Trump's Muslim Brotherhood Challenge

• President Donald Trump has pushed for the Muslim Brotherhood to be designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization
• Muslims and liberals are pushing back
• Where does this leave ordinary Americans today?

For some time President Trump has engaged in the rather noble (though risky) endeavor of seeking to have the Muslim Brotherhood officially recognized by the Secretary of State as an FTO (Foreign Terrorist Organization) in accordance with section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). This enterprise has been met with the predicable calls for blind tolerance and multicultural etiquette so often urged upon us by the mainstream liberal media. It is crucially important in life to 1) know an enemy when one sees or hear them and 2) call them an enemy once one does.

A slightly more coherent (though not much more) case was put forward by Charlie Savage, Eric Schmitt and Maggie Haberman in a recent New York Times piece which stated that due to the somewhat decentralized nature of the Muslim Brotherhood, it would be more difficult to categorize them as an organization as such. However, they seem to stumble over their own argument by stating that "Several political parties in places like Tunisia and Jordan consider themselves Muslim Brotherhood or have ties to it but eschew violent extremism.". It's rather laughable that they're effectively saying, "look at Tunisia and Jordan, they're so non-violent, they're barely part of the Brotherhood at all!".

The latest update in President Trump's crusade was following a visit by Egypt's President, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and his subsequent urging to formally designate the Brotherhood as an FTO. This would make sense as there has been historic harassment of Egypt's Coptic Christians by the Brotherhood. This was more than alluded to in point 30 of Bill S.2230 — To require the Secretary of State to submit a report to Congress on the designation of the Muslim Brotherhood as a foreign terrorist organization, and for other purposes. This was a bill that was put forward back in 2015 and sponsored by Republican Ted Cruz. It seems that authorities on the Right have not been reticent to recognize an enemy as such and to take action as needed.

There have been a number of Islamic sympathizers and apologists who have predictably said that Muslims are being unfairly targeted and that violence against Muslims are encouraged on the back of this proposed policy. The Institute for Social Policy and Understanding certainly seems to think so, though it is crucial to note that the ISPU is headquartered out of Dearborn, MI which has over 50% Muslim population.
Incidentally, read the list of FTOs formally recognized by the Department of State and it will become immediately apparent that the vast majority of FTOs are Islamic in ideology and primarily Muslim in membership. Are all of these organizations also engaged in the unfair targeting of Muslims?

While it remains to be seen how Trump will handle his Muslim Brotherhood challenge, it seems any reader of this article is left with two possibilities:

1) Already knowing plenty of facts revealing the terrorist nature of Islam, would it be better to simply ignore them for the sake of multicultural etiquette?

2) Americans to reserve their right to challenge Islamic ideology and doctrine as well as its fundamental incompatibility with Western values.

Option 1 is not a contingency that I would recommend.

 Josh Cohen is a freelance writer and Conservative political commentator living in Minnesota. He is a contributing writer for Laura Loomer at https://lauraloomer.us/author/josh. Josh also hosts a blog where he provides insight into a wide array of social and political topics as well as a podcast where he invites thought leaders from all realms of the political and cultural sphere for long-form discussions. http://theunfilteredpodcast.blogspot.com/.