You Can See the Links from Cairo to Copenhagen [The National]
May 15, 2014
Often, we make the mistake that the Arab world and Europe are linked on only a tangential level. The assumption is that beyond intermittent interest through media channels and tourism, the repercussions of what happens in one region remain there and do not affect developments in the other. The reality, however, is quite different. Denmark, for example, is more than 3,000 kilometres from the Arab world, but it’s not simply Danish interests abroad that are affected by the Arab world. Rather, Danes at home are also deeply impacted.
This has also been true of many other European countries, for years and centuries. The relationship between Europe and Islam is a long and complex one – and part of that historical encounter includes an engagement with the Arab world. That was true when parts of Europe were in the Arab world – as were Muslim-ruled Iberia (modern day Spain and Portugal) and Sicily – and it remains true.
In recent times, there have been issues that may seem very distant, but are actually very close. In the past three years, two revolutionary uprisings in the Arab world have had ramifications in Denmark, for Danish citizens of the Muslim faith and otherwise.
On a recent trip to Denmark, it became clear to me that the most worrying for the Danish authorities and Danish society at large, including its Muslim community, is the collective impact of the Syrian uprising. The brutality and repression of Bashar Al Assad’s regime in Syria has led to widespread sympathy for the Syrian revolution in Denmark – and it has led to many Danes of various ethnic origins travelling to Syria. Some are there to help in the humanitarian aid effort; others are there to fight.
In many European countries, society has made the assumption that anyone travelling to Syria at this time is more likely than not to return (if they return at all) as radicalised, and therefore a threat.
The discussion in Denmark is perhaps unique in that regard. While the UK government, for example, has indicated that naturalised Britons travelling to Syria may well face charges or be stripped of their British nationality, the Danish authorities are assisting returnees from the Syrian conflict in a variety of ways.
Schools – many of those who return are still high school students – are encouraged to make allowances for returnees wanting to re-enrol in their studies. The returnees are also offered psychological assistance, out of a recognition that the experience must have been rather traumatic. As yet, the assumption is that the returnees have not broken any law, and they must be treated as such. It could be a decision that is reconsidered if future returnees turn out to be radicalised against Denmark.
Syria is not the only country within the Arab world that has affected faraway Denmark. The removal of Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi was deeply unpopular in Denmark, even from many on the right who are opposed to the Islamist movement.
The violent dispersal of the pro-Morsi Rabaa sit-ins in August led to the Danish government suspending more than $5 million (Dh18.4 million) worth of aid and two projects on which Denmark was collaborating with the Egyptian government. For a large proportion of Denmark’s Muslim population, the dispersal of Rabaa – said by former prime minister Hazem Al Beblawi to have claimed up to 1,000 lives – was a substantial watershed.
It is not that the Danish population was ideologically sympathetic to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. Indeed, it generally wasn’t. Danish society is generally quite secular – one of the most secular in Europe, with a political elite that is hardly warm to notions of Islamism. In spite of that, many were, and remain, antipathetic to the military backed government.
I was told by more than one person that reports of human rights abuses in Egypt will be a stumbling block for a genuine people-to-people relationship between Denmark and Egypt. The official state relationship has been restored, but public opinion seems to have merely acquiesced to the new balance of power.
Beyond that, the wider discussion in the Arab world around the Muslim Brotherhood has also had repercussions in Denmark. The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood generally does not exist in Denmark, but supporters of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood do, and they’ve been active in other ways. Next month, a new mosque will open in Copenhagen, supported by the Qatari state and reportedly managed by a team heavily influenced by the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood.
A year ago, they might have been more open about such links and affiliations. Today, with the increasing pressure on the Brotherhood in different countries – including a public review into the organisation worldwide conducted by the British government – the space for the Brotherhood to operate, even in Denmark, is not what it once was.
Arabs and Europeans may think their worlds are separate and distinct. They might imagine their trade links or tourism are all that binds them together – but the past three years have shown that to be more of a fallacy than ever.
For better or for worse, things are really far more interconnected than we care to imagine – and they are likely to become even more so.
Dr HA Hellyer is an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute in London and the Brookings Institution in Washington DC
On Twitter: @hahellyer
Source: The National
