Policy

Muslim Brotherhood: Scaling Back Activities with Trump’s Arrival to Avoid Terrorist Label


A report published by the Eilaf website revealed that the Muslim Brotherhood issued clear and direct instructions to its leadership across the Middle East to scale back confrontational political activities with influential Arab regimes and to reduce media escalation during the early days of President Donald Trump’s administration in Washington. This move aims to prepare for the potential revival of the proposal to classify the Brotherhood as a terrorist organization.

The report pointed out that after the events of October 7, the Brotherhood, influenced by several political factors, increasingly perceived the Islamic Republic of Iran as their sole and optimal path to return to the political stages of the Middle East. This perception aligns with a potential deal that President Joe Biden’s administration could make, eventually passing it on to Kamala Harris, in line with the Democrats’ strategy of containing Iran through soft diplomacy.

The report further asserts that the Muslim Brotherhood placed all its bets on the regional table, building alliances with the Iranian regime, supported by Qatari ambitions, in anticipation of Kamala Harris’s inevitable victory.

Harris was seen as the favored candidate of Iran, Qatar, and the Brotherhood. Prior to the U.S. presidential elections, the Brotherhood even promoted a potential return to a political era similar to the one they experienced under former President Barack Obama’s administration. Obama had previously facilitated the rise of Brotherhood members to political prominence in several countries, even securing parliamentary and presidential seats through the momentum of popular protests, known as the “Arab Spring.”

The report also highlighted the Brotherhood’s strategic shortcomings, which are evident in their inability to renew themselves or adapt to new regional political dynamics. They have failed to make even a limited impact on the balance of conflicts or to propose alternative approaches to their ideological enmity with certain states in the region.

This leaves the Brotherhood with only one option: to revert to a strategy of dormancy in anticipation of Trump’s second term, to avoid potential reprisals. Such reprisals could form part of the concessions in an expected regional deal, where certain actors might offer “sacrifices” in exchange for political gains to maintain a minimum balance amidst Trump’s continued policies to clear Iran’s lingering influence in the region. These arrangements, initiated under previous Democratic administrations, are becoming evident through measures such as expelling Hamas political leaders and closing their offices in Doha, Qatar’s capital.

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