Islamist media has reported that Tunisian Muslim Brotherhood leader Rachid Ghannouchi has called the recent wave of stabbing attacks in Israel “a historic opportunity to support the Palestinian uprising and the Palestinian right and liberate Jerusalem.” According to the Middle East Monitor report:
October 16, 2015 The head of Tunisia’s Ennahda Movement, Sheikh Rashid Ghannouchi said the recent security developments in Jerusalem is a Third Intifada triggered by the Israeli prosecution of the Palestinian people and their rights, properties and religious sanctities.
During an interview with Quds Press yesterday, Ghannouchi said: ‘The Palestinian people are trying to raise their voice to the world and expose the brutal Israeli crimes against them.’
‘The Palestinian uprising is a wake-up call for the nation’s youth and the world to save the Palestinians from the Israeli aggression,’ he said.
Ghannouchi said the world should get out of its silence and people should move and pressure their governments especially because there is a historic opportunity to support the Palestinian uprising and the Palestinian right and liberate Jerusalem.
‘Israel is suffocating because of its arrogant leadership, and therefore there is an opportunity to support the Palestinians, lift the Israeli siege imposed on Jerusalem and Gaza and provide the conditions to build a Palestinian state,’ he said.
The GMBDW reported in March that Mr. Ghannouchi had made comments in which he has said that the “Islamic Nation” will not be free until Palestine is “liberated.” We reported in October 2014 that Ghannouchi, the leader of the Tunisian Ennahda Party and a close associate of Global Muslim Brotherhood leader Youssef Qaradawi, had visited the US where he was invited to speak at Yale and Columbia Universities as well as at the US Institute of Peace (USIP).
Mr. Ghannouchi has a long history of ties to Palestinian extremism and calls for terrorism and which recently have included:
- In May 2013, the GMBDW reported that Mr. Ghannouchi had called for young people to realize that “Jihad belongs in Palestine.”
- In 2011, Mr. Ghannouchi gave an Arabic-language interview in which he predicted the end of Israel,
- In February 2009, Mr. Ghannouchi was a signatory to the so-called Istanbul declaration that called for the opening of a “third jihadist front” against Israel. The statement was the result of a conference held under the auspices of the Global Anti-Aggression Campaign (GAAC), an international Islamist umbrella group comprised of Islamist scholars tied to the Global Muslim Brotherhood as well as Salafi-Jihadi scholars including individuals designated as terrorists by the US government.
For a profile on Rachid Ghannouchi, go here.
For a profile on the Ennahda Party and its ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, go here.
