European Foundation for Democracy

Muslim extremists ambushed and interrupted a conference organised by EFD and called for the death of EFD Senior Fellow Irshad Manji and Tofik Dibi MP, a member of the Green Party in Holland.

Press Statement - “We will not leave”: Muslim reformers to extremists

- On 7 December 2011, twenty radical Muslims hijacked an event featuring Muslim reformists, Irshad Manji and Tofik Dibi, in Amsterdam.

The Pew Research Centre’s recent findings that tensions between the Muslim and Western world remain high strengthens the European Foundation for Democracy’s unwavering commitment to improving these relations. EFD’s LIBERAL MUSLIMS EMPOWERMENT PROJECT is making a significant impact in this area by facilitating the successful integration of Muslims in Europe.

On 22nd June 2011, Time Magazine published an article which is worth analysing. The title – clean and telling – was “Why the Muslim Brotherhood Are Egypt’s Best Democrats”. The article’s thesis was the following: “Of all political groups to have emerged since the fall of Hosni Mubarak – including the myriad youth movements, secular parties, leftists and remnants of the old National Democratic Party – the Muslim Brotherhood seems to have the best understanding of how democracy works.”

In recent years the term “Islamophobia” has been widely used- and misused. If there are certain thinkers and politicians in the West who can be defined as “Islamophobes” for their ideas and writings, it is not entirely fair that people criticising radical Islam deserve this moniker.

On 30^th August 2010, Time Magazine had “Is America Islamophobic? What the anti-mosque uproar tells us about how the US regards Muslims” as its cover story. I must admit if the cover with a stars and stripes crescent shocked me, I was really appalled when I read the article inside.

EFD Fellow Bakary Sambe appeared alongside EFD Visiting Fellow Walid Phares for an interview with Voice of America presenter Lamia Gritli discussing the recent death of Bin Laden. Speaking on a range of issues, Bakary Sambe noted that whilst the head of Al Qaeda has now gone, the ideology he spread will continue to pose threats, stressing the decentralised structure of the global network of radical groups.

In mid-February, the Iranian News Agency Tabnek, linked to Mohssen Rezai the former Revolutionary Guard General, reported that "Nazi propagandists are once again active in Iran." The Islamist News Agency criticised the fact that no one took action against the Iranian Nazis. Whilst Tabnak is anti-Israeli, it still does not view co-operation between some Islamists and Nazis in a favourable light.

EFD Senior Fellow and Islamic Studies expert, Valentina Colombo, has recently been appointed as a member of the consultative body "Comitato per l'Islam Italiano" (Italian Islam Committee), reporting to Italy's Interior Ministry. Valentina has also recently become a member of the EU-funded "PRISNET" programme, assisting European and Balkan governments in addressing the challenge of radicalisation in prisons.

The Iranian rulers see in the new mass protests in Arabic states the reawakening of Islam and speak of the "new axis of Islam in the middle East." They think that the Islamic revolution of 1979 was the beginning of the protests against the western and "Zionist" supremacy.