The European Parliament has been hit with fresh accusations of platforming a youth group linked to the Muslim Brotherhood. A Spanish NGO, speaking at this week’s European Youth Event, appears to have Islamist links.
Sobre los Márgenes is a Madrid-based youth organisation that led a workshop on race during this week’s EU Youth Event in Strasbourg. The objective of the gathering is to bring Europhile youth organisations together.
The organisation has links to the Muslim Brotherhood, sources claim, by way of its president, Fatima Bourhim Mesaoudi, and apparently receives support from the controversial Turkish-based Al-Sharq Forum.
The Forum is financed by the former director of Al Jazeera, Wadah Khanfar, and specialises in cultivating Islamic elites. It has been linked to the promotion of Islamism before and has received EU Commission funding.
This is not the first time an Islamist group has been featured at the Parliament. Many MEPs have criticised inadvertent aid given to Islamist groups. The NGO ENAR (European Network Against Racism) earned a reputation among some as the Muslim Brotherhood’s mouthpiece in Brussels.
In an email response to The European Conservative, Mesaoud referred to the accusations as libellous, denying any link to Islamism and the Muslim Brotherhood. She said that “conspiracy theories” such as this played a role in fueling violent hate crimes against minorities.
The Muslim Brotherhood is an expansive and, more often than not, covert network of Islamist extremists that has been accused of operating a well-organised civic society outreach through numerous NGOs and think tanks throughout Europe. In Sweden, an academic report this year revealed that the organisation was penetrating the heart of Swedish society through youth organisations and maintaining a hold over immigrant communities.
French MEP Catherine Griset and the ID group have similarly denounced the inclusion of the Muslim student organisation FEMYSO in the proceedings of this week’s EU Youth Forum. The group has been repeatedly lambasted by MEPs and security experts for its ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.
FEMYSO has defended itself, saying it has been the subject of an elaborate smear campaign. MEPs, however, highlight the financial ties between the group and the European Commission.
The European Youth Event, which concludes this weekend, has been criticised again and again as a soft underbelly that allows policymakers to be influenced by various ideologues.
