The New York Times (NYT) recently published a column by Gehad el-Haddad — the [previous] spokesman for the global Islamist group The Muslim Brotherhood — penned from the confines of his Egyptian jail cell, in Tora prison. Haddad wrote about his movement’s “peaceful reformist approach,” and he concluded his letter by a shy admission that his group’s political maneuvering created distance between the Brotherhood and the Egyptian people. Haddad, however, failed to address the problematic approach of the ideology of political Islam that was the core problem that forced many Egyptians, including millions of Muslims to turn against the Muslim Brotherhood.

In a column in the Daily Beast, British activist and columnist Maajid Nawaz wrote an open letter to Gehad Haddad, addressing the points Haddad in his NYT’s column and how Haddad only presented half the story, and how it is “disingenuous to argue that your Islamist ideology does not contribute to the intolerant atmosphere from which jihadists are able to recruit.” Nawaz also highlighted that Hadad, (and other Islamists), cannot have it both ways: “If anti-Muslim rhetoric is dangerous because it acts as a backdrop to violence against Muslims, then Islamist rhetoric is dangerous because it acts as a backdrop to jihadist violence.”

I recommend reading the whole article here.

As for the debate on whether the Muslim Brotherhood is a terrorist organization or not, I repost this analysis (initially included in my weekly Egypt’s compilation), by Mokhtar Awad and Samuel Tadros.