Interpol issued “red notice” arrest warrants for more than 40 senior Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated figures over the weekend, including the head of the Doha-based International Union of Muslim Scholars Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi. A red notice seeks “the location and arrest of wanted persons with a view to extradition or similar lawful action.”
“Egyptian authorities succeeded in persuading Interpol that these figures are fugitives and terrorists who are inciting violence and crimes,” a high-level Egyptian security official informed the newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat.
Interpol issued “red notices” for Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, Sheikh Wajdy Ghanem and 40 other “senior members” of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood organization.
The Egyptian official said the persons included on the list are wanted on a number of terror-related crimes. As for Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, who is often described as the “spiritual godfather” of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Egyptian official said:
“He has issued statements aiming to confound relations between Qatar and its Gulf neighbors, in addition to inciting violence in Egypt and Syria.”
Interpol’s official website confirmed that Qaradawi, aged 88, is wanted on a range of charges including “agreement, incitement and assistance to commit intentional murder, helping prisoners to escape, arson, vandalism and theft.”
Egypt holds Qaradawi responsible for violent attacks on Egyptian prisons in 2011 that left scores of Egyptian security officers dead or wounded. The prison breaks freed thousands of inmates, including jailed Muslim Brotherhood activists.
Qaradawi currently resides in Qatar.
In a quick response, activists on social networks opened a campaign under the slogan “Al-Qaradawi is not a terrorist” (Arabic link), criticizing Interpol’s decision.
Last year, Qaradawi urged Egyptians to boycott presidential elections, won by now-President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. Qaradawi also urged Egyptians to support ousted Muslim Brotherhood president Mohamed Morsi and restore him to his “legitimate post.”
The influential Sheikh was stripped of his citizenship by former president Gamal Abdel Nasser. He was first arrested under Egypt’s King Farouk in 1949, then again under Nasser in 1956 and later in 1963. He then fled to Qatar, where he became a citizen in the 1970s, according to the Egypt Daily News.
Qaradawi’s fatwas, or religious rulings, in support of suicide bombings against Israeli civilians sparked considerable controversy. He was banned decades ago from entering both the United States and United Kingdom.
Last year, Qaradawi visited Gaza and said, “Our wish should be that we carry out Jihad to death. We should seek to liberate Palestine, all of Palestine, inch by inch.” In August of this year, Saleh al-Arouri, the Turkey-based Hamas commander who is in charge of terrorism in the West Bank, admitted that Hamas was behind the kidnapping and killing of three Israeli teens at a conference organized by Qaradawi.
Jonathan Spyer wrote of Qaradawi in Qatar’s Rise and America’s Tortured Middle East Policy, which was published in the August 2014 issue of The Tower Magazine.
Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the movement’s most famous and influential preacher, is a resident of the Qatari capital. His sermons, broadcast on Al-Jazeera from Qatar, replete with anti-Semitic hatred and loathing for Israel, are listened to by millions.
[Photo: Omar Chatriwala / Flickr]