Abdel-Halim Khafagy

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Abdel-Halim Hassanin Khafagy (ʿAbd al-Ḥalīm Ḥasanīn Ḫafāǧī) (* February 6, 1932 - August 31, 2013 ) was an Egyptian teacher and publisher as well as founder and long-time managing director of the SKD Bavaria publishing house. He had lived in Munich with his family since 1979 .

While staying in the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina , Sarajevo , Khafagy was arrested by SFOR forces as a terrorist suspect on September 25, 2001 and was subsequently detained at the SFOR military base in Tuzla for 11 days .

1955–1971 - Prison in Egypt as a supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood

Khafagy was imprisoned in Egypt in 1955 in connection with the general wave of arrests against the Muslim Brotherhood following an attack on President Gamal Abdel Nasser in October 1954. He spent the next 16 years up to 1971 in prison. According to his own admission, Khafagy fell into the mills of the judiciary of the Nasser regime because he financially supported the families of imprisoned Muslim Brotherhoods. Khafagy's statements regarding his membership in the Muslim Brotherhood are, however, contradictory; While he openly admitted his membership in the Muslim Brotherhood at a witness hearing in 1997 at the Munich police headquarters, he denied membership in other witness interrogations (2002) as well as in the naturalization process (from 1998) and finally to the BND investigative committee.

1971–2001 - From Kuwait to Germany

Nasser's successor as Egyptian president, Anwar as-Sadat , did not lift the ban on the Muslim Brotherhood, but released its followers from prisons from 1971 onwards, which also ended Khafagy's imprisonment. He first emigrated to Kuwait and then eight years later, in 1979, with his family to Germany. Here he took on a job as a religion teacher at the Islamic Center in Munich , which is operated by the IGD , one of the Muslim Brotherhood organizations in Germany with the largest number of members, according to the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution. Khafagy had had an unrestricted residence permit in Germany since 1992; In 1987 he had withdrawn an application for asylum, and in 2007 an application for naturalization that had been ongoing since 1998 - on the advice of the competent authority because he did not have sufficient knowledge of German, because his civil status was unclear and his financial situation was uncertain. In addition, the Bavarian Ministry of the Interior expressed security concerns about naturalization. a. because of the contradicting attitude towards the Muslim Brotherhood and because of the contacts with the Islamist environment - Khafagy was at least temporarily a member and employee of the IGD. According to a report by the Bavarian Office for the Protection of the Constitution on September 26, 2001, Khafagy was considered "one of the leading representatives of the Islamic Muslim Brotherhood".

Publisher SKD Bavaria

In 1983, Khafagy founded the publishing house SKD Bavaria Verlag und Handels GmbH with others . As long-time managing director until the publishing business was discontinued in 2006, Khafagy wrote and published numerous religious Islamic writings, including a multi-volume translation of the Koran. He was also responsible for the publication of writings by the creationist and former (until 2000) Holocaust denier Harun Yahya , the Holocaust denier Roger Garaudy and the Islamist preacher Yusuf al-Qaradawi . According to the assessment of the Bavarian Office for the Protection of the Constitution, the publishing house was controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood and published "books with clear tendencies of anti-democratic, racist, anti-Jewish and Islamist polemics".

2001 - Arrested in Sarajevo

In the summer of 2001, Khafagy was in Bosnia and Herzegovina for professional reasons ; he was busy with editorial work on his publisher's planned edition of the Koran in Serbo-Croatian. After Khafagy had contacts with suspected al-Qaida members, Khafagy was observed in the United States as part of the increased security readiness of SFOR in Bosnia-Herzegovina after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 . Finally, he was arrested by an SFOR unit in his hotel room in Sarajevo on September 25, 2001, because his employee was mistaken for a wanted al-Qaida member . This arrest was associated with the harsh use of force; Khafagy - almost 70 years old at the time - suffered a laceration on his head, which was sewn on site by a medical soldier. According to Khafagy, the SFOR soldiers used direct and unprovoked violence; SFOR, on the other hand, declared the use of force with resistance during the arrest - the BND committee of inquiry into this case finally assessed the use of force as "disproportionate".

In the SFOR base camp at Camp Eagle Base near Tuzla, Khafagy was then arrested and interrogated for 11 days as a suspect in connection with the terrorist attacks in the USA.The circumstances of the detention (sleep deprivation, no legal assistance) contradicted the rule of law, but Khafagy said he was reported to the BND - Committee of Inquiry not further ill-treated. After the suspicion against Khafagy's employees turned out to be false and no offenses could be proven himself, Khafagy was deported to Egypt on October 6, 2001, of which he was still a citizen. From there, Khafagy traveled back to Germany.

Khafagy's case was dealt with by the “BND investigative committee” of the German Bundestag, with the result that his arrest and imprisonment had no parallels with the other cases negotiated there ( Khaled al-Masri , Murat Kurnaz , Muhammad Haidar Zammar ); it was not a " rendition case".

Publications

  • Together with Gharieb M. Gharieb. Rev. by: Harun Behr : God's unadulterated words: Answer to Salman Rushdie's satanic verses , Munich: SKD Bavaria Verl. Und Handel, 1990, ISBN 3-926575-13-1
  • Abdul-Halim Khafagy: To my believing sister ... 33 letters about soul and paradise , Munich: SKD Bavaria, Verl. Und Handel, 1995, ISBN 3-926575-35-2

Web links

  • German Bundestag, 16th electoral term, printed matter 16/13400: 1. Committee of inquiry, recommendation for resolution and report , June 18, 2009 (= final report “BND Committee of Inquiry”), Part B (findings, facts), A., III. The case of Abdel Halim Hassanin Khafagy , pp. 76-102, and Part C (evaluations), E. Evaluation of the complex "Abdel Halim Khafagy" , pp. 389-396

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hans-Martin Tillack, Frauke Hunfeld, Interview with Khafagi: "Who did that to me?" , Stern.de , May 8, 2008 (last accessed December 26, 2013)
  2. ↑ Stefan Meining : A Mosque in Germany: Nazis, Secret Services and the Rise of Political Islam in the West , Munich (Beck) 2011, p. 201, ISBN 978-3-406-61411-8 ; see. also final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 77 f (see web links)
  3. ↑ Final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 77 f (see web links)
  4. ↑ a b final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 78 (see web links)
  5. ↑ cf. Final report "BND committee of inquiry", p. 77 (see web links)
  6. ↑ cit. According to Stefan Meining: A mosque in Germany: Nazis, secret services and the rise of political Islam in the West , Munich (Beck) 2011, p. 201, ISBN 978-3-406-61411-8 ; see. also final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 77 (see web links)
  7. ↑ a b final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 77 (see web links)
  8. ↑ Stefan Meining: A Mosque in Germany: Nazis, Secret Services and the Rise of Political Islam in the West , Munich (Beck) 2011, p. 202, ISBN 978-3-406-61411-8
  9. ↑ Final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 78 f (see web links)
  10. ↑ Final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 81 (see web links)
  11. ↑ Final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 81 f (see web links)
  12. ↑ Final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 389 (see web links)
  13. ↑ Final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 390 (see web links); on the other hand, there are reports from Khafagy's circle that he reported abuse in the weeks after his arrest, cf. Interview Tagesschau.de from August 24, 2007 (accessed December 30, 2013)
  14. ↑ Final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 83 (see web links)
  15. ↑ Final report "BND Committee of Inquiry", p. 389 f (see web links)
personal data
SURNAME Khafagy, Abdel-Halim
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Khafagy, Abdel Halim Hassanin; Ḫafāǧī, ʿAbd al-Ḥalīm Ḥasanīn
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Egyptian publisher
DATE OF BIRTH February 6, 1932
DATE OF DEATH August 31, 2013