History of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt

This article refers to the history of the Egyptian organisation called the Muslim Brotherhood
Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt
The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is an Islamist religious, political, and social movement. Following the 2011 Revolution the group was legalized, and with an estimated 600,000 members or supporters it's considered the largest, best-organized political force in Egypt...

;
for non-historical information on the organization see Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt
Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt
The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is an Islamist religious, political, and social movement. Following the 2011 Revolution the group was legalized, and with an estimated 600,000 members or supporters it's considered the largest, best-organized political force in Egypt...

;
for other Muslim Brotherhood organizations in other countries, see the Muslim Brotherhood
Muslim Brotherhood
The Society of the Muslim Brothers is the world's oldest and one of the largest Islamist parties, and is the largest political opposition organization in many Arab states. It was founded in 1928 in Egypt by the Islamic scholar and schoolteacher Hassan al-Banna and by the late 1940s had an...

article.

The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in Ismailia

Ismaïlia

-Notable natives:*Osman Ahmed Osman, a famous and influential Egyptian engineer, contractor, entrepreneur, and politician, was born in this town on 6 April 1917....

, Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...

by Hassan al-Banna

Hassan al-Banna

Sheikh Hasan Ahmed Abdel Rahman Muhammed al-Banna known as Hasan al-Banna was a schoolteacher and imam, best known for founding the Muslim Brotherhood, one of the largest and most influential 20th century Muslim revivalist organizations.-Early life:Banna was born in 1906 in Mahmoudiyah, Egypt...

in March 1928 as an Islamist religious, political, and social movement. The group spread to other Muslim countries but has its largest, or one of its largest, organizations in Egypt, where for many years it has been the largest, best-organized, and most disciplined political opposition force, despite a succession of government crackdowns in 1948, 1954, 1965 after plots, or alleged plots, of assassination and overthrow were uncovered. Following the 2011 Revolution

2011 Egyptian revolution

The 2011 Egyptian revolution took place following a popular uprising that began on Tuesday, 25 January 2011 and is still continuing as of November 2011. The uprising was mainly a campaign of non-violent civil resistance, which featured a series of demonstrations, marches, acts of civil...

the group was legalized, and in April 2011 it launched a civic political party called the Freedom and Justice Party (Egypt)

Freedom and Justice Party (Egypt)

The Freedom and Justice Party , is an Islamist political party in Egypt. The party is nominally independent but has strong links to the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt, the largest and best organized political group in Egypt...

to contest elections.

1928-1938

The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in 1928 by Hassan al-Banna

Hassan al-Banna

, along with six workers of the Suez Canal

Suez Canal

The Suez Canal , also known by the nickname "The Highway to India", is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea. Opened in November 1869 after 10 years of construction work, it allows water transportation between Europe and Asia without navigation...

Company. Al-Banna was a schoolteacher, to promote implementing of traditional Islamic sharia

Sharia

Sharia law, is the moral code and religious law of Islam. Sharia is derived from two primary sources of Islamic law: the precepts set forth in the Quran, and the example set by the Islamic prophet Muhammad in the Sunnah. Fiqh jurisprudence interprets and extends the application of sharia to...

law and a social renewal based on an Islam

Islam

Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

ic ethos of altruism and civic duty, in opposition to political and social injustice and to British imperial rule

British Empire

The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...

. The organisation initially focused on educational and charitable work, but quickly grew to become a major political force as well, by championing the cause of disenfranchised classes

Social class

Social classes are economic or cultural arrangements of groups in society. Class is an essential object of analysis for sociologists, political scientists, economists, anthropologists and social historians. In the social sciences, social class is often discussed in terms of 'social stratification'...

, playing a prominent role in the Egyptian nationalist

Nationalism

Nationalism is a political ideology that involves a strong identification of a group of individuals with a political entity defined in national terms, i.e. a nation. In the 'modernist' image of the nation, it is nationalism that creates national identity. There are various definitions for what...

movement, and promoting a conception of Islam that attempted to restore broken links between tradition and modernity

Modernity

Modernity typically refers to a post-traditional, post-medieval historical period, one marked by the move from feudalism toward capitalism, industrialization, secularization, rationalization, the nation-state and its constituent institutions and forms of surveillance...

1939-1954

Links to the Nazis began during the 1930s and were close during the Second World War, involving agitation against the British, espionage and sabotage, as well as support for terrorist activities orchestrated by Haj Amin el-Hussaini in British Mandate Palestine, as a wide range of declassified documents from the British, American and Nazi German governmental archives, as well as from personal accounts and memoires from that period, confirm. Reflecting this connection the Muslim Brotherhood also disseminated Hitler's Mein Kampf
Mein Kampf
Mein Kampf is a book written by Nazi leader Adolf Hitler. It combines elements of autobiography with an exposition of Hitler's political ideology. Volume 1 of Mein Kampf was published in 1925 and Volume 2 in 1926...

and The Protocols of the Elders of Zion
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion is a fraudulent, antisemitic text purporting to describe a Jewish plan for achieving global domination. It was first published in Russia in 1903, translated into multiple languages, and disseminated internationally in the early part of the twentieth century...

widely in Arab translations, helping to deepen and extend already existing hostile views about Jews and Western societies generally.

In November 1948 police seized an automobile containing the documents and plans of what is thought to be the Brotherhood's `secret apparatus` with names of its members. The seizure was preceded by an assortment of bombings and assassination attempts by the apparatus. Subsequently 32 of its leaders were arrested and its offices raided. The next month the Egyptian Prime Minister of Egypt, Mahmud Fahmi Nokrashi, ordered the dissolution of the Brotherhood.

On December 28, 1948 Egypt's prime minister was assassinated by Brotherhood member and veterinary student Abdel Meguid Ahmed Hassan, in what is thought to have been retaliation for the government crackdown. A month and half later Al-Banna himself was killed in Cairo by men believed to be government agents and/or supporters of the murdered premier. Al-Banna was succeeded as head of the Brotherhood by Hassan Isma'il al-Hudaybi, a former judge.

In 1952 members of the Muslim Brotherhood are accused of taking part in arson that destroyed some "750 buildings" in downtown Cairo — mainly night clubs, theatres, hotels, and restaurants frequented by British and other foreigners — "that marked the end of the liberal, progressive, cosmopolitan" Egypt.

The Brotherhood supported the military coup that overthrew the monarchy in 1952, but the junta

Military dictatorship

A military dictatorship is a form of government where in the political power resides with the military. It is similar but not identical to a stratocracy, a state ruled directly by the military....

was unwilling to share power or lift martial law

Martial law

Martial law is the imposition of military rule by military authorities over designated regions on an emergency basis— only temporary—when the civilian government or civilian authorities fail to function effectively , when there are extensive riots and protests, or when the disobedience of the law...

and clashed with the Brotherhood.

1954-1982

After the attempted assassination of Gamal 'Abd al-Nasser

Gamal Abdel Nasser

Gamal Abdel Nasser Hussein was the second President of Egypt from 1956 until his death. A colonel in the Egyptian army, Nasser led the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 along with Muhammad Naguib, the first president, which overthrew the monarchy of Egypt and Sudan, and heralded a new period of...

, in 1954, a member of the secret apparatus was accused by the authorities of being the perpetrator of the attempt. Nasser

Gamal Abdel Nasser

then abolished the Brotherhood and imprisoned and punished thousands of its members.

Many members of the Brotherhood were held for years in prisons and concentration camps, where they were sometimes tortured, during Nasser's rule. In 1964 there was a minor thaw when writer Sayyid Qutb

Sayyid Qutb

Sayyid Qutb was an Egyptian author, educator, Islamist theorist, poet, and the leading member of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood in the 1950s and '60s....

was released from prison only to be arrested again along with his brother Muhammad

Muhammad Qutb

Muhammad Qutb, , is an Islamist author, scholar and teacher best known as the younger brother of the Egyptian Islamist thinker Sayyid Qutb...

in August 1965, when he was accused of being part of a plot to overthrow the state -- to assassinate the President and other Egyptian officials and personalities -- and subjected to what some consider a show trial. The trial culminated in a death sentence for Qutb and six other members of the Muslim Brotherhood and on 29 August 1966, he was executed by hanging.

Qutb became the Brotherhood's most influential thinker. He argued that Muslim society was no longer Islamic and must be transformed by an Islamic vanguard through violent revolution. To restore Islam from modern jahiliyya Muslim states must be overthrown. While Qutb's ideology became very popular elsewhere, in Egypt the Brotherhood's leadership distanced itself from his revolutionary ideology, adhering instead to a nonviolent reformist strategy, to which it has remained ever since.

Nasser's successor, Anwar Sadat

Anwar Sadat

Muhammad Anwar al-Sadat was the third President of Egypt, serving from 15 October 1970 until his assassination by fundamentalist army officers on 6 October 1981...

, became president of Egypt in 1970 and gradually released imprisoned Brothers and enlisted their help against leftist groups. Since then, the organisation has been tolerated to an extent, but remains technically illegal and is subjected to periodic crackdowns.

In the 1970s

1970s

File:1970s decade montage.png|From left, clockwise: US President Richard Nixon doing the V for Victory sign after his resignation from office after the Watergate scandal in 1974; Refugees aboard a US naval boat after the Fall of Saigon, leading to the end of the Vietnam War in 1975; The 1973 oil...

, a large student Islamic activist movement took shape, independently from the Brotherhood. Sadat himself became the enemy of the Brotherhood and other Islamist groups after signing a peace agreement with Israel

Israel

The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

in 1979, and was assassinated by a violent Islamist group Tanzim al-Jihad on October 6, 1981.

1982-2005

In the 1980s

1980s

File:1980s decade montage.png|thumb|400px|From left, clockwise: The first Space Shuttle, Columbia, lifted off in 1981; American President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev eased tensions between the two superpowers, leading to the end of the Cold War; The Fall of the Berlin Wall in...

, during Hosni Mubarak

Hosni Mubarak

Muhammad Hosni Sayyid Mubarak is a former Egyptian politician and military commander. He served as the fourth President of Egypt from 1981 to 2011....

's presidency, many of the student Islamist activists joined the Brotherhood. The Brotherhood dominated the professional and student associations of Egypt and was famous for its network of social services in neighborhoods and villages. In order to quell the Brotherhood's renewed influence, the government again resorted to repressive measures starting in 1992. Despite mass arrests, police harassment and an essentially closed political system, Brotherhood candidates have made strong showings in several parliamentary elections.

Over the next ten years the Brotherhood made repeated calls for a more democratic political system. In 1997, the Brotherhood's Supreme Guide Mustafa Mashhur

Mustafa Mashhur

Mustafa Mashhur was the fifth General Guide of the Muslim Brothers. He was the official head of the Egyptian Islamist organization from 1996 until 2002, although outside observers have suggested that he informally ran the organization during the ten-year term of his predecessor Muhammad Hamid...

, suggested the reintroduction of the jizya

Jizya

Under Islamic law, jizya or jizyah is a per capita tax levied on a section of an Islamic state's non-Muslim citizens, who meet certain criteria...

, the poll tax on non-Muslims but according to The Guardian

The Guardian

The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...

newspaper, the proposal caused an "uproar" among Egypt's six million Coptic Christians and "the movement later backtracked."

In 1997 Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Mustafa Mashhur

Mustafa Mashhur

told journalist Khalid Daoud that he thought Egypt's Coptic Christians and Orthodox Jews should pay the long-abandoned jizya

Jizya

Under Islamic law, jizya or jizyah is a per capita tax levied on a section of an Islamic state's non-Muslim citizens, who meet certain criteria...

poll tax, levied on non-Muslims in exchange for protection from the state, rationalized by the fact that non-Muslims are exempt from military service while it is compulsory for Muslims. He went on to say, "we do not mind having Christians members in the People's Assembly

People's Assembly of Egypt

The People's Assembly is the lower house of Egypt's bicameral parliament. In spite of its lower status, however, it plays a more important role in drafting legislation and day-to-day legislative duties than the Shura Council, the upper house....

...the top officials, especially in the army, should be Muslims since we are a Muslim country ... This is necessary because when a Christian country attacks the Muslim country and the army has Christian elements, they can facilitate our defeat by the enemy." According to The Guardian

The Guardian

The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...

newspaper, the proposal caused an "uproar" among Egypt's six million Coptic Christians and "the movement later backtracked."

In 2000, 15 MB deputies were elected to the Egyptian parliament. A book detailing the record of the MB deputies in the 2000-2005 Egyptian parliament (The Brothers in the 2000-2005 Parliament) found its parliamentary leader Hamdy Hassan working vigorously to fight cultural expression the Brotherhood felt was unIslamic and blasphemous, from literature to beauty contests. Hassan accused the Minister of Culture (Farouk Hosny

Farouk Hosny

Farouk Hosny , is an Egyptian abstract painter who was Minister of Culture from 1987 to 2011.-Early life and career:...

) of leading what Hassan called the `current US-led war against Islamic culture and identity`. Another Brotherhood MP (Gamal Heshmat) took credit for forcing culture minister Hosni to ban the publication of three novels on the ground they promoted blasphemy and unacceptable sexual practices.

2005-2010

In 2005 the Brotherhood participated in pro-democracy demonstrations with the Kifaya

Kifaya

Kefaya is the unofficial moniker of the Egyptian Movement for Change , a grassroots coalition which prior to the 2011 revolution drew its support from across Egypt’s political spectrum...

movement. In the 2005 parliamentary elections, the Brotherhood's candidates could only stand as independents under the emergency law, but identified themselves by campaigning under the most famous of their slogans - 'Islam Is the Solution'. They won 88 seats (20% of the total) to form the largest opposition bloc despite many violations of the electoral process. Meanwhile, the legally approved opposition parties won only 14 seats.

More than 1,000 Brothers were arrested before the vote's second and third rounds, and police blocked Brotherhood supporters from entering the polls in some districts, according to independent organizations monitoring the election. Brotherhood leaders also accused the government of changing the final count to lead to a victory for the ruling party candidate in seven districts, a concern echoed by independent monitors. More than 100 Egyptian judges signed a statement condemning "aggression and acts of thuggery by supporters of the ruling party against the judges while...police forces stood idle."

During and after the election the Brethren launched what some have called a "charm offensive." Its leadership talked about its `responsibility to lead reform and change in Egypt.` It addressed the `Coptic issue` stating that `conditions` for Coptic Christians (Copts) would be better `under the Brotherhood group`, and Copts would be "full citizens, not ahl-dhimma," and insinuated that the Brethren would do away with Egypt's decade's old church building-permit system that Coptic Christians felt was discriminatory. Internationally the Brethren launched an English-language website and some of the MB's leaders participated in an Initiative to `Re-Introduc[e] the Brotherhood to the West `, "listing and addressing many `Western misconceptions about the Brotherhood.`" An article was written for The Guardian

The Guardian

The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...

newspaper under the title `No need to be afraid of us`; and another for American Jewish newspaper The Forward

The Forward

The Forward , commonly known as The Jewish Daily Forward, is a Jewish-American newspaper published in New York City. The publication began in 1897 as a Yiddish-language daily issued by dissidents from the Socialist Labor Party of Daniel DeLeon...

.

This campaign, however, was a direct threat to the Egyptian government and its position as an indispensable ally of the west in its fight against radical Islamist ideologues "bent on the Islamization of society and permanent conflict with the West." The government responded by not only continuing to arrest the Brotherhood's leaders and squeeze its finances, but introduced an amendment of Article 1 of the Egyptian constitution. The amendment would ("in theory") have had the effect of "allowing women, and Christians, to run for any position, including the presidency," by defining Egypt as `a state of citizenship` and remove the reference to Islam as `the religion of the state.` When challenged to vote for the new version of the article, the Brotherhood's members of parliament walked out of the legislative chamber.

The party has also reportedly been weakened by "missteps" that have alienated "many Egyptians" and reportedly played into the government's hands. In December 2006 masked Brotherhood students at Cairo's Al Azhar University staged a militia-style march, which included the "wearing of uniforms, displaying the phrase, 'We Will be Steadfast', and drills involving martial arts. This betrayed the group's intent to plan for the creation of militia structures, and a return by the group to the era of 'secret cells'", according to journalist Jameel Theyabi.
Others agreed it was reminiscent of the group's violent past and public outcry ensued.

According to one observor: "after a number of conciliatory engagements and interactions with the West", the Brotherhood,

retreated into its comfort zone of inflammatory rhetoric intended for local consumption: all suicide bombers are `martyrs`; `Israel` regularly became the Jews`; even its theological discourse became more confrontational and oriented to social conservatism.

Two years later the Egyptian government amended the constitution, prohibiting independent candidates from running for Parliament, these being the only candidates the Brotherhood could field. It also arrested thousands of its members, many of whom were tried in military courts. The state delayed local council elections from 2006 to 2008, disqualifying most MB candidates. The MB boycotted the election. The government incarcerated thousands of rank-and-file MB members in a wave of arrests and military trials, the harshest such security clampdown on the Brotherhood "in decades."

All but one of the Brotherhood candidates lost their seat in the 2010 election marred by massive arrests of Brethren and polling place observers. The reaction of a Muslim Brotherhood spokesman to the election was: "We lost seats and a much deserved representation in the parliament. But we won people's love and support and a media battle that exposed [irregularities in] the elections."

2011-present

Following the 2011 Egyptian revolution

2011 Egyptian revolution

and fall of Hosni Mubarak

Hosni Mubarak

Muhammad Hosni Sayyid Mubarak is a former Egyptian politician and military commander. He served as the fourth President of Egypt from 1981 to 2011....

, the group was legalized. In 30 April 2011 it launched a new party called the Freedom and Justice Party

Freedom and Justice Party (Egypt)

, which reportedly plans to "contest up to half the seats" in the Egyptian parliamentary election scheduled for September 2011. The party "rejects the candidacy of women or Copts for Egypt's presidency", but not for cabinet positions.

General leaders

General leaders (G.L.) of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt (المرشد العام لجماعة الإخوان المسلمون) are

Founder & First G.leader : Hassan al Banna حسن البنا
2nd G.L : Hassan al-Hudaybi حسن الهضيبى
3rd G.L : Umar al-Tilmisani
Umar al-Tilmisani
Umar al-Tilmisani was the third General Guide of the Egyptian Muslim Brothers. He headed the Egyptian Islamist organization from 1972 until 1986...

عمر التلمسانى
4th G.L : Muhammad Hamid Abu al-Nasr
Muhammad Hamid Abu al-Nasr
Muhammad Hamid Abu al-Nasr was the fourth General Guide of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. A controversial choice to lead the group after the 1986 death of longtime General Guide 'Umar al-Tilmisani, al-Nasr was opposed by a large faction backing other candidates such as Salah Shadi or Husayn...

محمد حامد أبو النصر
5th G.L : Mustafa Mashhur
Mustafa Mashhur
Mustafa Mashhur was the fifth General Guide of the Muslim Brothers. He was the official head of the Egyptian Islamist organization from 1996 until 2002, although outside observers have suggested that he informally ran the organization during the ten-year term of his predecessor Muhammad Hamid...

مصطفى مشهور
6th G.L : Ma'mun al-Hudaybi
Ma'mun al-Hudaybi
Ma'mun al-Hudaybi was the sixth General Guide of the Egyptian Muslim Brothers. He briefly succeeded Mustafa Mashhur as General Guide in 2002, and headed the Islamist group until his death in 2004. His successor is Mohammed Mahdi Akef. Ma'mun al-Hudaybi was the son of the second General Guide,...

مأمون الهضيبى
7th G.L : Mohamed al Mahdy Akef محمد المهدى عاكف
8th G.L & Current Leader: Mohammed Badie
Mohammed Badie
Muhammad Badie is the eighth General Guide of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. He has headed the Egyptian branch of the international Islamist organization since 2010...

محمد بديع

External links

Ikhwan Online (Arabic)
Ikhwan Web (English)
Profile: Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, Al Jazeera English, February 6, 2011
The Muslim Brotherhood Uncovered, Jack Shenker and Brian Whitaker
Brian Whitaker
Brian Whitaker has been a journalist for the British newspaper The Guardian since 1987 and its Middle East editor from 2000-2007. He is currently an editor on the paper's "Comment Is Free". He also writes articles for Guardian Unlimited, the internet edition of the paper...

, The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...

, February 8, 2011
Profile: Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, BBC News
BBC News
BBC News is the department of the British Broadcasting Corporation responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs. The department is the world's largest broadcast news organisation and generates about 120 hours of radio and television output each day, as well as online...

, 9 February 2011

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

1928-1938

1939-1954

1954-1982

1982-2005

2005-2010

2011-present

General leaders

Further reading

External links