The politics of Mohammed Morsi's trial

The trial of Mohammed Morsi is a political trial designed by the Egyptian authorities to disgrace, delegitimise and dispose of the Muslim Brotherhood from the Egyptian political landscape. In a seminal study widely regarded as the most definitive account of the political trial, the Frankfurt school jurist Otto Kirchheimer regarded the political trial as a strategic mobilisation of the devices of law and justice to attain political ends.

"The classic political trial", Kirchheimer argued, is one in which the regime "attempt[s] to incriminate its foe's public behaviour with a view to evicting him from the political scene". Morsi's trial is a classic political trial designed to evict Morsi and his movement from the Egyptian political space.

Political trials are inevitable consequences of revolutions. From the English and French revolutions the 17th and 18th century to the Chinese and Iranian revolutions in the 20th century, the courtroom provided a convenient space for a ritualised elimination of former regimes.

Courts are mobilised not so much to eliminate the defunct regimes but to clarify, rationalise, justify and finally authenticate the revolution in an act of judgment. This is what is at work in Morsi's trial - the use of the courtroom to validate and authenticate a contested revolution. The court is not concerned with the determination of guilt and innocence so much as the rationalisation and justification of the events of July 3, 2013.

A revolution, not a coup d'etat?

The rhetoric of law and order, terrorism, and national security are all smokescreens for the power struggle between the Muslim Brotherhood and the military-backed regime. Beneath the rhetoric of terrorism and national security, there are the unfathomable purposes of history and power - a history of a botched revolution; conflicting accounts of what happened on 3 July 2013 (a coup d'etat, a counter-revolution or a second revolution); and the violence and crackdown that followed. The trial reduces these complex historico-political events into an either - or binary proposition that fits the self-referential logic of law.

The charges against Morsi and others - "incitement to violence" and "conspiracy to commit terrorism" - are charges carefully chosen to serve as fulcrums - narrative anchors in which to ground the regime's pedagogic stunts. The trial provides the event - the stage, the language, and the choreography - that lends bodily form, as Alexis De Tocqueville once noted, to the pedagogic enterprise.

As a truth-bearing platform with superior ability of image formation and saturation, the trial gives juridical reality and an appearance of neutrality and objectivity to the narrative of the state.

Within its own self-referential logic, the trial weighs the charges, assigns blame and attributes responsibility for the events alleged by the prosecution. It does not take account of the political and historical war that rages just beneath the invocation of its discourses. The objections of Morsi and his co-accused regarding the coup d'etat, the violence of the military, and the criminal origin of the regime are incompatible with "how the law thinks". For the purpose of criminal law, these are "objection[s] that cannot be heard": They do not signify within law's logic, its rationality, and modes of thought.

Order legitimation and power rationalisation

The immediate purpose of the trial is two-fold. Firstly, the trial is the most effective silencing device: By delegating the matter to a sympathetic judiciary, the regime silences all forms of criticism while it neutralises the political field from its adversary. Secondly, and perhaps most importantly, the trial has the aim of rationalising and justifying the coup d'etat by retroactively situating Morsi's defeat within a broader historical, political and moral narrative.

Using its truth-bearing discourses that allow it to create images that can neither be effaced nor rectified, the trial rationalises and justifies the power of the military regime. By presenting the adversary in the worst possible moral and political light, the trial both elaborates and consolidates a historico-political thesis in the image of the military and its civilian elites. What matters is not the validity or meaningfulness of the image so much as its effectiveness.

By accusing and judging the defendants for these crimes, the regime has a didactic goal that far exceeds the elimination of the Muslim Brotherhood: It aims to create a generative politico-historical thesis and an enduring image capable of instilling fear, prudence and obedience in potential foes. By projecting and amplifying a terrorist image of Morsi and his movement in the courtroom, a site of truth and justice supposedly elevated from the expediency of power and politics, the trial vindicates and authenticates a historico-political thesis in the image of the regime.

'I am your president. You have no legitimacy'

However, trials are not chess games that go according to pre-arranged rules. They can denaturalise, as to expose its flimsy facade of legality. In exercising the authority to judge its enemies, it submits itself to the accusation of its adversaries and the judgment of history. Just as the state uses the devices of law as political weapons, Morsi too can turn to these weapons.

The device is not equally available to the state and Morsi, but the deliberative framework of the trial and the principle of calling to account means that the defendant has a speaking position from which he can give an account of himself and the charges. Indeed, if Morsi's first day in court is any indication to go by, his trial could well be the trial of the military regime.

In his first court appearance, Morsi rejected the legitimacy and the authority of the court to try him. He argues that he is "the legitimate president" of the republic and accuses the military of a coup and treason. He challenges the court to justify how an illegal action - a coup d'etat - gives rise to a legal right that enables the criminals to judge an elected president: "This coup is a crime and treasonous, and the court is held responsible for it."

Morsi's defence will ask questions the prosecutor and the court cannot answer legally: According to what law, according to what rule of judgment and principle of justice do the courts and the social order they serve exercise the right to judge and punish an elected president? For Morsi and his supporters, "This is a military coup whose leaders must be put on trial in accordance with the constitution."

If an elected president can be called to the court to account for these acts, what of the military leaders who committed a treasonous offense? In other words, can the military bring Morsi to the court without calling the Revolution to the court? It is this question that law is ultimately incapable of answering without sliding into the abyss, to its origin in self-help. It is also here that the disjuncture between law and revolutions becomes most manifest, exposing the government and its courts to the judgement of history.

Regardless of how the court frames and ultimately settles these destabilising questions, Morsi's trial brings both the military and the revolution into the courtroom. The narratives and the verdict leave behind traces or remainders that cannot be integrated, or contained by the trial. It is this remainder, this excess, that exceeds the trial's ability to conceal and suppress, that returns to haunt Egypt and unsettle it from within.

Awol K Allo is a Fellow in Human Rights at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial policy.

Source: Al Jazeera

'Egypt's Moment of Truth Has Arrived'

Freshly inaugurated Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi surprised his countrymen and the world on Sunday with a daring move to take back power from the strong grip of the military. In what has been widely seen as a well-timed, politically clever move, Morsi forced seven top-level officers into retirement, including Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi. The head of the old-guard military leadership, Tantawi effectively took charge of Egypt via the powerful military council following the fall of former dictator Hosni Mubarak last year. Then, just before Morsi, the country's first democratically elected president, took office on June 30, the military had most of his presidential powers removed.

But on Sunday Morsi's spokesman said that this constitutional declaration had been scrapped. The country now awaits the creation of a new constitution that will be approved via referendum, after which a new parliament will be elected.

Tantawi and his number two, Gen. Sami Anan, are set to be kept on as advisers in Morsi's government, and so far the military has not rebelled against the president's power play, which involved hiring younger officers as replacements. There was no "negative reaction" within the military, according to an anonymous official quoted by the official news agency on Sunday.

"I did not mean to send a negative message about anyone, but my aim was the benefit of this nation," Morsi said in a speech on Sunday. His spokesperson also said his decision aimed to "pump new blood into the military establishment in the interests of developing a new, modern state."

Celebration in Cairo

Morsi and his fellow Islamists from the Muslim Brotherhood were not expected to act so quickly in removing the military from power, but the president appears to have taken advantage of a moment of weakness. The military has been embarrassed by its failure to thwart an attack by militants at the Sinai border that killed some 16 Egyptian guards, and has since launched a large deployment in the area.

Thousands of Morsi's supporters reportedly gathered in Cairo's Tahrir Square to celebrate his success. But on the international level, there is some concern that he could use his new power to create an Islamist state.

Reaction from officials in Washington to Morsi's military shake-up was calm, however. "We had expected President Morsi at some point to coordinate changes in the military leadership to name a new team," said US Defense Department press secretary George Little. The most important thing, US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland added, is that both sides "keep working well together to advance the goals of the democratic transition in Egypt."

German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle expressed concern for the democratic future of Egypt, though. "These are fateful days for Egypt," he told daily Rheinische Post on Tuesday. "The future of the country will be decided by the citizens and the political institutions."

German media commentators on Tuesday praised Morsi's political skill, but expressed fears about the next steps he might take.

Conservative daily Die Welt writes:

"This is yet another development that is hard to interpret. It could be that, in a bid to gain better stature, Morsi has stepped out from behind the military's shadow and asserted the primacy of politics. That would be a first step in the necessary post-military state. But it could also be that Morsi is now beginning to remove the last big obstacle on the path to an Islamic government. Then the primacy of the military would be replaced by that of religion."

"But for the sake of the country, the region and the world, let's hope that Morsi is a brave man who can also show courage towards his own side in the same way he showed it towards the military. If this is the case, he has a balancing act ahead of him."

Conservative daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung writes:

"The Islamist appears to have handled the situation skilfully. … But much will depend on how Morsi exploits this new room to maneuver. He can lead Egypt into democracy, or he can choose further Islamization. The only certainty is that he must act."

"The expectations on the street are high. The Egyptians want a better future -- not tomorrow, but today. The first freely elected president will be measured by whether he can fulfil these expectations. But the revolution is taking place in fits and starts, and Egyptians' lives won't improve immediately this way."

Left-leaning daily Die Tageszeitung writes:

"The political disempowerment of the military leadership is the most important development for Egypt since the fall of Mubarak. President Mohammed Morsi has shown great skill. He managed to split the military leadership and get the members of the military council to participate in their own political displacement. Simultaneously, Morsi also had the dismissed generals highly decorated once again, effectively honoring them away."

"With this, he has made himself secure in two ways: The retired military men remain legally untouchable, an important step in ensuring that they wouldn't organize any resistance for a possible putsch. And, as the new presidential advisers, they are not allowed to leave the country without his permission. That means that legal steps against them can't be ruled out for the future. The fact that the military has remained quiet so far speaks to the president's elegant tactics."

Financial daily Handelsblatt writes:

"Egypt's moment of truth has arrived: Mohammed Morsi, Egypt's Islamist president, had done what was practically unthinkable, and removed the military from power. No one knows whether this volte-face in the power struggle will last or if it will spark retaliation from the military. But it was overdue if the most populous Arab country wants to move on more than a year after the fall of its long-time dictator Hosni Mubarak."

"Egypt is going under economically. … That's why the country desperately needs peace and stability, in addition to the fact that success in the Egyptian revolution would send a positive signal to the entire region. … But the danger that a brutal power struggle might break out between the old guard and the Muslim Brotherhood unfortunately can't be ruled out. That's why economic aid from the West is even more important to help stabilize the country. But so far there has been little more than a few encouraging words."

Source: Spiegel

Egyptian workers mount mass strikes against US-backed junta

Since the beginning of the week, a new wave of strikes and protests has spread over Egypt. Textile workers are on strike in the Nile Delta town of Mahalla al-Kubra, in Alexandria and in the coastal governorate of Daqaliya.

Ceramic workers in the industrial city of Suez, doctors in Marsa Matrouh, university workers in Kafr el-Sheikh, postal workers in Alexandria and Assiut and health workers on the Sinai Peninsula are also on strike. Other protests and strikes have been reported from Cairo, Bani Sueif and Minya.

The renewed strikes and protests reflect growing hostility in the working class to the reactionary policies of the US-backed military junta and its new Islamist figurehead, President Mohamed Mursi.

After Mursi’s inauguration as the first president after the revolutionary ouster of dictator Hosni Mubarak last year, the Egyptian ruling elite’s main goal is to further privatize the Egyptian economy, cut subsidies, and attract more foreign investment.

The Islamists and the junta generals are currently in discussions about forming a new cabinet, tasked with further attacks on the Egyptian masses. Among the names discussed for the new prime minister are three prominent bankers—Farouk El-Oqda, the current governor of the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE), former CBE governor Mahmoud Abul-Oyoun, and former deputy CBE governor Hesham Ramez.

The strikes are the working class’ answer to the continuation of Mubarak-style free-market policies.

On Sunday 25,000 textile workers at the state-owned Mahalla Misr Spinning and Weaving Company in the industrial town of Mahalla al-Kubra went on strike and staged a sit-in at the factory. Workers demand an increase in their share of the company’s annual profits, higher retirement bonuses and the removal of the management.

The workers of Mahalla played a leading role in last year’s revolution, and the Egyptian ruling elite is concerned that the mass strike could spark another revolution. On Monday and Tuesday workers of seven other Nile Delta textile factories went on strike, raising the same demands as Mahalla workers.

Members of the Freedom Justice Party (FJP), the political arm of the MB, reportedly tried to convince the Mahalla workers to end their strike, but were chased away.

The Egyptian daily Al-Masry Al-Youm published a video of the striking Mahalla workers which gives a picture of the militant mood among workers in Egypt.

In the video, a female worker expresses her disillusionment with the Islamist president who only cares about a tiny wealthy elite. “The first thing he does when he gets his hands on the presidency is to forget about us. He’s only thinking about those earning 200,000 or half a million. He doesn’t think about the workers who are sweating blood. Where are our rights? We can’t even afford a crust of bread. Where is our president now? We want the minimum wage. Not one of our demands has been met.”

A male colleague adds: “The revolution didn’t bring anything to the workers of Misr Spinning in Mahalla. Back in 2006, we were getting profit-sharing bonuses of four and a half months. Other people are getting more and we’re getting less. How can they bring in someone like Fouad Abd-al-Alim [the new head of the public sector Holding Company for Textiles and Garment Production]? He was the most corrupt one here. He destroyed the factory in Mahalla and is destroying the rest of the public textile factories. The workers here are making the revolution again from the start. The coming revolution will be a workers’ revolution.”

Threatened by the specter of a renewed revolution, the junta and the Islamists are seeking to violently repress the strike wave.

In Suez, one of the epicenters of the revolution, security forces fired tear gas at hundreds of factory workers of the Cleopatra Ceramics company on Tuesday. The workers stormed government buildings in the port town, demanding the prosecution of the owner of factory Mohamed Abul Enein, a former member of Mubarak’s now-dissolved National Democratic Party (NDP). The workers accuse Enein of not paying wages, illegally firing workers, and being involved in the infamous “Battle of the Camels”—when Mubarak’s thugs attacked protesting workers and youth on Tahrir square.

Military units reportedly entered Suez after the clashes between the workers and police forces, in which at least 15 workers were injured and 6 arrested.

In South Sinai, security forces reportedly fired live ammunition to disperse hundreds of health workers staging a sit-in in front of the office of the undersecretary of the Ministry of Health. The workers demanded higher incentives and protested poor health conditions inside the hospitals in South Sinai and the lack of medicines and equipment.

The regime did not dare to attack the Mahalla textile workers yet, however. It aims to rely on its pseudo-left supporters to bring the situation under control. Egypt’s Minister of Industry and Commerce, Mahmoud Issa, reportedly plans to visit the Mahalla workers on Wednesday. On Tuesday evening, the secretary general of the Gharbiya governorate who went to the factory was not able to calm down the workers and they said they would continue the strike.

Amongst the negotiators are experienced petty-bourgeois elements, such as Kamal al-Fayoumi, who aim to shut down and sell out the strike. These figures try to present themselves as representatives of the workers but their policies are directly opposed to the interests of the working class and play into the hands of the counterrevolution.

Fayoumi is a member of the misnamed pseudo-left Revolutionary Socialists (RS) group, which is opposed to a second revolution against the junta, and a struggle for workers power and socialism. The RS supported Mursi in the presidential elections and claim that the Islamists can be pressured for social reforms.

While Mursi and the junta are violently cracking down on striking workers, the RS claim in their latest statement that “pressure on Mursi and the Muslim Brotherhood is just what will drive their decision in the right direction, the direction of completing the objectives of the revolution and overthrow the rule of the military and purge the state.”

Source: World Socialist Web Site

Former Political Enemies Join in Exile to Push for Change in Syrian Leadership

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, May 22 — One was the right-hand man to Syria's dictators, the other counted himself among the country's most wanted. The elder successfully maneuvered within the secular Syrian Baath Party; the younger worked with the Muslim Brotherhood for decades to change the government and its party.

They were about as far apart as possible on the Syrian political spectrum.

But now, as exiles, Abdel Halim Khaddam, Syria's former vice president, and Ali Sadreddin al-Bayanouni, the leader of the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria, are partners in a long-term plan to bring change to Syria. "Oppression has united us," said Mr. Bayanouni, a lanky man with understated charisma. "We are all sons of the same land, and it turns out we have all been suffering from the same condition."

After a slow, careful exchange of contacts, the men tied their fates together in March, forming the National Salvation Front, an unlikely political alliance with the dual goals of unifying Syria's fractious opposition and reassuring insiders fearful of change.

That each claims a following and influence in different parts of Syrian society gives the alliance a unique potential that Syria's opposition has never had, many experts agree.

Mr. Khaddam, 74, and Mr. Bayanouni, 67, both say they hesitated before making such a leap, meeting in Belgium for two days to discuss their regrets and hopes, until they were certain they saw eye to eye on Syria's future and had a basis of mutual trust.

"At the end, I felt like I knew him for many years," Mr. Khaddam said of Mr. Bayanouni, who concurred.

Mr. Khaddam spoke on condition that his present whereabouts not be disclosed because of security concerns and growing sensitivity by some European governments over his political work.

For years the Syrian opposition was made up of a ragtag band of leftists, Arab nationalists and Islamists with competing interests and divergent strategies. With the assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister, Rafik Hariri, in February 2005, opposition figures came into the spotlight as fingers pointed at the Syrian government and international pressure grew. (A preliminary report by United Nations investigators found a state role in the killing, but President Bashar al-Assad has strongly denied the allegations.)

Mr. Bayanouni and Mr. Khaddam are cagey about exactly what their alliance is doing other than lobbying, largely because they are concerned over security. They have planned a general meeting in early June to gather opposition figures and outline their charter.

They spend much of their time on the telephone, seeking to lure others, even as Syria has begun a crackdown on opposition figures, especially those who have been suspected of meeting with either of the two men. Some critics say Mr. Khaddam became allied with Mr. Bayanouni more for his own future than for Syria's.

"It is a marriage of convenience," said Ammar Qurabi, a spokesman for Syria's National Organization for Human Rights. "Khaddam needs a party to have credit inside Syria and get himself back into political life. The Muslim brothers are also in need of a strong person with important files inside the regime."

But in any case, Mr. Khaddam promises to bring the opposition a new degree of clout. With a war in Iraq, and fear of Islamists growing throughout the region, Syria's neighbors and other nations have been loath to support the Muslim Brotherhood.

By joining politically with the Brotherhood, Mr. Khaddam ostensibly sends a reassuring message that other members of the government would not face retribution if it fell, and that a stable government would be built soon after.

"What happened in Iraq will never happen in Syria," he insisted. "We will protect the army and maintain the institutions of government."

Such comments are a measure of how far each man has come.

After the current president's father, Hafez al-Assad, took control in a coup in 1970, the Syrian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood — the Islamist group founded in Egypt — became one of several parties pushed underground.

The group and numerous splinter elements violently resisted the rule of Mr. Assad and the Baath Party in the mid-1970's.

When the Brotherhood rose up in the town of Hama in 1982, Mr. Assad sought to crush it for good, sending in the army and virtually razing the city, killing thousands of the group's members and jailing many others.

For many Syrians, the Brotherhood became synonymous with Muslim extremism; for the group's members, Hama is a permanent reminder of the brutality of the Assad era.

Mr. Bayanouni, who says he had no role in any violence during the turbulent 70's and 80's, fled to exile in Jordan. In 2000, the Jordanian government asked him to leave under Syrian pressure, he said. He was granted asylum by Britain, and has continued to lead the Syrian branch of the Brotherhood from London.

Mr. Khaddam, on the other hand, was a rising star in Syrian politics in the 1960's, ever at the side of Hafez al-Assad, serving in various government positions before becoming foreign minister, and later vice president.

But when the elder Mr. Assad died in 2000, and his son succeeded him, Mr. Khaddam was gradually forced out of his areas of influence.

Mr. Khaddam says he began reaching out to the opposition years ago — even as vice president — initially to include opposition members and help strengthen the government, later to bring it down.

In late 2003, he secretly sent an emissary to London to meet Mr. Bayanouni and tell him of his intention to break with Mr. Assad.

"The messenger told me that Khaddam would be going against the regime, but that it is going to take some time," Mr. Bayanouni said. "I sent word back that it should happen soon."

Last summer Mr. Khaddam resigned in a speech before a conference of the Baath Party, warning his comrades of the threat to the state caused by growing corruption, he said. He quickly left for exile in Paris, where he has lived in an opulent house.

In late December he gave a hint of his ambitions by accusing Mr. Assad and other Syrian officials of having a hand in Mr. Hariri's assassination, setting off an international firestorm in the process. The stern vice president became the most senior member of the Syrian inner circle to publicly break ranks with Mr. Assad.

Months later Mr. Khaddam sent another messenger to Mr. Bayanouni in London, suggesting that they combine forces, setting off a deep debate among the upper ranks of the Brotherhood leadership.

It proved to be an excruciating moment for the Muslim Brotherhood, but also a chance to heal old wounds and enter a world that it never could before.

"It was a difficult decision to make," Mr. Bayanouni said. "We knew he was a partner to everything that has happened in Syria."

But Mr. Bayanouni and other Brotherhood leaders agreed that Mr. Khaddam had little role in the internal politics of the country, and had no actual blood on his hands, Mr. Bayanouni said.

So they arrived at a compromise: Mr. Khaddam had to apologize.

"Today his stance is one of regret, and he is very serious about democracy in Syria," Mr. Bayanouni said. "There is a death sentence against him. He is being chased now like they chased us. He does have some responsibility for what has happened in the past, but it is clear he has changed."

Syria recently asked Interpol, the international police organization, to arrest Mr. Khaddam and turn him over to Syria.

He faces charges of sedition and has been expelled from the Baath Party. Many of his children's assets have been seized.

The government has also begun a wave of arrests of major opposition figures in Syria.

Still, Mr. Bayanouni emphasizes that not all is forgotten. When a new government is in place, he said, a court will be able to decide whether Mr. Khaddam was guilty of anything. But in the meantime, he said, Mr. Khaddam will be a critical piece of the opposition.

Source: New York Times

A NATION CHALLENGED: THE BANKER; Italian Arab Is Perplexed By Swiss Raid

As he left his office here the night before the Swiss and Italian police raided it, Youssef M. Nada, 71, shook his head, saying: ''To come to the end of my life, a good life, and be accused of helping terrorists -- it is too much.''

Mr. Nada and his partner Ghaleb Himmat, who spent five hours talking with a reporter this week in their office and in Mr. Nada's tiled hillside mansion across the lake in Campione d'Italia, Italy, do not fit the image of the shadowy unregulated money shifters portrayed by some American officials.

From a building with copper-colored windows, they run an empire that had a Bahamas bank and shares of business throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa, with cement plants, drydocks, textile and brick factories and a division that trades steel, wheat, oil and other commodities. The lone sign for the sixth-floor office is a red placard with one word, ''NADA.'' All others ''were taken down because of the reporters,'' said a banker from another floor.

The trading screens and offices look typical.

Before the raid, Mr. Nada denied that he had aided Al Qaeda or any other terrorist group. ''It is not true, and I'm sure the U.S. government must know it is not true,'' he said when asked about the allegation.

Mr. Nada said he believed that he was a victim of guilt by association because he is a member of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and has had members of Osama bin Laden's immensely wealthy family as clients. ''I have been a member of the Muslim Brotherhood for 50 years,'' he said. ''That is no secret. But it is not a violent organization.''

The group, founded in Egypt in 1928, was banned in 1948 for opposing [Farouk I of Egypt]. It wants Egypt to become an Islamic state. Today it has members in Parliament, and the United States State Department does not list it as terrorist organization.

Mr. Nada, who left Egypt in 1959 and is an Italian citizen, pointed out that a deputy to Mr. bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, wrote a book that attacked the group as infidels because they renounced jihad.

His investment house, Al Taqwa, meaning piety or fear of God, offers 3,000 clients investments in accordance with shariah, or Islamic law. That tenet forbids charging interest or owning anything to do with alcohol, weapons, gambling or adultery.

His chief investment vehicle, Al Taqwa Bank of the Bahamas, which he says he voluntarily liquidated in February, worked like a mutual fund, or mudarabah in Arabic. It made no loans and could not own bonds or, for example, shares in casinos, brewers or weapons manufacturers. But it owned commodities contracts and businesses, many in food and construction materials.

At its height, Mr. Nada said, the bank controlled $220 million in assets, and during its 14-year life investors -- ''mostly Muslims, but also some Christian and Jewish friends'' -- had annual returns of 7 to 14 percent. It closed, he said, because large losses in Indonesia and Malaysia plus news reports that alleged shady dealings started a run by investors. The United States said, however, the Bahamas revoked its charter in April.

An investigation by the Swiss Banking Commission, which included an audit by PriceWaterhouseCoopers, found no evidence of money laundering or allowing other entities to use al-Taqwa as a front, according to the audit.

''What more do you want?'' Mr. Nada asked.

Mark Widmer, a spokesman for the Swiss attorney general, said that there were ''signs and rumors about al-Taqwa for years,'' but that Swiss investigators had never found the ''substantial suspicion'' that courts require for a search warrant. He declined to say what new evidence led to the raid today.

Mr. Nada does not appear to lead a shadowy life. He donates to charity, invited a television crew to his house to meet Muslim women who were wearing head scarves and was for years the Middle East expert at the Pio Manzù Research Center, an organization in Rimini, Italy, affiliated with the United Nations.

SOurce: New York Times

A NATION CHALLENGED: ISLAM -- Cairo; Thousands Hear Call Of Prayer and Politics At World's Mosques

In mosques yesterday, Muslims gathered for Friday Prayers, and in many instances the preaching was political and sharply anti-American. Here is a sampling from some of the largest mosques in Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

An Orderly Rally, With Paper Hats

At Al Hussein mosque at Al Azhar University, Friday Prayers turned into a political rally organized by the Muslim Brotherhood, a group that has sought for decades to install a pure Islamic state in Egypt.

Sheik Sayed Muhammad Tantawi, the imam of Al Azhar, delivered the main sermon and used the story of the Prophet Muhammad's visit to Jerusalem as an opening to endorse the Palestinian uprising.

''Our brothers in Palestine have the right to defend themselves,'' he said. ''It is a duty for them to defend themselves. This is justice. This is Islam to stand by the oppressed until they win.''

He ended his speech by praying for Muslims in Afghanistan and echoing the line of the Egyptian government concerning the American attacks: ''Only terrorists should be targeted,'' he said, ''not the whole people of Afghanistan.''

Once he finished, a Muslim Brotherhood leader, Saif al-Islam, led the worshipers in a chant: ''America is the enemy of Arabs and Muslims. Let us all die in our war against America.''

''America is terrorism,'' Mr. Islam shouted, ''It backs terrorism in Israel. Who is next? Now they are hitting Afghanistan. Then the next target is one of the Arab countries.''

Waving copies of the Koran, others shouted, ''God the almighty said Islam is the solution.''

Children, carried on the shoulders of their fathers, sported paper hats on which ''Hamas,'' the radical Islamic group, and ''Palestine'' were written in red.

Despite its passion, however, the demonstration appeared to be well choreographed. Black-uniformed security police officers stood outside the mosque but did not intervene. After about an hour, when the rally appeared to be winding down and people inside were drooping from the heat, Sheik Tantawi, a small man in a gray robe and white turban, appealed to everyone to go home.

He left them with an indirect reminder that not all acts done in the name of Islam were correct.

''The prophet told us to always help our brothers when they are innocent and to correct their deviation when they are guilty,'' he said. ''This is how we help our brothers. We should stop them from doing the wrong deeds.''

Source: New York Times

Egyptians Vote Today, but Islamic Opposition Group Is Barred

Egyptians are to vote on Wednesday in parliamentary elections that have emerged less as a challenge to President Hosni Mubarak's Government than a window on a widening rift between the Government and its outlawed Islamic opponents.

With the country's most influential Islamic organization, the Muslim Brotherhood, barred from competing as a political party, Mr. Mubarak's governing National Democratic Party is widely expected to maintain its commanding majority in Parliament, where it now holds 348 of 444 elective seats.

While Mr. Mubarak and his supporters have said they are committed to fair elections, the severe measures taken against the popular Islamic organization in recent weeks have underscored deep tensions that will not be measured in the polls.

"This election is like a play in the theater," Nabil Abdel-Fattah, an independent analyst at Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, said in an interview today. "It certainly does not reflect political reality."

In the last week, dozens of Muslim Brotherhood leaders have been sentenced to prison terms and hundreds of their supporters arrested as part of what human rights campaigners say is a deliberate effort by the Government to disfranchise the country's largest political opposition movement.

With tacit backing from the West, the Government has defended the crackdown as a necessary step in its quest to suppress a campaign of violence by Islamic militants, who it says have drawn support and inspiration from the organization, which itself has long been outlawed.

Yet the Muslim Brotherhood has used the repressive measures as ammunition of its own as it renews its appeal to ordinary Egyptians, many of whom regard the Islamic organization as an important counterweight to what they consider a corrupt secular regime.

Permitted to compete only as independent candidates, members of the organization are running for only one-fourth of the seats and are not expected to play a large role in the outcome.

This election is the first in Egypt since 1987 that has not been boycotted by the major opposition parties, and television advertisements appearing on the Government-owned stations urge citizens to give their vote "to whoever deserves it."

But even as more than 4,000 candidates spent a final day on the hustings, the Government came under verbal attack from a prominent human rights organization, which declared itself "deeply troubled" about the climate in which the elections were taking place.

In a letter addressed to Mr. Mubarak, the New York-based Human Rights Watch/Middle East cited the measures taken against the Muslim Brotherhood, including the sentencing last week of 54 prominent members to prison terms of up to five years after a mass trial in military court.

Some of those sentenced had intended to run for seats in Wednesday's elections, and the human rights organization criticized their prosecution for nonviolent offenses as intended to keep them from taking part in the elections.

Even to students of Egyptian politics, many of the candidates' platforms this year are virtually indistinguishable, leaving their supporters to emphasize the symbols paired with names on Egyptian ballots.

Source: New York Times

Egypt Begins Crackdown on Strongest Opposition Group

After a series of raids and arrests that have weakened Islamic groups trying to topple the Government by force, Egyptian security forces have begun a crackdown against the country's most powerful opposition organization, the Muslim Brotherhood, which rejects violence.

The campaign, which includes the detention and interrogation of scores of Muslim Brotherhood leaders, signals a drive by the Government to curtail not only those movements that have carried out violent attacks, but also one that has come to dominate many municipalities, professional and labor associations and university faculties.

The confrontation pits the Government of President Hosni Mubarak for the first time against the intellectual authors of Islamic fundamentalism, who the President contends are merely terrorists. 'This Is the First Time'

"This is the first time this Government has linked us to terrorism," said Issam al-Irian, a senior Brotherhood leader, as he sat in a spartan office in central Cairo. "It is part of a wide move by the Government to curtail all forms of democratic participation. It is an expression of the Government's weakness. But by narrowing the opportunities for democratic participation, the Government is creating more problems that it is solving."

The Muslim Brotherhood, founded in 1928, is the prototype for modern Islamic fundamentalist political parties throughout the Middle East and North Africa.

Although it has been officially banned since 1954, with a membership estimated in the hundreds of thousands it is the largest Egyptian opposition movement -- legal or illegal -- and dominates many of the 14,000 private philanthropies that provide services from health clinics to primary schools.

Its assets, with backing from supporters here and in Persian Gulf countries like Saudi Arabia, run into the hundreds of millions of dollars.

The Brotherhood, which has its headquarters in central Cairo, calls for the establishment of an Islamic state by peaceful means. It rejects the violence used by outlawed organizations like the Islamic Group in their efforts to topple the Government. Control of Civic Institutions

But at the same time, the Brotherhood has mounted an aggressive campaign to take control of a variety of civil and charitable institutions. It now dominates the largest of Egypt's 22 professional associations, including the medical, engineering and legal groups. And, aside from the rejection of the use of force, the goals of the Brotherhood dovetail with those of the underground groups.

The wide reach of the Brotherhood is based on its charitable work, including scores of clinics, hospitals and schools. But it also appeals to many Egyptians, especially those in the professional classes, as the only credible opposition movement.

"The Brotherhood, among the professional class, owes its support to the fact that it is an effective protest movement," said Said al-Naggar, the head of New Civic Forum, a liberal think tank. "It is the only outlet many people have to express dissatisfaction with the current system. Many of the professionals do not necessarily support the Islamic ideology, although there is a feeling that Western-style opposition parties, whether socialist or democratic, have failed."

But there is a price for effective organization. Women, for example, must wear the hejab, or head scarf, if they want to enter the Physicians' Union, a former leftist stronghold with a membership of 80,000 that is now controlled by the Brotherhood. Low-Cost Appliances

"The Brotherhood provides loans, cars, furniture and even electrical appliances to union members, at low cost," said Mohammed al-Farhat, who is not a member of the Brotherhood. "The union gives the physicians and their families the best quality health care at a minimal price. They have a reputation for being honest and careful with union funds." That reputation has wide appeal in a country whose Government is seen as thoroughly corrupt.

Until now, the Government concentrated its efforts on battling the Islamic Group, which has waged a two-year campaign of violence in which nearly 400 people, mainly police officers and militants, have been killed. But security forces have killed one militant commander and captured several others, putting the underground groups on the defensive.

"The security situation over all is much better now than a few months ago," a Western diplomat said. "This has made it easier to do this. The Government has the energy and the manpower available to go after what it sees as a second-tier organization."

But Brotherhood leaders say the Government wants to silence the only effective opposition in a country that nominally has a multiparty system, but where the same ruling group has been in power since 1952.

While refusing to lift the ban on the Brotherhood, President Mubarak has, until now, allowed it to operate. Brotherhood members were even permitted to run in parliamentary elections in 1988, although the candidates ran as members of the tiny Liberal and once-moribund Socialist Labor Party, both of which the Brotherhood now controls. Election Fraud Alleged

The main opposition parties, including the Socialist Labor Party, have boycotted subsequent parliamentary elections because of what they say is fraud. But the tolerance of the Brotherhood appears to have ended. For the first time, President Mubarak has begun referring to the group as a "terrorist" organization in public statements.

Government officials say documents discovered in February at the office of a company that had links to the Brotherhood directly tied the organization to violent groups.

They also say a defector from the underground armed movement detailed payments by Brotherhood supporters to armed factions.

And they have angrily criticized Brotherhood leaders for organizing a demonstration by hundreds of lawyers last month that turned violent. The demonstration was called to protest the death in police custody of a lawyer who defended jailed militants. Government critics and human rights groups say the lawyer, Abdel Harith Medani, was tortured to death. The Government denies the charge.

"The Brotherhood is a ring trying to agitate disturbances on the street," said Interior Minister Hassan al-Alfi. "And this is also what the terrorists and the murderers are doing with their explosions and assassinations." Spiritual Leader Questioned

The Government has taken a number of steps in its new campaign against the group. Hamed Aboul-Nasr, 81, the ailing spiritual leader of the Brotherhood, was called in for police questioning for two days this week, accused of writing anti-Government leaflets and inciting the lawyers' protest last month. Parliament has canceled the right of professors to elect the deans of university faculties, many of which are now dominated by the Brotherhood.

Mayors and village council members, many of whom belong to the Brotherhood, will be appointed by the Government rather than elected.

Brotherhood members, including most of the senior leaders around the country, have been arrested. A prominent clergyman was recently prevented from delivering a sermon to thousands of worshipers. And editors and reporters from Al Shaab, the paper of the Socialist Labor Party and a strong fundamentalist voice, have been hauled into court and imprisoned in recent weeks for articles critical of the Government.

The crackdown worries many who fear that if the Brotherhood leaders are driven underground or imprisoned, they could call on their followers to join the armed movements. Comparison to Algeria

"I never believed that the Brotherhood represented the moderate branch of the Islamic movement," said Hussein Ahmed Amin, Egypt's former Ambassador to Algeria and a prominent writer. "It was a matter of the distribution of roles. The Brotherhood preached a moderate line to get into Parliament and the Labor Party, which it came to dominate, as well as to appeal to those who wanted change, but deplored violence.

"But the origin of the trouble in Egypt is the same as in Algeria. The rise in militancy is caused by the failure to create a democratic system, by social and economic grievances, Government corruption, a lack of housing, unemployment, immigration from the rural areas to the cities and a lack of competing ideologies. The Islamic movement will not disappear with repression. And if the Government presses the Brotherhood too hard it could become more overtly radical and put all its energy into acts of terror."

Brotherhood leaders are not shy about echoing such a threat.

"If our supporters believe we cannot achieve our goals peacefully," said Mohammed Maamoun al-Hodaiby, the spokesman for the Brotherhood, "then they may turn to more radical means to achieve them.

"What do you expect?"

Source: New York Times