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Abstract
The Arab capitulation in the Six Day War was posited to stimulate the so-called Islamic resurgence in the region since the 1970s, which several scholars see as a sign of Islamic resistance to the Western cultural presence within the Arab world. This article argues that Islamizing the conflict began well before the 1967 defeat, and that the hegemony of the Islamist discourse has been made possible owing to its penetration into mainstream political and media discourses. It is also argued that by ‘religionizing’ the Palestinian–Israeli conflict, Islamists provide a new narrative to reshape and reframe the perception of this conflict as being religious rather than political in nature. The article takes the Muslim Brotherhood as a topical case study, demonstrating how its print and digital media highlighted the Islamization of the conflict with Israel and providing frequent references to the 1967 defeat as evidence of God’s wrath meted out on Arab rulers, not only for abandoning the Islamic State project, but also for oppressing Islamist movements.
Notes
1 Al-Dawa, June 1977.
2 See e.g., Youssef M Choueiri, ‘The political discourse of contemporary Islamist movements’, in Abdel Salam Sidahmed and Anounshirvan Ehteshami (eds), Islamic Fundamentalism (Boulder: Westview, 1996); John Esposito, Islam and Secularism in the Middle East (London: Hurst & Company, 2000).
3 Meir Litvak, The Islamization of the Palestinian–Israeli Conflict: The Case of Hamas. Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 34(1), 1998, 148–163, p. 148.
4 Litvak, 1998, 148.
5 Yvonne Haddad, Islamists and the ‘Problem of Israel’: The 1967 Awakening. Middle East Journal, Vol. 46 (2), Spring, 1992: 266–285, p. 266.
6 L. M. Kenny, The Aftermath of Defeat in Egypt. International Journal, Vol. 23, No. 1: 97–108 (Winter, 1969), pp. 105–106.
7 Sadeq Jalal Al-Azm, Naqd al-Khitab al-Deeni. 2nd edition (Beirut: Dar al-Talia, 1970), p. 176.
8 Kenny, 1969, 105–106.
9 Haddad, 1992, 267.
10 Nasr Hamid Abu Zeid, Naqd el Khitab el-Deeni (Cairo: Sina Publishing, 1994), pp. 71–72.
11 For a detailed discussion of the MB media, see Noha Mellor, Voice of the Muslim Brotherhood (New York: Routledge, 2017).
12 Uri M Kupferschmidt, Literacy, Illiteracy and Censorship in the Tradition of the Muslim Brotherhood, in Philip Sadgrove (ed.) Printing and Publishing in the Middle East. Journal of Semitic Studies, Supplement 24 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008): 165–184, p. 170.
13 Roberto Franzosi, Narrative Analysis—or Why (and How) Sociologists Should be Interested in Narrative. Annual Review of Sociology, Vol. 24: 517–554, 1998, pp. 523–524.
14 Franzosi, 1998, 545.
15 Margaret R. Somers, The narrative constitution of identity: A relational and network approach. Theory and Society, Vol. 23: 605–649, 1994, p. 606.
16 Somers, 1994, 607.
17 Somers, 1994, 616.
18 Franzosi, 1998, 519–521.
19 Somers, 1994, 619.
20 Franzosi, 1998, 519.
21 Norman Fairclough, Analysing Discourse (London: Routledge, 2003), p. 32.
22 Fairclough, 2003, 215.
23 Maarten A Hajer, Doing discourse analysis: coalitions, practices, meaning. In: Van den Brink, Margo/Metze, Tamara: Words Matter in Policy and Planning. Discourse Theory and Method in the Social Sciences (Utrecht: Netherlands Graduate School of Urban and Regional Research, 2006): 65–76, p. 72.
24 Fairclough, 2003.
25 Norman Fairclough, Discourse and Social Change (Cambridge: Polity, 1992).
26 Fairclough, 1992.
27 Aziz Talbani, Pedagogy, power and discourse: transformation of Islamic education. Comparative Education Review 40(1), 1996, pp. 66–82.
28 Mark Juergensmeyer, The New Cold War? Religious Nationalism Confronts the Secular State (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), pp. 194–195.
29 Ira M. Lapidus, ‘Contemporary Islamic movements in historical perspectives’, Policy Papers in International Affairs, 18 (Berkeley: University of California, 1983).
30 Rogers Brubaker, Religion and Nationalism: Four Approaches. Nations and Nationalism, Vol. 18, 2012, Issue 1: 2–20.
31 Mohamed Aboulkhir Zaki, Modern Muslim Thought in Egypt And Its Impact on Islam in Malaya. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of London, 1965, p. 231.
32 Zaki, 1965, 243.
33 Israel Gershoni & James P. Jankowski, Redefining the Egyptian Nation, 1930–1945 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002) pp. 95–96.
34 Tariq Al-Bishri, Al haraka al siyassiya fi misr (Cairo: Dar al Shorouq, 2002), p. 141.
35 The Times (1968) Threat to Nasser regime grows after riots. November 27, 1968.
36 Abbas Kelidar, Shifts and Changes in the Arab World. The World Today, Vol. 24, No. 12 (Dec., 1968), pp. 503–511, p. 507.
37 Cited in Kenny, 1969, 105.
38 Galal Amin, al-Muthaqqafun al-Arab wa Israel (Cairo: Dar el Shorouq, 1998).
39 Noha Mellor, The Egyptian Dream. On Egyptian National Identity and the Uprisings (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2016), p. 127.
40 Peter Mansfield, Egypt since June 1967. The World Today, Vol. 24, No. 10 (Oct., 1968), pp. 414–420, p. 414.
41 Al-Sayyed Abdel Sattar Al-Meligy, Tagrabati maa al-ikhwan (Cairo: al-Zahraa lil ilam al-Arabi, 2009).
42 Abul Ela Madi, Gamaat al-unf al-dawliyya wa ta’welathia lil-Islam (Cairo: Maktabat al-Shurouq, 2006).
43 Al-Meligy, 2009.
44 Abu Zeid, 1994, 55.
45 See, for example, Charles Tripp, Ali Mahir Pasha and the Palace in Egyptian Politics. Unpublished PhD thesis, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 1984.
46 Abd al-Fattah Muhammad El-Awaisi, The Muslim Brothers and The Palestine Question 1936–1947. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Exeter, 1986, p. 43.
47 el-Awaisi, 1986, p. 44.
48 Israel Gershoni, The Muslim Brothers and the Arab Revolt in Palestine, 1936–39, Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 22, 1986, No. 3: 367–397, p. 379.
49 Thomas Mayer, Egypt and the 1936 Arab Revolt in Palestine. Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 19, 1984, No. 2: 275–287, p. 278.
50 Mahmoud Abdel Halim, al-Ikhwan al-Muslimoun. Ahdath Sanaat al-Tarikh. Vol. 1. 1928–1948. 4th edition (Alexandria: Dar al-Dawaa, 1994), p. 88.
51 Cited in Adnan M Rizk, Mustafa al-Sibai 1915–1964 (Damascus: Dar al-Qalm, 2000), p. 110.
52 Mayer, 1984, 284.
53 Awatef Abdel Rahman, Misr wa Filistin (Cairo: Dar Al Maarefa, 1980), p. 68.
54 The magazine was launched on 30 May 1938, marking the tenth anniversary of the movement. It ceased on 16 October 1939.
55 Abdel Halim, 1994, 174.
56 Abdel Halim, 1994, 91.
57 Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun, 27 June 1946.
58 Al-Nadhir, issue 14, 28 August, 1938.
59 Al-Nadhir issue 9, 24 July, 1938.
60 Abdel Halim, 1994, 174.
61 Abdel Halim, 1994.
62 Mohammad Fathi Ali Shoeir, wasa’il al-Ilam al-Matbua fi dawat al-ikhwan al-Muslimin. Unpublished MA thesis, Al-Imam University, Saudi Arabia, 1983, p. 325.
63 Al-Muslimun, January 1954.
64 Kupferschmidt, 2008, 183.
65 Yoav Di-Capua, Gatekeepers of the Arab Past (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009), p. 314.
66 Di-Capua, 2009, 317.
67 Zeinab Al-Ghazaly, Ayyam min Hayati (Cairo: Islamic Publication and Distribution, 1999).
68 Hamed Abu Nasr (1987).
69 Fouad Zakariyya, Myth and Reality in the Counterparty Islamist Movement (London: Pluto Press, 2005), pp. 20–21.
70 Gilles Kepel, Muslim Extremism in Egypt. The Prophet and Pharaoh (Berkeley: The University of California Press, 1984), p. 111.
71 Cited in Kepel, 1984, 112; see also Liwa al-Islam, November 1990.
72 Kepel, 1984, 112.
73 Scholars such as Tariq al-Bishri also believed that the Jewish leaders of the Communist movement in Egypt in the 1940s were close to the Zionist movement in Israel, which they supported in 1948. The aim of the Communist movement, according to al-Bishri (2002, p. 23), was to counteract the Islamic movement led by Islamic associations such as the MB and Young Egypt party; nevertheless, the Communist movement managed to attract a sector of the youth and enrich the political sphere at the time, argues al-Bishri.
74 Al-Dawa, June 1977.
75 Al-Dawa (July 1978).
76 For example, al-Dawa, Sept. 1979.
77 Al-Dawa, Oct 1979.
78 Mellor, 2016, 136.
79 Liwa al-Islam, June 1988.
80 Liwa al-Islam December 1989.
81 Liwa al-Islam, November 1990.
82 Hosam Tammam, al-Fada’iyyat al-salafiyya. Hal tuqawem al-salafiyya almanat al-fada’iyyat lil tadiyon? Islamyun web forum, 18 May 2009, https://www.islamun.net (accessed on 22 April 2016).
83 Al-Amira Samah Farag Abdel Fattah, al-ilam al-gadid. Ro’ya min waqi al-solekiyat al-itisaliya li shabab gamaat al-ikhwan al-muslimin. unpublished manuscript, 2012, https://scholar.cu.edu.eg/?q=mediatizedconflict/node/43160 (accessed on 18 November 2016). Some archived pages can be viewed using WayBackMachine available on https://web.archive.org
84 The Palestinian activist Ibrahim Allosh posted a comment on ashahed2000 website, responding to an article by Jonathan Freedland in the Guardian, published on 17 October 2001. Freedland questioned the rationale behind the Arabs’ obsession with the Palestinian cause, and how the Israeli withdrawal of forces from Gaza could ever change the lives of Arabs and Muslims anywhere else in the region: ‘of course Mr Freedland was deliberately ignoring the bonds between Arabs and Muslims, cultural and national bonds, or Arabism and Islam’, wrote Allosh.
85 Sebnem Gumuscu, ‘Class, status, and party: the changing face of political Islam in Turkey and Egypt’, Comparative Political Studies, 43(7), 2010: 835–861.
86 OECD, Reviews of National Policies for Education Higher Education in Egypt (Paris: OECD Publishing, 2010), p. 190.
88 Fathi Shihab Eddin, mokhattat Bernard Lewis li tafteet al-alam al-islami. IkhwanOnline, 9 Jan. 2011, https://www.ikhwanonline.com/new/Article.aspx?SecID=344&ArtID=77565
89 See, for instance, Abdel Rahim Ali’s interview on Ala Hawa Misr talk-show, An-Nahar station, dated 29 November 2016.
91 Al-Horriya wal adala, 4 January, 2012, p. 12.
92 Al-Horriya wal adala, 29 October 2011, p. 1.
93 Al-Horriya wal adala, 29 October, 2011, p. 12.
94 Al-Horriya wal adala, 30 October 2011, p. 13).
95 Mohamad Habib, al-ikhwan al-muslimin bayna al-soud wal riyasa wa taakul al-shariya (Cairo: Sama, 2013), pp. 69–7.
96 al-Dawa Nov. 1980.
97 Litvak, 1998, 151.
98 Litvak, 1998, p. 153.
99 Conversely, the past decade has witnessed an intensification of the debate surrounding ‘atheism’ as a potential response to the rise of jihadist violence, such as that of ISIS (see, e.g., Fi Falak al-Mamnou programme on France 24 Arabic, 11 Nov. 2016).
100 Litvak, 1998, 149.
101 Litvak, 1998, 157.
102 Gregory Starrett, Putting Islam to Work: Education, Politics, and Religious Transformation in Egypt (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), pp. 8–9.
103 See also Claudia De Martino, Israeli War Perception from the Six Days War to the Operation Cast Lead: An Analysis of the Israeli Siege-Mentality. International Journal of Euro-Mediterranean Studies, Vol. 2(2), 2009: 235–252, p. 236.
104 Abu Zeid, 1994.