The Special Apparatus (al-Niẓām al-Khāṣṣ): The Rise of Nationalist Militancy in the Ranks of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood

Existing scholarship has largely focused on the role of Sayyid Qutb’s ideas when analyzing the Muslim Brotherhood’s violent history. Perceiving Qutb’s ideas as paving the way for radical interpretations of jihad, many studies linked the Brotherhood’s violent history with this key ideologue. Yet, in so doing, many studies overlooked the importance of the Special Apparatus in shaping this violent history of the Brotherhood, long before Qutb joined the organization. Through an in-depth study of memoires and accounts penned by Brotherhood members and leaders, and a systematic study of British and American intelligence sources, I attempt to shed light on this understudied formation of the Brotherhood, the Special Apparatus. This paper looks at the development of anti-colonial militancy in Egypt, particularly the part played by the Brotherhood until 1954. It contends that political violence, in the context of British colonization, antedated the Brotherhood’s foundation, and was in some instances considered as a legitimate and even distinguished duty among anti-colonial factions. The application of violence was on no account a part of the Brotherhood’s core strategy, but the organization, nevertheless, established an armed and secret wing tasked with the fulfillment of what a segment of its members perceived as the duty of anti-colonial jihad.

MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD IN EUROPE: BETWEEN RELIGION AND POLITICS.

The article examines the reasons that prompted the governments and expert circles of many EU countries to pay increased attention in the past two years to the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood (BM) religious and political association within the EU. According to the author, this is due not only to the terrorist attacks of Islamists in France and Austria in 2020, but also to the manifestations of the growing influence of this category of Muslim organizations and groups on the social and political life of the countries of the Old World. The article focuses on the analysis of the means, methods and mechanisms characteristic of the groupings associated with the structures of the Muslim Brotherhood in Europe, on their differences from similar organizations in the Middle East. The author turns to the history of the emergence and growth of the influence of the «brothers» in Europe in order to more thoroughly examine the phenomenon of today: while the authority and influence of the BM are noticeably falling in the Arab countries, in the Old World the situation is different for the «brothers» – in many cases they manage to hide their Islamist essence under the cover of left, «progressive» rhetoric, which allows them to fit into the current political and ideological discourse in the host countries. However, with the aggravation of intercivilizational relations in Europe, BM groups are increasingly forced to leave their traditional «hiding places», publicly claiming the status of «defenders of discredited Muslims», but in fact trying to legalize their radical views and positions. The resulting scale of their presence and influence in European societies noticeably frightens the establishment and the population of these countries. The author comes to the conclusion that at the current stage, an aggravation of the confrontation between the political elites in the EU countries and the BM structures is inevitable

The Muslim Brotherhood Faultline in Saudi-Qatari Relations: Domestic Divisions and Regional Rivalry

The commentary argues the Saudi-Qatari tensions lie in conflicting perspectives about the role of political Islam within the fabric of both states and their actions regionally. Funda-mentally, the rivalry stems from contrasting relations between political and religious elites in each country which has taken on an increasing political importance in tensions between Riyadh and Doha. Central to much of this are questions about the role played by the Muslim Brotherhood (and its various affiliates). More relatedly, the Saudi-Qatari rifts emerge out of competing understandings of authority and legitimacy, and with it, concern at the contesta-tion of these claims.

Things Fall Apart: The Disintegration of the Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood

The Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood has been accepted by the Hashemite monarchy throughout most of its seventy-five-year history. Today, however, it is illegal and a new, more pro-regime version exists, as well as several other groups that have their roots in the organization. Based on a close reading of the Arabic writings by Salim al-Falahat, a former leader and current critic of the Muslim Brotherhood, as well as Jordanian media reports, this article seeks to explain how this falling apart of the organization happened. Many studies focus on fissures within the Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood. I argue that while these are important to explain the underlying divisions underpinning this breakdown, it was actually the reformist ZamZam initiative launched in 2012 and the organization’s handling of its aftermath that caused the Muslim Brotherhood to fall apart in the ensuing years.

Explaining the moderate platform of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood: Against the inclusion-moderation hypothesis

<p>Throughout its existence, the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood (SMB) has consistently maintained a moderate policy on governance. The main aim of this study is to explain this moderation. Previous literature has usually explained moderation in similar movements by an “inclusion-moderation hypothesis”, which holds that moderation results when movements have the opportunity to participate in pluralist political processes. However, the SMB has been progressively excluded from the Syrian political arena since 1963. The inclusion-moderation hypothesis implies, as its converse, that exclusion leads to radicalisation. This study shows that contrary to this expectation, the SMB’s ultimate exclusion from the Syrian political arena in 1982 was in fact the primary driver of its moderate policy. The SMB also participated in parliamentary politics in its early history, and therefore has not moderated over time, as the inclusion-moderation hypothesis would require. Thus, the inclusion-moderation hypothesis does not work for this case, and this dissertation advances an alternate explanation for the SMB’s continued commitment to a moderate policy on governance. This study’s central thesis is that the SMB’s moderate policy on governance can be explained by the Brotherhood’s primary target audience, that is to say, the political force which, in the SMB’s view, can deliver its political objective. As this definition implies, the target audience shifts over time, in accordance with changing circumstances. In 1980, the primary target audience comprised diverse actors in opposition to the al-Asad government: the Fighting Vanguard, the Syrian ulama, and the secularist opposition. In 2001, the audience was the Bashar al-Asad government. In 2004, it was the secularist opposition; and in 2012, it was the foreign sponsors of the secularist opposition.</p>

Explaining the moderate platform of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood: Against the inclusion-moderation hypothesis

<p>Throughout its existence, the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood (SMB) has consistently maintained a moderate policy on governance. The main aim of this study is to explain this moderation. Previous literature has usually explained moderation in similar movements by an “inclusion-moderation hypothesis”, which holds that moderation results when movements have the opportunity to participate in pluralist political processes. However, the SMB has been progressively excluded from the Syrian political arena since 1963. The inclusion-moderation hypothesis implies, as its converse, that exclusion leads to radicalisation. This study shows that contrary to this expectation, the SMB’s ultimate exclusion from the Syrian political arena in 1982 was in fact the primary driver of its moderate policy. The SMB also participated in parliamentary politics in its early history, and therefore has not moderated over time, as the inclusion-moderation hypothesis would require. Thus, the inclusion-moderation hypothesis does not work for this case, and this dissertation advances an alternate explanation for the SMB’s continued commitment to a moderate policy on governance. This study’s central thesis is that the SMB’s moderate policy on governance can be explained by the Brotherhood’s primary target audience, that is to say, the political force which, in the SMB’s view, can deliver its political objective. As this definition implies, the target audience shifts over time, in accordance with changing circumstances. In 1980, the primary target audience comprised diverse actors in opposition to the al-Asad government: the Fighting Vanguard, the Syrian ulama, and the secularist opposition. In 2001, the audience was the Bashar al-Asad government. In 2004, it was the secularist opposition; and in 2012, it was the foreign sponsors of the secularist opposition.</p>

Easter Sunday Bombings and Jihad in Sri Lanka

2019 Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka by Islamist radicals poses a level of complexity that could challenge conventional thinking about radicalization and the spread of influence of groups like Al Qaeda, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and the Muslim Brotherhood, in many fundamental respects. At a very basic level, it defies common understanding of the emergence of Islamist radicalism in Sri Lanka – a country ravaged by extremist violence in other forms perpetrated by groups like JVP and the LTTE for example, which are mostly secular in character. In this context, jihadism in Sri Lanka introduces a new dynamic - utilitarian and pragmatic - where groups, cutting across their ideological and political divides, come together to achieve common goals. Ability of the groups like ISIS and Muslim Brotherhood to recruit and deploy local Muslims in Sri Lanka to attack Western targets and attract global attention testify to the potency and resiliency of the ideology. [1]

Governing Political Islam

This paper analyzes what I define as an anti-Islamist discourse (or an “Islamistphobia”) both as a social reality and as conceptual innovation in contemporary Egypt. The paper focuses on four interrelated actors—the current Egyptian regime and its discourse on political Islam, the Muslim Brotherhood and its historical entanglements with the Egyptian state, the Salafi al-Nūr and Rāya Parties, and al-Azhar’s relation with both the regime and the Islamists. I advance an idea that anti-Islamist sentiments channel primarily through official (state) and media discourses in Egypt, rooted in both a colonialist locale and in a contemporary religious framework and its anticolonial rhetoric. It is, however, directed primarily against the Muslim Brotherhood, rather than against all Islamist groups across the board. Keywords: Anti-Islamist discourse, Islamistphobia, Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt, political Islam

Who Supported the Early Muslim Brotherhood?

Scholarship on political Islam suggests that support for early Islamist movements came from literate merchants, government officials, and professionals who lacked political representation. We test these claims with a unique tranche of microlevel data drawn from a Muslim Brotherhood petition campaign in interwar Egypt. Matching the occupations of over 2,500 Brotherhood supporters to contemporaneous census data, we show that Egyptians employed in commerce, public administration, and the professions were more likely to sign the movement's petitions. The movement's supporters were also overwhelmingly literate. Contrary to expectations, the early Brotherhood also attracted support from Egyptians employed in agriculture, albeit less than we would expect given the prevalence of agrarian workers in the population. A case study tracing Muslim Brotherhood branch formation and petition activism in a Nile Delta village illustrates how literate, socially mobile agrarian families were key to the propagation of the movement in rural areas.