Regular readers of the Global Muslim Brotherhood Daily Watch already know that we spend the vast majority of our time trying to report on what is true and therefore have little if any time to devote to what is not. Attempting to critique and/or refute the ever growing legion of conspiracy theories regarding the Muslim Brotherhood would be a full-time job in itself and not one we are able to undertake. However, from time to time an issue arises in this regard which we feel is important enough to address as we did on the subject of Malik Obama, the half brother of President Obama, and whether or not he was actually “one of the architects of the major investments of the international organization of the Muslim Brotherhood” (He does not appear to be). Since the shootings attacks last Sunday outside an event in Garland, Texas devoted to cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad, the usual parties have been engaged in doing their best to connect the Muslim Brotherhood in the US to the attacks, chiefly though the Islamic Community Center (ICC) of Phoenix and its ownership by the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT). As widely reported by the US media, both of the attackers had attended the ICC mosque and were known to the mosque leadership. Additional evidence cited for the ICC’s ties to the US Brotherhood is that the mosque imam was one of the so-called “flying imams” who as reported by the GMBDW were removed from a US Airways flight in 2006 on the grounds of suspicious behavior and whose case was taken up by the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the Muslim American Society, both part of the US Muslim Brotherhood. Finally, it is said that the ICC Facebook page has posted links to the MAS.
Of these reported links, the strongest is the ownership of the ICC mosque by the NAIT. We should point out that the GMBDW is quite familiar with the NAIT and the GMBDW editor has published a report on the history of the US Muslim Brotherhood which includes detailed information on the organization some of which can also also be found on the GMBDW NAIT Wiki page. However, as noted, at last count the NAIT held title to some 332 mosques in the US, estimated to be about about 27 percent of the estimated 1200 mosques in the United States. Knowing what we do about the NAIT, we can assume that the majority of these mosques, if not all, are somehow tied to the US Muslim Brotherhood as NAIT itself is an integral part the Brotherhood as documented in the report referenced above. However, we have no idea how many individuals are attending NAIT mosques but the number surely runs into many many thousands or hundreds of thousands given that a number of these are surely very large mosques. Whatever any given mosque leadership knows or believes about NAIT, it is beyond any credibility to suggest that every Muslim worshipping at a NAIT-owned facility is somehow also tied to the US Muslim Brotherhood. Therefore, until such time that reliable sources report that the Garland shooters had some demonstrable and substantial connection to the ICC leadership or that they were somehow radicalized at the mosque itself, the GMBDW will not be reporting that the shootings were “tied to the Muslim Brotherhood.” Should such evidence emerge, of course we are prepared to alter that conclusion.
As our are regular readers surely know by now, the GMBDW is hardly “soft on the Muslim Brotherhood” as our critics have sometimes alleged and we have long and frequently pointed to the dangers and adverse social consequences regarding the global organization. In fact, we were reporting on the Global Muslim Brotherhood long before most of the current crop of Brotherhood conspiracy theorists had ever taken up the subject. However, we cannot emphasize strongly enough that any information and/or intelligence reported on the Global Muslim Brotherhood needs to be scrupulously documented and carefully analyzed as we always try to do and nobody is well-served by creating a Muslim Brotherhood “bogeyman” that is said to behind every ill-deed perpetrated by a Muslim anywhere in the world.
For our report on the reaction of the US Muslim Brotherhood to the shootings, go here.
