Qatar pumps billions into Italy’s universities: Investing in terrorism in heart of Europe

Shaimaa Yahya

Qatar has worked to spread its terrorist agenda for several years in various ways, including directly promoting terrorism, investing in the educational system, social welfare and mosques to spread and promote its extremist ideas, and supporting groups loyal to its policies and approaches that aim to penetrate countries’ domestic affairs.

Old files

Within the framework of agreements concluded between Rome and Doha in the educational and research fields since 2012, the Italian parliament ratified the last agreement on May 27, 2020, which opened the file of relations with Qatar and its sponsorship of a very radical version of Islam linked to the ideology of the Brotherhood.

Overwhelming rejection

This agreement sparked widespread rejection in Italy due to Qatar’s suspicious background in supporting terrorism and extremist ideas, its relations with terrorist groups, its work to spread extremism around the world, and its known attempts to pour this poison into other societies and improve its image. This agreement opens the doors of Italian education to extremism and the ideology of the Brotherhood, which is sponsored by Qatar.

Italian journalist Giulio Meotti expressed his dissatisfaction in an article regarding the Italian parliament’s ratification of the bilateral agreement between Rome and Doha allowing the facilitation of opening Qatari schools in Italy. “Politicians in Italy are blind to matters related to Qatar and its roles in the Middle East,” he said.

Italian criticism

Qatar and Italy have witnessed a close relationship in recent years that has allowed for the signing of more than 36 agreements in various fields, in addition to the arms deals signed in 2018, which sparked great criticism and condemnation among the Italian opposition, who called for the need to stop Doha’s interference.

The Italian newspaper Centro Studi Machiavelli pointed out that this agreement could pollute the standards of Italian education, as it is based on the exchange of students and university education, the possibility of funding scholarships, establishing university cooperation, and teaching Arabic in Italy, especially as the Qatari regime hosts Youssef al-Qaradawi, a major supporter of terrorism who justifies what ISIS is doing in Syria. It also condemned Qatar’s support for the Brotherhood and other extremists and terrorists in Syria, the Arab Gulf states and Egypt, adding that Doha is not fit to be a partner in any kind of cooperation.

Meanwhile, Italian newspaper Secolo Trentino confirmed that Qatar has strong ties with the extremist Hamas movement, in addition to its close cooperation with Iran and the Brotherhood since the days of the Khomeini Revolution and its conviction to Sayyid Qutb’s extremist ideology. If this is Qatar’s cultural domain, then these agreements for exchanging education open universities’ doors for Doha to spread extremism within Italian society.

Qatar’s shameful infiltration

Giovanni Giacalone, an expert on extremist organizations and a senior analyst for security, terrorist issues and emergency management at the Catholic University of Milan, also opposed the educational cooperation between Qatar and Italy, because it would allow the Brotherhood’s terrorist ideology to permeate all areas of Italian society.

Giacalone added that Qatar’s presence in Islamic centers in Italy is nothing new, but its presence in universities and research centers is a very serious problem, because it warns of Doha’s infiltration and the penetration of its ideology into Italy’s political and academic circles, even if the opposition is not united enough to prevent the ratification of the latest agreement.

Qatar is doing in Italy as it did in the United States, where it contributed more than $1.5 billion to 28 American universities to spread its vision of Islam and the extremist ideology of the Brotherhood.