Egyptian ‘Nazi’ dismissed from Georgetown panel

Georgetown University has withdrawn an invitation to Ramy Jan — a Coptic Egyptian affiliated with a group planning to form a new party based on Nazi ideology — to speak on a panel about the future of democracy in Egypt.

Georgetown’s Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, host of the event, revoked the invitation after a wave of criticism. Slated for January, the panel, “Egypt and the struggle for democracy,” is to include political analysts, members of the Muslim Brotherhood and a retired member of the Egyptian Armed Forces.

Jan was invited as a founding member of a group called Christians against the Coup. The group declared its opposition to the military takeover that removed former President Mohamed Morsi from office in July.

The center was unaware of Jan’s other political affiliations at the time the invitation was extended, the center’s director John Esposito told the New York Times on Wednesday.

“This was new to us that he had a background like that, and as soon as it came to our attention he was immediately disinvited,” Esposito said. “We had no idea that there was this issue out there.”

A researcher at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Eric Trager, first raised Jan’s apparent Nazi beliefs and accused Georgetown University of playing “an identity game.”

“Georgetown clearly sought a rare, pro-MB [Muslim Brotherhood] speaker. When you play this kind of identity game, this is what you get,” Trager wrote on his Twitter account.

Jan’s affiliation with activists who claim to support fascist beliefs were revealed in a September 2011 broadcast on the privately owned Dream TV.

The program was uploaded onto YouTube, and includes statements by activists, including Jan, who said that they plan to register a new party to be known as the Egyptian Nazi Party. The activists spoke about the ideology of their party and said they did not intend to present the “negative side” of fascism.

“We have adopted the positive aspect of the Nazi Party, not the negative,” Mohamed Abdel Rahman explained. “We will not carry out holocausts against the Jews, and we will not fight them. This has to do with the policies of the state, in which we do not interfere.”

While the plan to establish an Egyptian Nazi Party was announced more than two years ago, no such party has yet been registered in Egypt. In the Dream TV broadcast, the activists said their party would support the “supremacy of the Arabic race” and the spread of the Arabic language throughout the world.

In the same video, Jan spoke about his ambitions to build an Egyptian nuclear program that would be built and managed by Egyptians.

Anti-Brotherhood Egyptian activists criticized Georgetown University’s handling of the panel formation.

“Disappointed with Georgetown for organizing a conference featuring a one-sided panel on Egypt including a random Nazi Copt (anti-coup) and MB,” author Rawah Badrawi wrote on her Twitter account Wednesday.