Reuters handles PR for the Muslim Brotherhood

Reuters correspondent Andrew Quinn reports on a charm offensive by the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, designed to win over American politicians.

Recall, the Brotherhood is committed to implementing Sharia law in Egypt, is deeply antisemitic, encourages Muslim men to treat women like chattel, advocates death for homosexuals, despises Western democracy, seeks the destruction of Israel, and believes in permanent underclass status for religious minorities.

So how does Quinn characterize the group?

The Muslim Brotherhood, which was founded in 1928 and seeks to promote its conservative vision of Islam in society, has made dramatic gains since a popular uprising toppled President Hosni Mubarak last year and launched Egypt on an unpredictable political course.

Then, there's this reassuring news:

The FJP candidate, Khairat al-Shater, said in comments reported on Wednesday that introducing sharia law would be his "first and final objective," but the FJP group in Washington sought to dismissed fears this meant they aimed to establish an Islamic theocracy.

And this amusing piece of sophistry:

Abdul Mawgoud Dardery, an FJP lawmaker from Luxor, said the party was dedicated to the principle of a "civil state" and the objectives of sharia law rather than its specific practice.

Leading to this inadvertently hilarious juxtaposition:

The FJP team took pains to appear both reasonable and flexible during their Washington visit, quoting both from the Koran and from the U.S. self-help manual "Seven Habits of Highly Effective People," and depicting themselves as the true heirs of the uprising in Cairo's Tahrir Square.

All reported on by Quinn with absolutely no background or critical insight on the Brotherhood, its fanatical founder, its dogma, or its, shall we say, less politically correct spokesmen.

"Conservative".

Reuters: masters of Newspeak

In a story about the first ever public display of contemporary art in Saudi Arabia, Reuters correspondent Asma Alsharif characterizes Saudi society as "conservative" four times:

"Evolution not revolution" reads the sign he plans to place over the conservative Islamic kingdom, where an exhibition organisers call Saudi Arabia's first public show of contemporary art has opened this month, entitled "We need to talk." [...]

Saudi Arabia, a country ruled over by the al-Saud royal family in alliance with powerful conservative clerics, has no elected parliament or political parties and applies a rigid variation of Sharia law. [...]

Other taboos include anything seen as blasphemous, criticism of the conservative nature of Saudi society, and sex or nudity. [...]

Angawi said he accepted that he might not be able to play some of the comments people recorded, and that finding the right balance between freedom of expression and the demands of a conservative society would be difficult.

Recall, this is a country where the most draconian suppression of human rights and freedoms is institutionalized in the country's Sharia-based legal system; Islamic dress-code is enforced by religious police; women must be accompanied by a male guardian at all times; homosexuality is outlawed and punishable by imprisonment, lashings and death; and non-Muslims are persecuted and tortured for practicing their faith.

This is what Reuters characterizes as "conservative".

By contrast, journalists in Reuters Jerusalem Bureau refer to a spitting incident by a Haredi Jew in Israel as "violence by zealots".

What do they teach these guys at Reuters school?

Jonathan Wright explains the fundamental difference between the fundamentalists

Former Reuters Cairo Bureau Chief and long-time Arabist, Jonathan Wright, who has been busy whitewashing the Islamists in Egypt for gullible Western audiences since before the fall of Hosni Mubarak in February, parses for us the critical distinction between the Islamists of the Muslim Brotherhood and the Islamists of the Nour party:

Nasser Khodeir, a civil engineer and Brotherhood supporter in the town of Tansa, said Brotherhood members were also Salafi in their beliefs but didn't share the importance Salafis attach to physical appearance, such as clothing and the cut of the beard. Salafis favour robes or trouser cut off above the angle and long beards, usually with the moustache short or shaved off.

Well, now that we know they will be using different barbers and tailors, please note that both the Brotherhood and al-Nour seek the imposition of strict sharia law (as outlined in Reliance of the Traveller: A Classic Manual of Islamic Sacred Law) and, ultimately, a global caliphate.

Both groups are deeply antisemitic, treat women like chattel, advocate death for homosexuals, despise Western democracy, seek the destruction of Israel, and believe in permanent underclass status for religious minorities in countries where they have power.

Wright won't tell you any of this of course; he's far too lost in translation:

"Reporters of course, they work very fast and they don't think too deeply about what they're doing."

Yes, we've noticed that.

Facts just twist the truth around

Reuters runs one of its fatuous "factbox" series to educate us on the policies of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, and correspondent Shaimaa Fayed parrots the following absurd non sequitur with absolutely no criticism and no hint of irony:

FJP [Freedom and Justice Party] and Brotherhood officials say they want to build a modern, democratic state based on Islamic sharia law.

A "modern, democratic state" built on a political and legal system 1,400 years-old where religious minorities are subject to systematic discrimination and women are treated as chattel.

But it gets worse:

The Muslim Brotherhood is a vociferous critic of Israel. Although it long ago renounced violence as a means to bring change in Egypt, it says those facing occupation have the right to "resist by all means." The Palestinian militant group Hamas sees the Brotherhood as a spiritual leader.

As a reminder, here's what that "vociferous critic" recently had to say about the Jewish citizens of Israel:

A Muslim Brotherhood rally in Cairo's most prominent mosque Friday turned into a venomous anti-Israel protest, with attendants vowing to "one day kill all Jews".

For Reuters correspondents, facts apparently just won't do what they want them to.

Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood changes its mind on a civil state, Reuters shocked

Since the February revolution in Egypt, Reuters has spent reams of paper carefully sanitizing the history, dogma, and objectives of the Muslim Brotherhood.  Just last May for example, the agency was assuring us that the Brotherhood had no interest in a parliamentary majority in Egypt and was not seeking to impose Islamic law (Sharia).

Things seem to have changed:

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's liberal Wafd party said on Sunday it may quit an electoral deal with the Muslim Brotherhood, highlighting growing tensions between liberals and Islamists over their vision for Muslim-majority Egypt.
The pact's aim was to allay fears that Islamists would seek to dominate debate about a new constitution, due to be re-written after parliament is elected. Some liberals fear Islamists want the constitution to create an Islamic state [...]

"It seems that the Brotherhood has retracted its position from the document that all members of the alliance have signed setting general rules that the new constitution must have," Yassin Tageldin, Wafd's deputy chairman, told Reuters.

He said Wafd understood that the agreement laid down principles to ensure that when re-written would establish a civil state.

The Brotherhood, which insists it wants a constitution that respects Muslims and non-Muslims alike, have said the pact was not a statement of principles about any constitutional debate but covered how groups would behave before elections [...]

Another Wafd leader, Essam Sheha, told Egypt's al-Mal newspaper that his party wanted to leave the pact after "the Brotherhood ... raised slogans calling for a religious state."

It was a reference to a demonstration on July 29, that was dominated by Salafists with a very strict view of Islam, whose slogans included saying said Islam came before any constitution.

We await the return of former Reuters Cairo Bureau Chief Jonathan Wright who will undoubtedly assure us all is well because the Brotherhood's leadership consists of engineers, doctors, lawyers, and academics.

Nothing to see here; move on.

Today's Orwellian Prize

Today's Orwellian Prize for Journalism goes to Reuters kingpin propagandist and correspondent Tom Perry who pens a feature story on Algerian singer Souad Massi performing in Judea and Samaria (the "West Bank") on Tuesday.  Perry writes:

The songwriter and guitarist acclaimed for her extraordinary voice predicts no quick end to the popular uprisings that are reshaping the Middle East.
And she thinks it is only matter of time before the Arab Spring reaches Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in the West Bank, where she performed at a sell-out concert on Tuesday.
"What would have been a miracle in the past, can today happen," said Massi, whose latest album, released in October, includes three songs on the theme of revolution. They include "Let Me Be In Peace," a duet with British star Paul Weller.
The track, she says, is dedicated to the Palestinians, who have waged two major Intifadas, or uprisings, against Israel in the last three decades.

Apparently lost on both Massi and Perry is the irony of a songtrack entitled "Let Me Be in Peace", dedicated to a society which popularized aircraft hijackings and suicide bombings and murdered over 1,000 people, mostly civilians, earlier last decade.

Moving on however, we wonder whether Massi has considered whether she would be welcomed performing songs in the Flamenco style in a Palestinian state where Shari'a is the main source of legislation. 

Perhaps, but we're guessing she'd have to change her stage costume.