*2.3. Containing the Threat of Political Islam*

In this chapter, it is examined how 'moderate Islam' serves as a tool of 'sharp power' in terms of containing the perceived or real threat of Political Islam. Reading between the lines of the abovementioned interfaith partnerships, as well as the declarations on tolerance, moderation and peaceful coexistence, it is argued that Abu Dhabi's and Dubai's rulers do not consider the fanatics of ISIS or al-Qaida per se to be their real enemies. Taking into account the UAE socio-political structures, the actual threat emanates from activists who not only ask for more liberties but also question the

royal absolutism. As the modern history of the Arab world has shown us, political dissidence in these countries is predominantly Islamist<sup>1</sup> in nature. During the third annual session of the PEACEMS forum in 2016, participants confirmed that:

Our greatest concern is to shed light on the political outcomes that stem from the distortion of the Islamic Sharia ( ... ) interpreting the teachings of our religion out of their original context has given the necessary pretexts to forces threatening social peace in Muslim societies, specifically those who are still trying to recover from regime change, meanwhile other forces have even attempted to reshape international order and replace the nation state with their self–declared 'Islamic Caliphate'. There is no parallel in these entities' usurpation of religious symbols and terminology. (PEACEMS 2016)

The previous passage directly refers to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria in addition to Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood experience, castigating the subversive role played by the Islamists every time they have meddled with politics. What is even more interesting, though, is how the Emirati 'moderate Islam' campaign demonizes Islamists of all stripes. In other words, under the pretext of 'distorting Sharia and the teachings of religious tradition', non-militant Islamist parties committed to democracy, elections and socio-political reform are easily equated with Osama bin Laden, the Taliban or Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. As one Emirati writer puts it 'Islam has been hijacked by the Islamists and should be reclaimed by the forces of moderation' (Al-Sawafi 2014). The whole campaign is reminiscent of the post-9/11 USA neoconservative 'bad and good Muslim' rhetoric.

Regionally, this anti-Islamist strategy has a twofold target, bearing ideological, religious and geopolitical implications: disparaging the well-organized, transnational Muslim Brotherhood (al-Ikhwan), while counterbalancing Qatar—another regional player whose small size did not prevent it from resorting to 'hard power' diplomacy after 2011 (Nuruzzaman 2015, pp. 226–29). In order to put the UAE 'ikhwanphobia' into context, we should first have a brief look at the Islamist movement's political evolution in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) and the Gulf in particular.

Most of the times during its turbulent history, the Brotherhood was either tolerated by the post-colonial state or persecuted, depending on the domestic situation, on the reevaluated regional policies of the Arab countries and on their shifting alliances. During the 1970s and the 1980s, some splinter Brotherhood groups, like al-Jama 'a al-Islamiyya, elaborated the idea of Takf ¯ ¯ır (excommunication of Muslims) and waged Jihad against the Ku ffar, i.e., the perceived 'infidels' ¯ who ought to be fought and killed either at home or abroad (Keppel 1985, pp. 71–91, 194–210; Pargeter 2010, pp. 181–85). The emergence of such extreme currents has been a mixed blessing; on the one side, it enabled the 'loyal' Brotherhood leaders to redefine themselves as 'moderates', while whitewashing their own socio-political conservatism and illiberal stance on issues like the segregation of sexes. On the other, this very fact justified harsh state suppression of Islamism sui generis. With a few exceptions like Syria, where the Brothers tried to topple the governmen<sup>t</sup> by force in 1982, in other countries like Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Kuwait or Yemen, they remained committed to charity and preaching (Clark 2004, pp. 42–145). During the last 30 years, the would-be 'moderate Islamists' formed

<sup>1</sup> As Islamists (al-islamiyeen) are defined those Muslims who consider Islam to be a complete socio-political and economic system, as well as, a cultural program, rather than a religion that is concentrated solely on spiritual matters. For this reason, analysts tend to use the term Political Islam and Islamism interchangeably. The historical matrix of this modern ideology was the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and the writings of its founder, the school teacher Hasan al-Banna (1906–1949). The evolution of Islamism has gone part and parcel with the political and social development of the Arab and the Muslim nation-states throughout the 20th century. Some groups of Islamists turned out to be extremely militant, engaged in terrorist attacks against Muslims and non-Muslims alike and even attempted to overthrow governments via armed revolts, whereas other groups respected central authorities and generally espoused non-violence. In terms of European political standards, those Islamists could be described as socially conservative and economically liberal, i.e., the 'Islamic equivalent' of Christian democratic center-right parties. An Islamist party (Al-Nahda) has been part of the Tunisian governing coalition for many years, while AKP, Erdogan's ruling party, is also considered Islamist in its ideology and origins. In Egypt, although the Muslim Brothers won parliamentary and presidential elections in 2012, they demonstrated illiberal tendencies in order to secure their rule.

parties and even elected their own deputies in national parliaments or participated in governments (Anani 2010, pp. 1–6).

Undeniably, the watershed in the organization's political fortunes was the Arab Spring. In the aftermath of the Tahrir Square uprisings, Egyptian Islamists won two consecutive elections, both parliamentary and presidential. The association founded by a humble school teacher 84 years ago had become the protagonist of the most pivotal Arab country's political transition. Islamist rule in Egypt was a reality, albeit a short-lived one. Mass protests, new alliances on the streets among those who were sidelined by the Brotherhood, not to mention relentless foreign interference, boiled down to Morsi's downfall. The Islamist cabinet and President Morsi were accused of incompetence, favoritism and autocratic tendencies; these claims are verified to some extent, considering the illiberal and socially conservative constitution that had been brought to popular vote (Hamid and Wheeler 2014). The country was at the brink of civil war when Abdel Fattah al-Sisi's 2013 3rd July coup took place, allegedly to 'save the 25th January revolution from the Islamists who hijacked it' (Kourgiotis 2014).

The sudden perish of the Muslim Brotherhood in its own birthplace echoed the post-Arab Spring contest for power among the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, which were alarmed by the Islamists' electoral victories and bitterly divided over their reactions towards them. We should keep in mind that by the time of the Arab uprisings, Brotherhood-a ffiliated Islamists had already established their presence in the Gulf countries dating back to the first purges under Naser (1952–1970). Thousands of Brotherhood members contributed in the social and educational development of the Arab Gulf and, as a matter of fact, they infiltrated those countries' nascent universities. The Emirati Brotherhood particularly had grown so powerful in Abu Dhabi's only university that, by the late 1980s, it was in a position to approve or reject the federal governmen<sup>t</sup> employees' applications to the scholarship committee (Al-Rashid 2013).

Over all these years, relations between the Brothers and their wealthy hosts in the Gulf were based on a simple 'social contract': shelter for da 'wa (preaching) in exchange for refraining from politics. Younger generations, nonetheless, were influenced by the Brotherhood's ideological reorientations and started talking about political reform even inside the less liberal kingdoms. That is the case of the 1990s al-Sahwa al-Islamiyya (Islamic Awakening) in Saudi Arabia, as well as Da 'wat al-Is.lah (Call ¯ for Reform), or simply al-Is.lah, in the Emirates. Not surprisingly, after starting monitoring Ikhwani ¯ activity in the universities and elsewhere, the UAE authorities demanded from al-Is.lah to cut its organic ¯ ties to the mother organization in Cairo (Freer 2015a, pp. 11–3, 18–20; Al-Rasheed 2002, pp. 176–83; Lacroix 2011, pp. 37–80). The Emirates had enough good reasons to feel threatened by the Brothers, because they left their activities unchecked for two decades at least.

On the contrary, the al-Thani dynasty of Qatar felt no existential threat to its rule by the Brotherhood influences in this tiny kingdom, because as Grabowski states 'Emir Hamad al-Thani left no space for the Brothers to gain support through social services, creating jobs etc.' (Grabowski 2016, p. 358). The Emir Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani and his father before him, in that movement's capabilities to fill the vacuum left by the demise of the Arab autocrats, they saw a golden opportunity to maximize Qatar's regional standing (Roberts 2014). Erdogan's governmen<sup>t</sup> acted in full conformity with al-Thani dynasty in creating a chain of 'loyalist Islamist republics' across the Arab world on behalf of 'the oppressed people' as the Turkish President has declared publicly (Daily 2014). Accordingly, Egypt, during the short term of Morsi's rule, received eight billion US dollars from Doha (Kerr 2013). In the same vein, Qatar extended its support to the Tunisian Islamist party Ennahda that dominated the 2011 constituent assembly following the country's first free elections and kept backing financially the post-2014 coalition government, much to the dismay of Abu Dhabi (Cherif 2017).

The Saudis and the Emiratis feared that, had the Ankara–Cairo–Doha axis remained intact, it would have probably emboldened the rest of the region's Islamists, including their own, to demand reforms, elections, etc. (Fajri 2013). As soon as Hosni Mubarak was deposed, Hizb al-Ummah al-Islami, the first political party in Saudi Arabia, had already been banned after a very brief 'Saudi Spring' (The Islamic Ummah Party n.d.). As for the UAE, anti-ikhwanism reached new heights; as early as

2011, members of al-Is.lah joined forces with liberal non-Islamists and signed a petition requiring ¯ universal su ffrage, legislative authorities for the Federal National Council<sup>2</sup> and broader constitutional reforms (Freer 2015b). A year later, Emirati authorities discovered an alleged coup attempt. According to Emirati sources, 60 Brotherhood a ffiliates were arrested and charged with plotting against the federal governmen<sup>t</sup> (The National 2012). Al-Nahyan ruling dynasty referred to an 'international Brotherhood conspiracy coordinated by neighboring countries', although President Morsi had repeatedly reassured the Arab leaders that 'Egypt had no intention of exporting its revolution' (Saleh and Hall 2012).

This Emirati version of 'McCarthyism' has led to the diplomatic stando ff with Qatar, crises with the UK and other European countries due to their reluctance to designate the Brotherhood as a terrorist group and even to a severance of relations with their protégé, the Yemeni President, because of his ties with the local Ikhwanis, namely the al-Islah party (Cafiero 2018). It is worth mentioning that some UAE based academics from Europe or the US try to apologize for their hosts' 'ikhwanphobia', arguing that the Brotherhood's ideology runs counter to the country's 'moderate Islamic' model. They reiterate that authorities have clamped down only on the Brotherhood-a ffiliated activists and that non-Islamist dissidents who call for reforms are generally tolerated (Forstenlechner et al. 2012). Such claims are rather dubious. In the meantime, the UAE governmen<sup>t</sup> acknowledged that the 'Islamist threat' has been graver in the poorer northern emirates and pledged to abolish inequalities in the distribution of the wealth, implementing the goals set by the Dubai 2021 Plan (Moshashai 2018, pp. 21–22).

Apparently, Saudi Arabia and the UAE had a strong interest in interfering with Egypt in the wake of the 2013 anti-Brotherhood protests. According to leaked Saudi cables, the two Gulf partners favored what has been known as the 'Pakistani model' (Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia in Cairo 2012), i.e., supporting military strongmen and cultivating relations with local religious authorities. This is exactly the same counter-revolutionary scenario that they tried to impose in Libya through General Haftar's offensive against Tripoli's Islamists. Regardless of investing billions of dollars so as to outflank Qatari influences and help Sisi stabilize his regime (Farouk 2014, pp. 10–13), 'healing' the Muslim Brotherhood 'disease' is not just a question of money; an e ffective 'medicine' had to be found, combining coercion, aid policies and—most importantly—ideological 'rehabilitation'.

Whereas the Saudis invested in their loyalist Salafists of Hizb al-Nour as a means to avert the pious masses from the Ikhwan (Kourgiotis 2016, pp. 13–21), the UAE took advantage of Egyptian 'recovery' from Political Islam to initiate their 'moderate Islam' policies. The contribution of al-Azhar University can be considered critical to the common cause of 'reclaiming Islam' and containing the Ikhwanis whether in Egypt or the Gulf. Historically, in the Sunni lands, the Ulema intervened in the production of religious tradition at the behest of central authority, no matter whether they were the Caliphs, the colonial empires or today's nation states. At the request of the UAE rulers, Islamists were portrayed by the Ulema as 'sick people' who needed 'immediate treatment':

The forum's biggest concern revolves around how religious fanaticism and terrorism will be defeated in the hearts of the people before materializing into actions ( ... ) it is the duty of the Ulema, the governments and other institutions to instruct Muslims on the proper forms of religiosity and religious behavior ( ... ) there is no doubt that our Islamic pharmacy is able to prescribe the right medication to the patients in order to ge<sup>t</sup> rid of the disease of violence once and for all. (PEACEMS 2014)

In the passage of the last five years, the Emirati–Azharite partnership came to the surface as the bastion of 'moderate Islam'; an alternative to both Ikhwanism and Salafism. The Egyptian President, Sisi, has

<sup>2</sup> The UAE parliament consists of 40 members—20 of them are elected every 8 years, while the rest are directly appointed by the Ruler's Court in every Emirate. Its authority is mostly consultative and not legislative, given the fact that it has the right only to review the laws presented to it by the Cabinet. No federal law can pass without the final approval of the Emirati Cabinet. Available online: https://www.government.ae/en/about-the-uae/the-uae-government/the-federal-national-council- (accessed on 16/11/2019).

been cautious enough to undertake a national campaign of fighting atheism, while pressing al-Azhar to revise its curricula in the direction of al-wasatiyya (religious centrism) and apply scrutiny on suspicious fatwas (Ibrahim 2014; Mourad and Bayoumi 2015). After the ordeal in Bataclan, Al-Azhar even asked the French governmen<sup>t</sup> to send its imams to teach French Muslims 'moderate Islam' (France24 2015). In the 2016 Grozny conference, the UAE together with al-Azhar and Russia redefined what Sunni Islam 'ought to be' and irritated the Saudi Ulema by excluding Salafism as intolerant and prone to Takf¯ır. The invitation of the Grand Mufti of Syria was a sign of the Emirati–Egyptian intentions to co-opt another staunch enemy of the Ikhwan, Bashar al-Assad (Diwan 2016). The Emirates for their part, organized a series of lectures delivered in the mosques of Dubai, throughout 2019, highlighting Islam's moderate stance on scientific, social and religious topics (Gulf News 2019).

From every aspect, 'religious rehabilitation' supplements the politics of containment. All those years of instructing Muslims on how to 'properly express their religiosity' has taken place in parallel to the Emirati airstrikes against the 'Caliphate' in Syria and Sisi's e fforts to eliminate the Jihadist insurgency that his regime was constantly facing in the Sinai Peninsula from the very beginning. The UAE leadership intensified its security cooperation with the new Egyptian governmen<sup>t</sup> and, at the same time, it took preemptive measures at home, such as the Anti-Terrorist Crimes Laws No. (7) and No. (9)/2014, the Anti-Hatred and Anti-Discrimination Law No. (2)/2015 and the Tolerance Law No. (9)/2017 (UAE The Cabinet n.d.d; Hamdy 2018). Moreover, two counter-terrorism centers, namely al-Hedayah (Guidance) and al-Sawab (Right), were established to eradicate Da 'esh ideological imprints on the Muslim youth (Sky News Arabiyya 2015).

Once again, the Jihadist threat proved to be a very convenient alibi; in terms of internal security, it justified the expansion of the UAE anti-Islamist crusade so as to include any kind of opposition. For one thing, Abu Dhabi's first PEACEMS gathering of Sunni Ulema from around the globe to discuss de-radicalization coincided with the public circulation of a list of 85 terrorist organizations including al-Is.lah and all the regional branches of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Emirates went as far as to ¯ target legally registered Islamic Associations and NGOs (Non-Governmental Organizations) tolerated by the US and European authorities on the grounds of disseminating dangerous Ikhwani ideology (Gulf News 2014). In the same year, the Council of Muslim Elders was founded in Abu Dhabi and the Grand Imam of al-Azhar was appointed as its chairman (Muslim Council of Elders n.d.). The Council functions as a counterweight to the Doha-based International Union for Muslim Scholars headed by the Brotherhood Imam and al-Jazeera TV star, Yussef al-Qaradawi (International Union for Muslim Scholars n.d.). Fierce theological battles have been fought between the two bodies ever since. Time will tell whether the UAE will remain the staunchest anti-Brotherhood power in the region even in light of a future rapprochement with Qatar.

Despite 'moderate Islam's' bias towards Salafists, the two models share the same quietist approach, i.e., de-politicize Islam as a way of de-radicalizing Muslim youth; in their view, the tolerant Muslim should be the apolitical ones. Similar initiatives were launched after the 9/11 terror attacks, like the Commonwealth O ffice's program 'Projecting British Islam'. Even if they failed to prevent the 'Hijrah' of European Jihadists, such programs have always been appealing to the insecure Arab dictators (Mandaville and Hamid 2018, pp. 2–8). By 'reclaiming Islam' from the Islamists, the state power reasserts its monopoly on the use of religious symbols, discourses and Quranic interpretations; Jihad and the Sharia are incorporated in the policies of the nation state. What is more, several regimes shield their immunity to potential political change.

In conclusion, from 2014, the UAE underwent a new nation-building process that illuminated the necessity to 'instill tolerance in the Emirati national consciousness' and 'forge future tolerant generations among the country's youth' (UAE Ministry of Tolerance n.d.). In that sense, 'true Islamic values' are restored for the society's sake, whilst Islamist and non-Islamist dissidents alike are ostracized as 'the enemies of religion and the motherland'.
