We wake up every morning, watch the news to see what's happening in the world, and all you hear about is mass destruction by the so called ‘defenders of Islam,' whether it is ISIS, the Muslim Brotherhood, Ansar Bait Almaqdis, Boko Haram, or any of the new terrorist groups that announce themselves every day. In order to comprehend all these terrorist groups and remain aware of current developments, Al-Bawaba EG visited Nabil Naem, founder of the Democratic Jihad Party and the leader of Egyptian Islamic Jihad, from 1988 until 1992. He is also known for criticising the Muslim Brotherhood and exposes considerable information about Jihadist groups in general. The Muslim Brotherhood terrorists have changed their strategy and started to target Egyptian civilians rather than the army and police, why is that? "Asking this question means you don't know the Muslim Brotherhood properly. The other face of the MB is that everybody for them in an infidel, based on the book of Sayyid Qutb, "Ma'alem Fe Altariq," (Milestones). People nowadays are infidels, even if they claim otherwise or have witnesses. "Other books emphasize the same point. Sayyid Qutb's brother, Mohamed Qutb, does so in his book, "Jaheleyet Al qarn Al Eshreen" (Twentieth Century Ignorance). Written 50 years ago, it says "people nowadays are living in ignorance even more than during the Prophet's days." Then there is "Waqe'na Al Moaser" (Contemporary Reality), which says people now say the Islamic testimony that there is no god but Allah, but they do not mean it. For that reason ISIS asks their intended victims to say it before killing them. "This is the ideology of the MBs. It has been set out in books for 50 years. They don't consider killing people a sin. They will even go to the extreme of putting bombs in elementary schools, targeting underage girls and boys. They disregard the rules of war set out by Mohamed (pbuh) and the Caliph Abu Bakr: "Do not kill women, children, babies, a worker, do not burn a fruitful tree or misplace it." That is Islamic strategy in times of war, when two armies collide, but they do exactly the opposite. "Because they consider the children of Egyptians are infidels. They justify this with a phrase from the Qura'an: "If Thou shouldn't leave them, they will mislead The worshipers and will beget none save lewd ingrates." ISIS and the Muslim Brotherhood share the same ideology. It is wrong to think otherwise. This should be well understood in fighting them." Can we say that the recent increase in terrorist attacks is linked to the Egyptian Economic Summit scheduled for March? "Yes. They want to thwart Sisi. But it isn't only the Muslim Brotherhood that wants to. America and Israel want to as well. They held a conference in Turkey last month attended by US, Turkish and Israeli intelligence, as well as the Muslim Brotherhood, under the title, ‘The Throttle Sisi Conference,' because Sisi is leading Egypt towards real development. If he is successful he will create a new force in the Middle East, equal to that of Iran in Asia, and they don't want this to happen with Egypt. "‘Nobody can fight Iran' according to Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Kirzae. He said that when asked whether, if the US-Iranian talks failed, he would expect a military strike against Iran. "Egypt is on its way to being powerful. For example, Egypt bought five warships from France and required them to be built in Egyptian shipyards, so as to have French expertise transferred to us. We should focus on this trend. The MBs are implementing a Western agenda to defeat Egypt, similar to what is happening with Bashar al-Assad. Is Syria's economic growth the reason for the emergence of Western support for the armed opposition and the emergence of terrorist groups? "Bashar and Hafez al-Assad ruled Syria for fifty years. When Hafez was in charge, Israel was only 20 years old. You think the Syrians all of a sudden discovered that they're Alawites? Of course not. It's because Bashar was working on a nuclear program as Saddam did. What happened to Saddam should have happened to Bashar. Bashar was targeted because he achieved development in Syria - the only country that does not have unemployment. They might be poor, but they are all working. "Bashar started real development in Syria. Syrian products were competing in quality with Turkish products in Europe, especially as European countries do not buy Chinese goods. They prefer Korean or Turkish products. Syria excelled in the clothing and textiles industry and overtook Turkey. So, inevitably, it became important to eliminate Bashar, whether he was Alawite, Shia, or an infidel. Is Syria targeted because of its location or the extension of Gas pipelines across Syrian territory? "The other thing that led to the targeting of Syria is the issue of gas. Iran is the biggest exporter of natural gas to Europe. The only exit for it is through Turkey and Syria. Due to historical differences between Iran and Turkey, however, Iran will never allow the passage of gas through pipelines crossing Turkey. So Iran began planning to use Syria to send gas on to Europe. That led to hitting Syria." What is your comment on the Muslim Brotherhood's recent visit to Washington? "This is related to a plan to demolish Egypt in collaboration with MBs. The meeting was held on the premises of the State Department. It was attended by Walid al-Sharabi, Essam Al-Haddad and Hussain Al-Kazaz. What you don't know is that there is a whole floor for the CIA at the building, so that meetings can be held with secret agents without being exposed. "For example, if I'm a diplomat, I cannot go to the intelligence department without being exposed, but I can go to the State Department building and, while there, I can go to the private US intelligence department without arousing any suspicious. "The aim of the MBs, in attending the meeting, was to get American approval for their new policy, the violent approach. They wanted not to be condemned by the Americans for that, and they wanted a pledge from the US administration not to be classified as a terrorist group. Why is this escalation happening now? Why not last year under interim President Adly Mansour? "First of all, the MBs were not prepared for armed action then. The other reason is that the Muslim Brotherhood, during the Adly Mansour period, had hopes of not being put on trial. They have now been convicted of crimes and are awaiting verdicts. "The US State Department also advised them to seek reconciliation with the state, because they will never rule the country again. So it was better for them to stay in political life and renounce violence. "The escalation of violence now is to put pressure on the country and gain from that." Former presidential candidate Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh said he was ready to negotiate to bring about reconciliation between the state and the Muslim Brotherhood. What do you think of that? "I say that Aboul Fotouh is practicing 'political prostitution.' This is the role of Abul-Fotouh, who belongs to the MBs body and soul. Nobody asked him to mediate with the Muslim Brotherhood and I can assure you that in any negotiations with the MBs, the state would lose. "The only way for the state to succeed is when the MBs themselves announce the dissolution of their organization. If this solution is not reached, it means the state has failed in confronting them. Any negotiations between the two parties, moreover, can only be considered a failure." Is there a relationship between the Muslim Brotherhood and the development of terrorism in the region? "Definitely. The evidence lies in the Syrian scenario, and I confirm this for history: Bashar al-Assad is a national hero. The entire world has been fighting him for four years and he has not fallen. I asked Khadr Alawarkh, formerly President Bashar's media adviser, about his dismissal from work. He said he was dismissed, ‘because I offered reconciliation.' He said that Bashar al-Assad is very intelligent and has inherited his father's conviction, ‘I either kill the Muslim Brotherhood or they kill me.' There is no third solution. Bashar repeatedly emphasised, "I shall either be killed in the palace or kill the MBs, I will not leave Syria" and rejected the solutions provided, such as a safe exit. "'There will not be a Syria without Bashar,' John McCain once said, adding that the solution lay in the departure of Bashar. And I say there can be no solution without Bashar. "Bashar commented in a press conference recently that he would not leave because the Syrian people wanted him. And that is a fact. I have met Syrian refugees in Lebanon who told me that Bashar's hell was better for them than the terrorists' heaven. ‘The terrorists,' they said, ‘use oppression and threats to abuse our women.' The Syrian Minister of Endowments reported that 20,000 Syrian girls had been raped causing a problem in proving genealogy." How do you evaluate ISIS, who is responsible for its spread? "ISIS – the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq – started with Abu Omar Al-Baghdadi, heir of Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, the founder of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, who was appointed by Osama Bin Laden. But Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi was bought by the wealthy Gulf sheikhs in order to bomb Shiite mosques and he launched a major operation that killed Abdul Aziz al-Hakim along with 80 others in a Shiite mosque. "That was how the Shiite mosques bombings started and the beginning of injustice to the Shiites. "For your information, ISIS leader Ibrahim Awad Al-Bakri, known as Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, was an officer in the Republican Guard of Saddam Hussein. He was arrested and jailed after the resuscitation of operations against the US military in Iraq. While serving time in American prisons, a good relationship sprouted between him and US intelligence, which eventually hired him, along with Mohammed Al-Adnany, to lead armed Islamist groups after their release from prison to overthrow the Bashar Al- Assad regime with the full support of US intelligence. "Special camps were established, especially in Jordan, called Marine camps. They were supplied from Qatar and Turkey. Then the terrorists began to enter Syria and Saudi Arabia agreed with 2,000 people from al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula to go to Syria or else be jailed. And when Bashar did not fall, Jordan asked the United States to close the camps because large numbers of Palestinian refugees had entered them and become a threat to Jordan itself. "The camps were then moved from Jordan to Turkey and increased from two to six and Jihadists came from all over the world—countries such as Chechnya, Uzbekistan, Belgium and France. They all went to Istanbul and from there to assembly points and then to the camps and finally to Syria. Six hundred Jihadist left from France, most of them of Arab descent and France insisted on shutting down the networks responsible for moving them because they had become a real threat to European states. The Charles Hebdo crime is an example." How do you explain the violence of ISIS, is there any difference between ISIS and other terror groups? "ISIS have a book called ‘Idarat Al Tawahosh' (Management of Savagery). It recommends burning, slaughtering and crucifying and supplies ISIS with its ideology. The book's author is Sayed Imam and Abu Muhammad Al-Maqdisi explains its provisions." Where does ISIS get the funds that allow them to be armed with the latest weapons and technology? "After the Battle of Mosul, ISIS seized $450,000 from banks and the same amount in other currencies (they got the equivalent in all of US $ 1 million) in addition to the control of 30 oil fields. They then opted to sell the barrel for $ 2 to Turkey who then sold it to Israel for $ 10. ISIS then increased the price to $ 5 per barrel to Turkey, who then sold it to Israel for $ 20. The result was that ISIS was became a force to be reckoned with, making Kerry say, "After the battle of Mosul, we lost control over ISIS." "Baathist officers, who are the planners for ISIS, have admitted that the war in Syria is useless. America wants it, but they know that they are losing the war. Therefore they decided to control the Iraqi Kurds in the north, giving them an opportunity to announce their state. They then took their forces to Arbil, the capital of the Kurdish state, and seized the Kirkuk oil field, the second largest in the world." ISIS, in my opinion, is destined for defeat. I am not sure when that will happen because there are a lot of sympathizers wanting to retaliate against America and ISIS's ability to attract soldiers to fight the USA is huge. Why do you think they have this ability to gather young people from all over the globe, especially Europeans and Asians? "The reason people join ISIS is their alienation from society. They have problems related to living in their communities. These make them look for salvation through ISIS, which offers them a simple religion which does not require culture. ISIS's ideology of Islam is superficial and naïve. It offers a religion without culture. Then, again, the person who joins is looking for salvation from the society in which he lives in and finds it in ISIS." Why do the names of jihadist organizations vary while there is coordination and an intellectual consensus among many of them? "True, there is no difference between al-Qaeda and ISIS. They have the same ideology. But ISIS classifies more humans as infidels than Al Qaeda. ISIS and Jabhet Al Nusra were good allies of the Muslim Brotherhood until the Botherhood reached the Egyptian presidency. Jabhet Al Nusra and Al-Qaeda were allied with the Muslim Brotherhood. This led ISIS to declare Ayman al-Zawahiri an infidel, because the MBs claim to be democrats and democrats, in their view, are infidels. The MBs are wicked—they smartly plan ahead-- while ISIS are a bit naïve. For example, the Muslim Brotherhood announced after the conference in America that they believe in freedom, including freedom for homosexuality. ISIS resents this and declared Al-Qaeda loyalists infidels, for being in alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood. A fight ensued between them, and ISIS executed 66 Jabhet AL Nusra loyalists. Al Nusra responded ,killing 34 ISIS operatives. They then accused Ayman al-Zawahiri of blasphemy and called on him to repent." Why has the spread of ISIS in most of Arab countries not led to the targeting of Israel? "The information that no one knows is that the distance between the positions of the Israeli army in the Golan Heights and that of the Syrian army is seven kilometers. ISIS and Jabhet Al Nusra are within the Syrian zone and cause no harm to Israel whatsoever. "Israel is not affected by their presence. On the contrary, it treats their wounded in Israeli hospitals. Netanyahu visited some of them last month. He said: ‘We treat the victims of the Syrian dictatorship.' They tell him ‘May God reward you.'" What about Yemeni developments? Why did al-Qaeda not intervene in Yemen to halt the Houthis while ISIS decided to do so? "Al-Qaeda did a lot and blew up many sites in Yemen. But the war with America and Ali Abdullah Saleh for ten years had exhausted them. The problem with the Houthis is that those who were in control of Yemen were the Muslim Brotherhood who drained Yemen over forty years without any significant development. So when the Houthis appeared in the revolution, the people, wanting change, followed them, but the Houthis have a hidden Iranian agenda. I see that they won't stay for long in Yemen. Saudi Arabia, moreover, won't allow it." The war in Sinai has evolved significantly, terrorists use advanced weapons and computers, not to forget the last bombing of Al-Arish? How do you justify this? And what are the developments there? "The terrorists in Sinai have received significant funding. Huge sums of money were smuggled into Sinai for recruiting new members to the terrorist groups. With regard to the Al-Arish incident, I received information that the driver of the water tanker who used to go to the camp was bribed with a large sum of money, said to be $100 thousand, and when he drove into the camp, they bombed the car by phone. But I think it's a losing battle. The terrorists will not survive against the Egyptian Army. There can be no doubt of that ."
