Dubai’s chief of police, General Dahi Khalfan al-Tamim, claims that the Muslim Brotherhood is “a small group that has strayed from the true path.” He also says that the revolution in Egypt “would not have been possible without Iran’s support and is the prelude to a new Sykes-Picot agreement” (1). And that Mohammed Morsi’s election in Egypt was “an unfortunate choice.” Like many leading figures in the Arab world, Al-Tamin uses Twitter, where he has said: “If the Muslim Brotherhood threatens the Gulf’s security, the blood that flows will drown it.”
Throughout this summer, Al-Tamin criticised the Brotherhood, which he calls “a sinful gang whose demise is drawing near”, and called for their assets and bank accounts to be frozen (2). The authorities in the UAE, of which Dubai is a part, have brought around 60 of the Brothers to court, charged with plotting against the regime.
The pan-Arab newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat belongs to Saudi crown prince Salman’s family. Despite its reputation in the West, it has almost no autonomy in matters of Arab politics. The day after Mohammed Morsi’s swearing-in on 30 June, its editor, Abdul Rahman Al-Rashed, asked some questions (really those of the Al-Saud family) (3). Would Egypt’s new head of state fight terrorism and oppose Al-Qaida? Would he continue Egypt’s mediating role over Palestine? Would he genuinely support the Syrian opposition, given his opposition to any foreign military intervention? Would he back Jordan’s king Abdullah against the challenge from the Jordanian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood?
Al-Rashed wrote: “As Iran has long been a strong ally of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, will the new president decide to resume relations with Tehran under the pretext that Iran has embassies and ambassadors in the Gulf states?... Will he remain silent about Iran’s ideological and religious activities that have intensified ever since the ousting of Mubarak, as seen in Tehran’s support for local groups and attempts to spread Shia ideology among some Egyptian circles? This is something Al-Azhar [Sunni Islam’s leading institution based in Cairo] has already criticised, warning that Egypt could be threatened with sectarian conflict.”
These warnings, and many others in the Gulf press, have attracted little attention in the West, perhaps because they run counter to the prevailing view: that there is a broad alliance uniting the emirs of the Gulf and the Islamist movements in their wish to impose strict religious order and sharia, as though a shared conservative vision of Islam supersedes political considerations and diplomatic rivalries, national differences and divergent strategies.
Read more: Gulf cools towards Muslim Brothers - Le Monde diplomatique - English edition
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