International Organization to Support the Prophet of Islam (Uluslararası Peygamber Efendimizi Koruma ve Destekleme Heyeti, IOSPI) is a Turkey-based Islamic organization affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood (MB).
The MB is considered the proverbial mothership backing almost all Islamic radical and extremist groups and organizations the world over. While it is an entity whose agenda and operations are largely shrouded in secrecy, IOSPI is relatively the more aggressive front of MB.
While the Organization to Support the Prophet is new in origin, its membership and Islamist agenda are already garnering grave security concerns from among world countries.
Background
The IOSPI, as reported in the Turkish media, was founded in October of 2021 to mark the first anniversary of the “Support Prophet Mohammed” initiative. This initiative was launched by Egyptian scholar Sheikh Muhammed Saghir in reaction to derogatory comments and smear campaigns against Prophet Muhammed (PBUH) in Western countries.
Sheikh Saghir is also the Secretary-General of IOSPI and is closely associated with the Turkish government.
Islamist agenda
Turkish President Recep Erdoğan’s trans-continental neo-ottomanist project to resurrect the bygone Ottoman Caliphate, with himself as its supreme leader (Caliph) is open knowledge. It is towards this end that Erdogan’s government, through IOSPI, seeks to expand its global influence and create a network of Turkey’s loyalist proxies in countries the world over.
As regards the Brotherhood, its new sister body provides a golden opportunity to capitalize on anti-Prophet defamation campaigns and manipulate the Muslim community’s sentiments into believing in jihad against non-Muslims as the only solution.
Controversial associations & membership
All of IOSPI’s founders, as cited in media reports, are members of the Brotherhood and have connections to the Turkish government.
The ultimate goal of MB- the parent body, in a distilled sense, is to unleash jihad against the non-Islamic regimes of the world and establish a global Caliphate. It was MB in fact which first converted Islam into a political activist ideology.
It is pertinent to note that such terrorist outfits as the Al-Qaeda and Hamas have drawn support from the Brotherhood. At IOSPI’s inaugural event in 2021, Khaled Meshaal, the Hamas leader was the keynote speaker
International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS), as mentioned in the preceding chart, is another body serving as MB’s front.
How is IOSPI a security threat to India?
Anti-India online hate campaign
The IOSPI is the aggressive front of MB which has already unleashed anti-India propaganda targeting the Indian government in the past.
It is evident from the posts shared by IOSPI’s official Twitter handle that a well-coordinated strategy has been executed time and again of falsely portraying the Indian government as a persecutor of Muslims.
Salman Nadwi’s connection with IOSPI
Salman Husaini Nadwi is an Indian scholar and professor in the Islamic sciences. He served as the Dean of the Faculty of Dawah at the Darul-Uloom Nadwatul Ulama madrasa in Lucknow
The archived version of IOSPI’s official website enlists Shaikh Nadwi as a member of its board of trustees (his name stands deleted now).
Nadwi has been an open supporter of MB, and even publicly opposed a call to ban the extremist politico-religious outfit, Popular Front of India. https://x.com/HindaviSwaraj94/status/1841547444947186071
It is pertinent to note that Nadwi had garnered widespread controversy in 2014 for allegedly writing a letter addressed to Iraqi militant and leader of the Islamic State (IS) Abu Bakr Baghdadi, accepting him as Caliph of Muslims.
It is pertinent to note that Nadwi had garnered widespread controversy in 2014 for allegedly writing a letter addressed to Iraqi militant and leader of the Islamic State (IS) Abu Bakr Baghdadi, accepting him as Caliph of Muslims.
Furthermore, in July 2014, it was reported that Husaini proposed to the Saudi government the creation of a militia of 500,000 Sunni Muslim Indian youth. This force would be part of a global Islamic army, aimed at fighting Shia militants in Iraq, aiding Muslims in need, and supporting the establishment of a Caliphate for the Muslim ummah.
India-centric events organized by IOSPI
IOSPI’s official website reports of a campaign they announced in June of 2022 against the hijab ban imposed on Muslim women by a Karnataka college.
In line with the same sentiment, they even organized a conference titled ‘International Conference in Support of Muslim Women of India and Turkestan’.
The video clip from the conference shows even an alleged Indian-origin woman speaker (identity unknown as burqa-clad in the footage) invited to address the gathered audience. She was outspoken in labeling the ruling Indian government as pro-Hindutva and as targeting Muslims. The speaker even cited the Citizenship Amendment Act and the Hijab row as two particular instances to falsely portray India as a country that is discriminatory to Muslims.
Indirect Indian linkages
While IOSPI itself has a relatively nascent origin, its roots- the Muslim Brotherhood & the Turkish government already have a deep network with Islamic bodies based in India.
AKP-ruled Turkey under Erdogan is a prime state backer of MB and is known to have supported the radical politico-religious outfit Popular Front of India (PFI) as well. In 2018, E.M. Abdul Rahiman and Prof. P. Koya, members of the National Executive Council of the PFI met İnsan Hak ve Hürriyetleri ve İnsani Yardım Vakfı (IHH) representatives in Turkey. IHH is a Turkish state-sponsored NGO.
The MB is incidentally well-networked with all of the Jamaat bodies in the Indian subcontinent. In 2013, Jamaat-e-Islami Hind (JIH) of India openly protested the ban imposed on the Brotherhood by the Egyptian court. The Jamaat, in 2015, condemned the death sentence awarded to MB’s key leaders-including the ousted Egyptian President Dr Mohammad Morsi.
The absconding radical Islamic preacher Zakir Naik is also known to have had links to members of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Indian Deobandi leader Sajjad Nomani has also courted controversy in the past for personally meeting Hamas leaders and expressing solidarity with their cause in the past. Hamas, the terror outfit is backed by the Muslim Brotherhood.
Conclusion
The International Organization to Support the Prophet of Islam (IOSPI) merges the aggressive elements of the Brotherhood and Erdogan’s Islamist initiatives with a confrontational strategy, diverging from the previously cautious and gradual approaches adopted by similar Islamic political and religious organizations. IOSPI’s explicit mission to uphold the reputation of their Prophet, coupled with a hostile media campaign aimed at discrediting all governments and entities that criticize Islam’s conservative practices and ideologies, underscores the organization’s potential to provoke inter-religious conflict on a global scale.
Moreover, IOSPI’s focus on the Indian government since its inception is particularly concerning. Its malicious objectives necessitate intervention to safeguard the nation’s internal harmony and security.
