Al-Aqsa Conference Brings Together UN-Sanctioned Terrorism Financier, Global Muslim Brotherhood Leaders

On 9 May 2021, a vir­tu­al Glob­al Mus­lim Broth­er­hood schol­ars con­fer­ence cen­tered on Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque brought togeth­er a UN-sanc­tioned ter­ror­ism financier, Glob­al Mus­lim Broth­er­hood lead­ers, and a British orga­ni­za­tion known to be pro-Hamas. Accord­ing to an arti­cle in Pales­tin­ian media:

May 9, 2021 The Pales­tine Schol­ars Asso­ci­a­tion par­tic­i­pat­ed in the [Inter­na­tion­al Union of Mus­lim Schol­ars] con­fer­ence enti­tled: “The Schol­ars’ Speech to Al-Mura­bitin in Al-Aqsa” (…) today, Sun­day 9/5/2021, with the par­tic­i­pa­tion of more than 40 sci­en­tif­ic (…) bod­ies and insti­tu­tions from all coun­tries of the Islam­ic world via the Zoom appli­ca­tion and (…) live broad­cast of YouTube and Face­book. [Trans­lat­ed from Ara­bic using Google.]

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The con­fer­ence was co-host­ed by the Inter­na­tion­al Union of Mus­lim Schol­ars (IUMS), an inter­na­tion­al body of Mus­lim the­olo­gians based in Doha, Qatar, whose lead­er­ship is close­ly tied to the Glob­al Mus­lim Broth­er­hood (GMB). Until recent­ly, it was led by GMB spir­i­tu­al guide Youssef Qaradawi. Sev­er­al promi­nent Euro­pean Mus­lim faith lead­ers tied to the GMB were IUMS mem­bers and/or have served as IUMS Trus­tees.

Anoth­er con­fer­ence co-host was Friends of Al-Aqsa (FOA), a British pro-Hamas orga­ni­za­tion that has been described by an Israeli NGO  advo­cat­ing Israel’s elim­i­na­tion. FOA is known to have launched the #Hand­sOf­fAlAqsa social media cam­paign and was one of the orga­niz­ers of a 15 May 2021 pro-Pales­tin­ian demon­stra­tion in front of the Israeli embassy in Lon­don where for­mer UK Labour Par­ty leader Jere­my Cor­byn spoke, and that drew more than 100,000 pro­test­ers, some of whom ripped up Israeli flags and dis­played anti-Semit­ic imagery.

The vir­tu­al Al-Aqsa con­fer­ence fea­tured an appear­ance by Muthanna Harith Al-Dari, head of the Polit­i­cal Depart­ment of the Asso­ci­a­tion of Mus­lim Schol­ars in Iraq (AMSI) and who in 2010 was sanc­tioned by the UN Secu­ri­ty Coun­cil for pro­vid­ing finan­cial sup­port to Al-Qai­da in Iraq. Numer­ous oth­er promi­nent indi­vid­u­als in the inter­na­tion­al Hamas and GMB sup­port net­work have also par­tic­i­pat­ed in the event, including:

• Ali Al-Qaradaghi, Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the IUMS

• Ismail Patel, head of FOA

• Kamal Khat­ib, deputy head of the North­ern Branch of the Islam­ic Move­ment in Israel, banned by Israel for  close ties to Hamas and the Mus­lim Brotherhood

• Nawwaf Takrouri, head of the Asso­ci­a­tion of Pales­tin­ian Schol­ars Abroad, which is known to have par­tic­i­pat­ed in Euro­pean Hamas sup­port conferences

• Ham­mam Saeed, for­mer Gen­er­al Comp­trol­ler of the GMB in Jordan

Oth­er recent Glob­al Influ­ence Oper­a­tions Report (GIOR) report­ing on the IUMS and the Euro­pean Hamas sup­port infra­struc­ture has included:

• A Jan­u­ary 2021 report that the Euro­pean Hamas sup­port net­work had estab­lished a new front group.

• A March 2021 report that Friends of Al-Aqsa had announced the kick-off of this year’s edi­tion of the annu­al “Al-Aqsa Inter­na­tion­al Week” that fea­tured mul­ti­ple GMB leaders.

• An April 2021 report that the IUMS had called on the French gov­ern­ment to stop inter­fer­ing with the “pri­va­cy of Islam,” reject­ing a new French Char­ter of Repub­li­can Val­ues aim­ing to cur­tail for­eign influ­ence over Mus­lim groups and mosques.

• A May 2021 report that the IUMS had post­ed a pro­posed Fri­day ser­mon on the top­ic of Jerusalem that includ­ed incite­ment to vio­lence, jihad, and self-sacrifice.