Trump urged to ward off Muslim Brotherhood, save entente with Qatar

Donald Trump should try to negotiate a way to “fence off” the Muslim Brotherhood from Qatar, but it would be tough to pull U.S. troops out of bases in the country, according to one author who warns America is in danger of being dominated by the Brotherhood and Islam in general.

“That is going to be a tough question,” according to Mike Scruggs, the author of two books -- one on the Civil War and the other on the Vietnam conflict.

Scruggs, in a recent column in the Tribune Papers of his native North Carolina, issued a warning, one that he has made repeatedly, that the Muslim Brotherhood exercises a deep influence on U.S. politics, to the point where the country faces Islamic domination.

He links the group, a Sunni Islamic organization set up in Egypt in the 1920s, to the Council on American-Islamic Relations, describing the latter as a “propaganda arm” in the U.S. By extension, Scruggs also condemns Minnesota U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison, a candidate for chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

Qatar’s leaders are accused of providing plentiful financial and other support to the Brotherhood, including to the short-lived elected Egyptian government led by the group, following the toppling of Muhammad Mubarak.

But Qatar is also home to “Al Udeid” Air Base and host to 10,000 American troops, the largest U.S. base in the Middle East.  

The new administration will want to try “to save the relationship but fence off Qatar from the Muslim Brotherhood, and not just pull out,” Scruggs told Gulf News Journal. “It would take a negotiator of the strength of Trump to make it work, try and find some ways to fence them off.”

On whether moving the troops to the UAE -- run by a regime decidedly unfriendly to the Brotherhood -- is a solution, Scruggs said that country’s stance on the organization must be appreciated, but stopped short of saying the new administration should transfer troops.

Scruggs said his view of the Brotherhood, and its influence in the U.S. and across the west, is becoming more widely held because “it is the truth.”

Scruggs believes a well-funded network of Islamic groups plan a take over of the U.S., but he could not speculate when that might happen.

“We might as well head it off while we still have our senses about us,” he said.

His position echoes those of others predicting an attempted Islamic takeover of western countries, claiming that the Muslim Brotherhood is a “resurgent nightmare.”

The former Air Force veteran subscribes to the view that there are many moderate Muslims -- who know little about the Koran -- but no moderate Islam. It is an “ideology wrapped around a largely contrived religion,” Scruggs said.

Moreover, the violence within the Koran is much greater than in the Bible, and much more fervent, he said.