Ex-Muslim Brotherhood Moderate Warns About...the Muslim Brotherhood

By Barry Rubin

This is really interesting. All along we have been told that there is a moderate faction in the Muslim Brotherhood. And there was: the people who wanted to form the Wasat party years ago. But they were shut up by the Brotherhood's leadership.

Now, the former leader of that effort--which was used to paint the Brotherhood as moderate--announced that he quit the Brotherhood in the 1990s. In other words, the moderates left or were forced out.

And what is the evaluation of Abou Elela Mady (not my preferred transliteration)? Here is a quotation from the interview he gave to Reuters:


"The Muslim Brotherhood will be the only group in Egypt ready for a parliamentary election unless others are given a year or more to recover from years of oppression."

So in other words the former leading moderate in the Brotherhood predicts that the Brotherhood might win a parliamentary election. I don't think they are likely to win but they are going to do very well.

Remember how during the revolution, those of us who said the Brotherhood was strong were ridiculed. Now the truth is coming out. To be fair, Mady compares the Brotherhood to the Turkish AKP. I think that's reasonable if one interprets it as a radical party that pretends to be moderate until it gains power and then step by step pushes for Islamism.

Once again, I don't think the Brotherhood is going to take power and make Egypt an Islamist state. I think that either the Brotherhood will be a very powerful and increasingly strong opposition party or will participate in a government coalition and leverage that into growing power.

Having an anti-Brotherhood president would mitigate their power. But if the first government falters--not being able to deliver better living standards--the Brotherhood will be waiting for its opportunity in several years.