In Egypt in 1977, members of the Islamist separatist group Takfir wa'l-Hijra ("Condemnation and Migration"), also known as the "Society of Muslims," attacked night clubs in Cairo during a more general series of food riots that had broken out. A few months after this, Takfir kidnapped a moderate Islamic preacher, Sheikh Muhammad al-Dhahabi, and subsequently murdered him. The group's leader, Shukry Mustafa and four hundred other members were arrested. Mustafa was tried for the crime, found guilty, and executed.
Takfir wa'l-Hijra named itself and modeled its behavior after the Prophet Muhammad who, in 622, renounced the corrupt society of Mecca and made his hijra (migration) away from that city to live in Medina. Shukry, a trained agronomist, along with his small band of followers set up their society-in-exile in the desert outside Asyut where they grew crops and created a self-sufficient community. Shukry's philosophy was based on a radical interpretation of Sayyid Qutb's call for Muslims to "withdraw" from corrupt secular societies, as explicated in Qutb's book, Milestones.