A Swedish inter-faith initiative that includes a charity and a mosque linked to the Muslim Brotherhood was awarded the prestigious 2020 Martin Luther King Award for its work with refugees. According to an Islamic Relief Worldwide IRW) press release:
December 10, 2020 An inter-faith initiative between Islamic Relief Sweden, the Church of Sweden and the Stockholm mosque has been announced as the recipient of this year’s prestigious Martin Luther King Award in Sweden.The Goda Grannar consortium – the Swedish term for Good Neighbours – was praised by the award’s jury for bringing faiths together and “inspiring us all to move from words to deeds and promote democratic coexistence.” The consortium was formed in 2015 after a large influx of refugees arrived in Stockholm from war-affected countries such as Syria. Working with community volunteers, the consortium initially provided nearly 4,000 new arrivals with shelter in churches and the mosque. It has since expanded and now provides a wider range of services for refugees including “language cafés”, guidance on Swedish society and legal advice.
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The Martin Luther King Award is awarded by the Equmenia Church, The Swedish Fellowship of Reconciliation (SweFOR), and the Christian Council of Sweden. It is awarded in the spirit of Martin Luther King to celebrate his legacy of hope and reconciliation.
Only three weeks later, a US. State Department press release referred to the “blatant and horrifying anti-Semitism and glorification of violence exhibited at the most senior levels of IRW” and called on all government bodies to reexamine their relationship with IRW:
December 30, 2020 The Office of the Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism condemns the well-documented record of anti-Semitic attitudes and remarks made by the senior leadership of Islamic Relief Worldwide (IRW). Given that IRW has an annual budget of approximately $100M+ and holds a designation as a charitable organization internationally, as well as 501 © (3) status in the United States, this record of anti-Semitism presents a significant issue for all donors and donor countries to IRW. The consistent pattern of spreading the most vile anti-Semitic vitriol by IRW’s leadership causes us to question the core values of the organization. […]
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Islamic Relief Sweden is the Swedish branch of Islamic Relief Worldwide, a UK-based international charity organization whose senior management has included many leaders of the Global Muslim Brotherhood. Established in 1984, IRW co-founders included Essam El-Haddad, a senior Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood member who later became an adviser to Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi, and Hany El-Banna who later founded the Muslim Charities Forum (MCF), which was stripped of UK public funding over its ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas. A former long-time IRW trustee is Ibrahim El-Zayat, a leader in both the European and the German Muslim Brotherhood. El-Zayat was also a trustee of the German branch of Islamic Relief. Another former IRW director is Ahmed Al-Rawi, the former head of the Council of European Muslims (formerly FIOE) and former President of the Muslim Association of Britain . The current IRW chair of trustees is Lamia El-Amri, a former President of the European Forum of Muslim Women, part of the Council of European Muslims.
The Stockholm mosque is Sweden’s largest mosque and run by the Islamic Association in Sweden (Islamiska Förbundet i Sverige, IFiS), the Swedish founding member of the Council of European Muslims (CEMS), which comprises the Muslim Brotherhood in Europe. A Swedish government report has identified the IFiS as part of the Muslim Brotherhood network in the country.
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