mubarak government, against members of the world’s largest and oldest Islamist group, al-ikhwān al-muslimūn, or “The Muslim Brotherhood”. To understand the significance of this, you need to understand a little bit of history. Mubarak became president when Sadat was assassinated by Islamist extremists associated with the Muslim Brotherhood (in fact, the fatwah against Sadat was issued by none other than Omar Abdel-Rahman, who is currently in prison for the first World Trade Center bombing). To say the least, Mubarak’s pro-Western, secular government is not a friend of the Muslim Brotherhood.
The antagonism between Egypt’s secular government and Muslim Brotherhood is not new. The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in 1928, in Egypt, by an Islamic fundamentalist preacher named Hasan-al-Banna. Al-Banna’s goal was to evict the colonial and secular powers who controlled Egypt at the time. The Muslim Brotherhood has never held political power, and has been outlawed periodically and persecuted by secular authorities throughout its existence. In 1948 (after the partition of Palestine), Egypt’s secular prime minister, Mahmoud Fahmi an-Nukrashi Pasha was assassinated by Muslim Brotherhood. In retaliation, Hassan-al-Banna was assassinated by the secular forces shortly after.
Given this acrimonious history, it should be no surprise to find the secular Egyptian government taking action against the Muslim Brotherhood; especially before an election. What should be a surprise, though, is that people parrot the accusations that “those mean Islamists are persecuting secularists in Egypt!”
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