Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt
In Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood is a Sunni Islamist religious, political, and social movement, with adherents estimated to number between 2 and 2.5 million. Founded by Hassan al-Banna in 1928, the group spread to other Muslim countries but has its largest organization in Egypt, despite government crackdowns in 1948, 1954, 1965, 1979, 1981 and 2013, after plots, or alleged plots, of assassination and overthrow were uncovered.
Following the 2011 Egyptian revolution, it launched a political party—the Freedom and Justice Party—to contest elections, which it described as having "the same mission and goals, but different roles" than the Brotherhood, and agreeing to honor all Egypt's international agreements. The party won 42% of the seats in the 2011–12 parliamentary elections, and its candidate, Mohamed Morsi, the June 2012 presidential election. Morsi was overthrown after mass protests within a year, and a crackdown ensued that some have called more damaging to the movement than any "in eight decades". Hundreds of members were killed and imprisoned, including Morsi and most of the Brotherhood's leadership. Among the general Egyptian population, a "huge hostility" was felt towards the MB. In September 2013, an Egyptian court banned the Brotherhood and its associations, and ordered that its assets be seized; and in December the military-backed interim government declared the movement a terrorist group following the bombing of security directorate building in Mansoura. The Brotherhood denied being responsible for the attack and Ansar Bait al-Maqdis, an al-Qaeda-linked group, claimed responsibility. They also issued a statement condemning violence.
History
Under the monarchy
The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in 1928 by Hassan al-Banna, an Egyptian schoolteacher, who preached implementing traditional Islamic Sharia law in all aspects of life, from everyday problems to the organization of the government. Inspired by Islamic reformers Muhammad Abduh and Rashid Rida, he believed that Islam had lost its social dominance to corrupt Western influences and British imperial rule.The organization initially focused on educational and charitable work, but quickly grew to become a major political force as well. It championed the cause of poor Muslims, and played a prominent role in the Egyptian nationalist movement, fighting the British, Egypt's occupier/dominator. It engaged in espionage and sabotage, as well as support for activities orchestrated by Haj Amin al-Husseini in British Mandate Palestine, and up to and during World War II some association with Britain's enemy, the German Nazis, dissemination of anti-Jewish, and anti-Western propaganda.
Over the years, the Brotherhood spread to other Muslim countries, including Syria Jordan, Tunisia, etc. as well as countries where Muslims are in the minority. These groups are sometimes described as "very loosely affiliated" with the Egyptian branch and each other.
In November 1948, following several bombings and assassination attempts, the government arrested 32 leaders of the Brotherhood's "secret apparatus" and banned the Brotherhood. At this time the Brotherhood was estimated to have 2000 branches and 500,000 members or sympathizers. In succeeding months Egypt's prime minister was assassinated by Brotherhood member, and following that Al-Banna himself was assassinated in what is thought to be a cycle of retaliation.
In 1952, members of the Muslim Brotherhood were accused of taking part in an event that marked the end of Egypt's "liberal, progressive, cosmopolitan" era – an arson fire that destroyed some "750 buildings" in downtown Cairo – mainly night clubs, theatres, hotels, and restaurants frequented by British and other foreigners.
After the 1952 revolution
In 1952, the monarchy was overthrown by nationalist military officers of the Free Officers Movement. While the Brotherhood supported the coup it vigorously opposed the secularist constitution that the coup leaders were developing. In 1954 another unsuccessful assassination was attempted against Egypt's prime minister, and blamed on the "secret apparatus" of the Brotherhood. The Brotherhood was again banned and this time thousands of its members were imprisoned, many of them held for years in prisons and sometimes tortured.One of them was the very influential theorist, Sayyid Qutb, who before being executed in 1966, issued a manifesto proclaiming that Muslim society had become jahiliyya and that Islam must be restored by the overthrow of Muslim states by an Islamic vanguard, also revitalising the ideal of Islamic universalism. Qutb's ideology became very influential outside of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, but the Brotherhood's leadership distanced itself from Qutb and adhered to nonviolent reformist posture.
Imprisoned Brothers were gradually released after Anwar Sadat became president of Egypt in 1970, and were sometimes enlisted to help fight Sadat's leftist opposition. Brethren were allowed to publish the magazine Al Dawa, though the organization remained illegal. During this time, more radical Qutb-inspired Islamist groups blossomed, and after Sadat signed a peace agreement with Israel in 1979, the Muslim Brotherhood became confirmed enemies of Sadat. Sadat was assassinated by a violent Islamist group Tanzim al-Jihad on 6 October 1981, shortly after he had Brotherhood leaders arrested.
Mubarak era
Again with a new president,, Brotherhood leaders were released from prison. Mubarak cracked down hard against radical Islamists but offered an "olive branch" to the more moderate Brethren. The brethren reciprocated, going so far as to endorse Mubarak's candidacy for president in 1987.The Brotherhood dominated the professional and student associations of Egypt and was famous for its network of social services in neighborhoods and villages. However, the government did not approve of the Brotherhood's renewed influence, and resorted to repressive measures starting in 1992.
In the 2000 parliamentary elections, the Muslim Brotherhood won 17 parliamentary seats. In 2005, it won 88 seats to form the largest opposition bloc, despite the arrest of hundreds of Brotherhood members. It lost almost all but one of these seats in the much-less-free 2010 election, which was marred by massive arrests of both Brethren and polling place observers. Under Egypt's emergency law Brethren could only stand as independents, but were easily identified since they campaigned under the slogan – "Islam Is the Solution".
During and after the 2005 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', insinuating that the Brethren would do away with Egypt's decades-old church building-permit system that Coptic Christians felt was discriminatory. Internationally the Brethren launched an English-language website and some of the Muslim Brotherhood's leaders participated in an Initiative to 'Re-Introduc the Brotherhood to the West', "listing and addressing many 'Western misconceptions about the Brotherhood.'"
Seeing this campaign as a direct threat to its position as an indispensable ally of the west against radical Islamism, the Egyptian government introduced an amendment to the constitution that removed the reference to Islam as "the religion of the state", and would have allowed women and Christians to run for the presidency. Brotherhood MPs responded by walking out of parliament rather than voting on the bill. In addition, the movement has also reportedly played into the government's hands provoking non-Islamist Egyptians by staging a militia-style march by masked Brotherhood students at Cairo's Al Azhar University, complete with uniforms and martial arts drills, reminding many of the Brotherhood's era of "secret cells".
According to another observer:
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, skewing future representation against independent candidates for parliament, which are the only candidates the Brotherhood can field. The state delayed local council elections from 2006 to 2008, disqualifying most Muslim Brotherhood candidates. The Muslim Brotherhood boycotted the election. The government incarcerated thousands of rank-and-file Muslim Brotherhood members in a wave of arrests and military trials, the harshest such security clampdown on the Brotherhood "in decades".
2011 revolution and Morsi
Following the 2011 revolution that overthrew Hosni Mubarak, the Brotherhood was legalized and emerged as "the most powerful" and "most cohesive political movement" in Egypt. Its newly formed political party won two referendums, far more seats than any other party in the 2011–12 parliamentary election, and its candidate Mohamed Morsi won the 2012 presidential election. However within a year there were mass protests against his rule and he was overthrown by the military.In the January–February 2011 uprising itself, the Brotherhood remained "on the sidelines", but even before it was officially legalized it launched a new party called the Freedom and Justice Party. The party rejected "the candidacy of women or Copts for Egypt's presidency", although it did not oppose their taking cabinet positions. In its first election the party won almost half of 498 seats in the 2011–12 Egyptian parliamentary election.
In the first couple of years after the revolution, critics speculated about both secret collusion between the Brotherhood and the powerful military, and a looming showdown between the two. The Brotherhood and the military both supported the March constitutional referendum which most Egyptian liberals opposed as favoring established political organizations. It was said to have stopped the "second revolution" against military rule by remaining uninvolved during violent clashes between revolutionaries and the military in late 2011, and protests over the thousands of secretive military trials of civilians.
Egyptian author Ezzedine C. Fishere worried that the Brotherhood had
managed to alienate its revolutionary and democratic partners and to scare important segments of society, especially women and Christians. Neither the Brotherhood nor the generals showed willingness to share power and both were keen on marginalising the revolutionary and democratic forces. It is as if they were clearing the stage for their eventual showdown.
While the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces dissolved the parliament dominated by the Brotherhood and other Islamic parties, the Brotherhood won the presidential election, defeating Ahmed Shafik, a former military officer and prime minister of Mubarak.
Within a short period, serious public opposition developed to President Morsi. In late November 2012, he issued a temporary constitutional declaration granting himself the power to legislate without judicial oversight or review of his acts, on the grounds that he needed to "protect" the nation from the Mubarak-era power structure. He also put a draft constitution to a referendum that opponents complained was "an Islamist coup". These issues—and concerns over the prosecutions of journalists, the unleashing of pro-Brotherhood gangs on nonviolent demonstrators; the continuation of military trials; and new laws that permitted detention without judicial review for up to 30 days, and impunity given to Islamist radical attacks on Christians and other minorities—brought hundreds of thousands of protesters to the streets starting in November 2012. During Morsi's year-long rule there were 9,000 protests and strikes.
By April 2013, Egypt had "become increasingly divided" between President Mohamed Morsi and "Islamist allies" and an opposition of "moderate Muslims, Christians and liberals". Opponents accused "Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood of seeking to monopolize power, while Morsi's allies say the opposition is trying to destabilize the country to derail the elected leadership". Adding to the unrest were severe fuel shortages and electricity outages—which evidence suggests were orchestrated by Mubarak-era Egyptian elites.
By 29 June, the Tamarod movement claimed it had collected more than 22 million signatures calling for Morsi to step down. A day later, mass demonstrations occurred across Egypt urging Morsi to step down. Demonstrations in support of him were organized as a response.