There was an extraordinary conversation on the BBC Radio 4 programme, The World This Weekend, yesterday, in which a prominent American neoconservative claimed that European governments have been "penetrated" by the Muslim Brotherhood.

On Wednesday, the European parliament will be voting on a re-negotiated deal to provide the US authorities with details of personal financial transactions by everyone in Britain and other European countries. The deal is intended as an anti-terrorism measure.

In a discussion with Frank Gaffney (who was responsible for international security at State Department under President Reagan and later founded the neocon thinktank, the Center for Security Policy), Baroness Sarah Ludford, a British Liberal Democrat MEP, pointed out that the US will not be providing Europe with details of American citizens' banking transactions in return. 

The conversation starts around 22 minutes 12 seconds into the recording:

Ludford: We don't have a reciprocal right to US banking data and some of us have wondered what Congress and the Senate in particular would say if Europe was to request that the banking data of all US citizens was to be transferred in bulk, en bloc, to Europe. 

BBC interviewer: Frank Gaffney, that's fair enough isn't it? If you're going to be given access to my bank details ... shouldn't that work the other way around as well?

Gaffney: I can't speak for the US government, obviously, because I'm not a government official any more but I suspect that one of the reasons why there might be a resistance to the kind of reciprocity that seems otherwise unobjectionable is that to the extent that European governments and maybe even the European parliament itself have been penetrated by folks who are sympathetic to, or actually working for, organisations like the Muslim Brotherhood – that would be a real problem for me from the security point of view.

Ludford: I can assure you that that is not the case. 

Gaffney (interrupting): I can assure you that it is the case.

The discussion continues:

Gaffney: All I am saying is I don't believe it is intelligent to embrace the Muslim Brotherhood and organisations that are fronts for that.

Ludford: I don't think anybody is suggesting ...

Gaffney: I assure you ma'am, that that is being done in Britain, it is being done on the continent of Europe, it is being done by the European parliament.

Ludford: I can assure you that the European parliament – MEPs – are not at all motivated by concern for the Muslim Brotherhood in our insistence on strict data protection privacy safeguards.

Gaffney: I can simply assure you that it is absolutely a point on which you agree with the Muslim Brotherhood, so whether you are doing it at their behest or simply doing it in parallel is beside the point to my way of thinking.

Ludford: I think that is really unhelpful. I'm sorry ... I just find that so unhelpful to somehow cast aspersions on anyone who is championing data protection, whether it's our banking data, our email, our internet usage, our phone calls or travel information ... [that] it ought to be open season for law enforcement to go fishing around in it all because if you don't agree to that you're somehow a front for the jihadists. I think that is absurd.