By Firas Ahmad

Why was Tariq Ramadan’s visa revoked? According to Daniel Pipes he is a extremist Islamist. The US government agrees. How should Muslims understand the implications of this decision?

The revocation of Tariq Ramadan’s visa by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) came as a surprise to both the Muslim community in America as well as the broader academic establishment. Earlier this summer, Dr. Ramadan was preparing to assume the Henry R. Luce Professor of Religion, Conflict, and Peacebuilding appointment at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana until DHS determined that he represents a security threat to the United States. DHS is not at liberty to divulge specific reasons for prohibiting Ramadan’s entry into the country. However a DHS spokesman, Russ Knocke, later explained that the visa was revoked in accordance with the law that denies entry to aliens who used a “position of prominence within any country to endorse or espouse terrorist activity.” The revocation, Mr. Knocke added, was based on “public safety or national security interests.”


Given the media attention surrounding DHS’s decision and Dr. Ramadan’s high profile status in Europe, the issue carries important policy implications for the future of Islam in America. Revoking Ramadan’s visa cannot be considered a routine matter. Failure to demonstrate to the public how Ramadan is a security threat intimates ambiguity with regards to the actual reason for the decision. What follows is a discussion that seeks to understand why Ramadan’s critics, including Daniel Pipes, are against his entry into the country and how their voices could motivate U.S. policy makers to revoke Ramadan’s visa. The broader concern revolves around whether policy makers are using national security as a pretext for providing or withholding legitimacy to particular perspectives on Islam. If this is the case, and Ramadan’s visa was revoked because of a particular set of beliefs unrelated to matters of security, then it is necessary to understand any potential strategic reality underlying the decision and realize its implications on the Muslim community in America. Tariq Ramadan is very popular in Europe, particularly amongst Muslim youth. His high profile image is informed in part by his ideas, and also in part by his lineage. He is the maternal grandson of Hassan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood. This fact alone is enough for some to label him an extremist. Ramadan’s supporters, which include a wide cross section of academia, argue that he is the subject of character assassination, and poses absolutely no security threat whatsoever. Both the Washington Post and the Chicago Times produced house editorials questioning DHS’s decision in the matter.


It remains unclear whether the Swiss scholar will be able to teach at Notre Dame or any other university in the United States in the future. For his part, Dr. Ramadan explicitly denies any and all accusations leveled against him that could have led to DHS’s decision. His harshest critics, including Daniel Pipes and Fouad Ajami amongst others, contend that Ramadan espouses extremist positions, is anti-Semitic and maintains links with dubious extremist organizations including Al-Qaida. Because DHS never released the details of its decision to revoke the visa, Ramadan’s defense of his reputation is directed towards the critics who argue in support of the decision. As a result, a series of articles published through major daily newspapers in the U.S. detail the arguments back and forth. On August 27th Pipes argued in support of the revocation in an article in the New York Sun. On August 31st, Ramadan responded point by point to all accusations levied by Pipes against him in the Chicago Tribune.

What is lacking in the accusations against Ramadan by his critics is the rigor of solid evidence demonstrating that he is a clear national security threat. The facts used by his critics in the media to paint Ramadan as an extremist are selective and removed from their necessary context. In Pipes’ article published in the New York Sun he argues that Ramadan denies Osama bin Laden was involved in the 9/11 attacks. Evidence for this claim is provided by a web link to a French news interview with Ramadan where he states that: “The probability [of bin Laden’s guilt] is large, but some questions remain unanswered … But whoever they are, bin Laden or others, it is necessary to find them and that they be judged.” The interview was dated September 22nd, 2001, less than two weeks after the attacks. At the time the only evidence available to Ramadan and the rest of the public linking bin Laden to the attacks was general media coverage. In this context, Ramadan’s words hardly demonstrate a denial of bin Laden’s culpability. Much of the evidence brought forth publicly against Ramadan follows this selective pattern of argumentation. Its tenuous nature makes the need for transparency in DHS’s decision making process that much more urgent.

WHY TARIQ RAMADAN?
The decision to silence Dr. Ramadan in North America highlights an important ideological divide within the academic and policy making community. It will also likely impact the environment surrounding Middle Eastern and Islamic studies in the United States. DHS’s decision also reveals the relationships between certain academic voices engaged in “anti-Islamist” rhetoric and the policy makers who incorporate that rhetoric into the U.S. policy making process.
Ramadan represents what many Muslims and Americans would consider a perfect blend of east and west, a persona palatable and distinguished enough in both cultures to facilitate the task of rebuilding bridges torn down by the events of September 11th. A social scientist by training, Ramadan became a leading figure of Islamic reform in Europe due to his moderate orientation. He is often mislabeled as a modern day Muslim Martin Luther. Ramadan neither attacks Islam as Luther attacked Catholicism, nor does he advocate a wholesale break with classical Islamic tradition. As a scholar and an activist, Ramadan provides an articulate and culturally conversant alternative to the existing conceptions of orthodoxy for Muslims in Europe. Unlike his less tolerant counterparts, he argues for the acceptance of multiple interpretations of the Qur’an, and is a strong critic of dictatorial and oppressive regimes across the Muslim world.

What confuses those familiar with Dr. Ramadan’s body of work about the decision is that his moderating influence over Muslim masses could have had a very positive impact on Islam in America. A number of American Muslim organizations remain ideologically wedded to groups founded and perpetuated within the social and political upheaval of the Middle East and South Asia, a criticism that critics like Daniel Pipes often, and at times justifiably, levels against them. Although their influence continues to wane in a post 9/11 environment, these groups operate within religious and political paradigms foreign to North America and the Western world. Dr. Ramadan, probably more so than any other Muslim scholar today, is in a position to address the particular mentality that informs this perspective. As the grandson of Hassan Al-Banna, he has the requisite stature and influence to successfully deconstruct these paradigms and encourage Muslims to understand that action must be informed by context. Ramadan takes a hard line stance against suicide bombing, advocates for a moratorium on the implementation of all death sentences for adultery, and encourages dialogue with the western world. What many Muslims hope for is to establish Islam in America as a cooperative, congenial and relevant religion capable of discourse with existing socio-cultural, political, religious and economic paradigms. Many feel that Ramadan’s presence in the U.S. would help facilitate this process.

Since the attacks of 9/11 there is little doubt that combating Islamic extremism is of paramount concern for U.S. policymakers. A critical question that they must answer is how does one go about engaging Islam and the Muslim world so as to prevent its extremist impulse from further threatening the country? The question is obvious; the answer much less so. If Ramadan exudes moderation, and the evidence of his links to or support for extremist organizations is circumstantial at best and entirely unsupported by his writings and speeches, why was he not allowed to bring his message to America? And if policy makers are not interested in associating with academics like Ramadan, then who are they looking to engage? In order to understand why DHS revoked Ramadan’s visa in such dramatic fashion, it is necessary to discern what possible strategies motivated such a policy decision.