Arab West Report Egyptian press summaries and media research for dialogue

For those who do not know, Ahmad Abū Laban is the one who expounded the crisis of the offensive cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad when he sent two delegations of Arabs living in Denmark to Egypt and Lebanon in order to protest against them.

Abū Laban, the Palestinian-born Egyptian engineer who was known for his tight relation with the Muslim Brotherhood, emigrated to Denmark in 1984 and rapidly became the chairman of the Islamic Waqf, [Reviewer: the Islamic Endowment], the main Islamic center in Copenhagen.

The author says that last year he was invited with an Arab intellectual delegation by Abū Laban in cooperation with the Danish Foreign Ministry to visit Denmark in order to witness the reality of the offensive cartoons.

As part of the visit, they met with Abū Laban in the Islamic Waqf where he absolutely denied playing any role in blowing the cartoon crisis out of proportion in Syria and Lebanon. He also denied calling for the boycott of Danish goods and expressed his desire to establish a dialogue between moderate Muslim scholars and Denmark to settle the issue.

To the author’s surprise, Abū Laban, in an interview with al-Jazīrah television, confirmed his role in the crisis, called for the boycott and refused any dialogue with the Danish government.

Abū Laban was once caught by a French reporter’s camera declaring that he was preparing somebody to execute a martyr operation in Denmark.

Abū Laban became famous after saying in a Friday sermon that the September 11 attacks in 2001 were a victory for Islām.

The author believes that the suspicious activity and behavior of Abū Laban and his extremists’ counterparts in Europe have played a role in issuing strict laws that limit the immigration of Arabs to Denmark and in the spread of the fear of Islamic phenomenon. Moreover, his violent reactions did not stop the offensive cartoons from appearing in other French and Dutch newspapers.