Egypt and the Muslim Brotherhood: A Special Report from STRATFOR INTELLIGENCE

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Egypt and the Muslim Brotherhood: A Special Report

With Egypt’s nearly 60-year-old order seemingly collapsing, many are asking whether the world’s single-largest Islamist movement, the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), is on the verge of benefiting from demands for democracy in Egypt, the most pivotal Arab state.

Western fears to the contrary, the MB is probably incapable of dominating Egypt. At best, it can realistically hope to be the largest political force in a future government, one in which the military would have a huge say.

The MB and the Egyptian State

The fear of Islamism for years allowed the single-party state to prevent the emergence of a secular opposition. Many secular forces were aligned with the state to prevent an Islamist takeover. Those that did not remained marginalized by the authoritarian system. As a result, the MB over the years has evolved into the country’s single-largest organized socio-political opposition force.

Even though there is no coherent secular group that can rival the MB’s organizational prowess, Egypt’s main Islamist movement hardly has a monopoly over public support. A great many Egyptians are either secular liberals or religious conservatives who do not subscribe to Islamist tenets. Certainly, the bulk of the people out on the streets in the recent unrest are not demanding that the secular autocracy be replaced with an Islamist democracy.

Still, as Egypt’s biggest political movement, the MB has raised Western and Israeli fears of an Egypt going the way of Islamism, particularly if the military is not able to manage the transition. To understand the MB today — and thus to evaluate these international fears — we must first consider the group’s origins and evolution.

Origins and Evolution of the MB

Founded in the town of Ismailia in 1928 by a schoolteacher named Hassan al-Banna, the MB was the world’s first organized Islamist movement (though Islamism as an ideology had been in the making since the late 19th century). It was formed as a social movement to pursue the revival of Islam in the country and beyond at a time when secular left-leaning nationalism was rising in the Arab and Muslim world.

It quickly moved beyond just charitable and educational activities to emerge as a political movement, however. Al-Banna’s views formed the core of the group’s ideology, which are an amalgamation of Islamic values and Western political thought, which rejected both traditional religious ideas as well as wholesale Westernization. The MB was the first organizational manifestation of the modernist trend within Muslim religio-political thought that embraced nationalism and moved beyond the idea of a caliphate. That said, the movement was also the first organized Islamic response to Western-led secular modernity.

Its view of jihad in the sense of armed struggle was limited to freedom from foreign occupation (British occupation in the case of Egypt and the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land). But it had a more comprehensive understanding of jihad pertaining to intellectual awakening of the masses and political mobilization. It was also very ecumenical in terms of intra-Muslim issues. Each of these aspects allowed the movement to quickly gain strength; by the late 1940s, it reportedly had more than a million members.

By the late 1930s, there was great internal pressure on the MB leadership to form a military wing to pursue an armed struggle against the British occupation. The leadership was fearful that such a move would damage the movement, which was pursuing a gradual approach to socio-political change by providing social services and the creation of professional syndicates among lawyers, doctors, engineers, academics, etc. The MB, however, reluctantly did allow for the formation of a covert militant entity, which soon began conducting militant attacks not authorized by al-Banna and the leadership.

Until the late 1940s, the MB was a legal entity in the country, but the monarchy began to view it as a major threat to its power — especially given its emphasis on freedom from the British and opposition to all those allied with the occupation forces. The MB was at the forefront of organizing strikes and nationalist rallies. It also participated, though unsuccessfully, in the 1945 elections.

While officially steering clear of any participation in World War II, the MB did align with Nazi Germany against the United Kingdom, which saw the movement become involved in militancy against the British. MB participation in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war further energized the militants. That same year, the covert militant entity within the movement assassinated a judge who had handed prison sentences to a MB member for attacking British troops.

It was at this point that the monarchy moved to disband the movement and the first large-scale arrests of its leadership took place. The crackdown on the MB allowed the militant elements the freedom to pursue their agenda unencumbered by the movement’s hierarchy. The assassination of then-Prime Minister Nokrashy Pasha at the hands of a MB militant proved to be a turning point in the movement’s history.

Al-Banna condemned the assassination and distanced the movement from the militants but he, too, was assassinated in 1949, allegedly by government agents. Al-Banna was replaced as general guide of the movement by a prominent judge, Hassan al-Hudaybi, who was not a member of the movement but held al-Banna in high regard. The appointment, which conflicted with the MB charter, created numerous internal problems and exacerbated the rift between the core movement and the militant faction.

Meanwhile, the Egyptian government’s October 1951 decision to abrogate the 1936 Anglo-Egyptian treaty set off nationwide agitation against British rule. Armed clashes between British forces and Egyptians broke out. The MB’s militant faction took part while the core movement steered clear of the unrest. It was in the midst of this unrest that the 1952 coup led by Gamal Abdel Nasser against the monarchy took place. The MB supported the coup, thinking they would be rewarded with a political share of the government. The cordial relationship between the new Free Officers regime and the MB did not last long, however, largely because the military regime did not want to share power with the MB and, like the monarchy, saw the MB as a threat to its nascent state.

Initially, the new regime abolished all political groups except the MB. The Nasser regime, in an attempt to manage the power of the MB, asked it to join the Liberation Rally — the first political vehicle created by the new state. Unsuccessful in its attempts to co-opt the MB, the Nasser regime began to exploit the internal differences within the movement, especially over the leadership of al-Hudaybi. The MB leader faced mounting criticism that he had converted the movement into an elite group that had reduced the movement to issuing statements and had taken advantage of the notion of obedience and loyalty to the leader to perpetuate his authoritarian hold. Al-Hudaybi, however, prevailed and the MB disbanded the covert militant entity and expelled its members from the movement.

In 1954, the regime finally decided to outlaw the MB, accusing it of conspiring to topple the government and arresting many members and leaders, including al-Hudaybi. Meanwhile, the military regime ran into internal problems with Nasser locked in a power struggle with Gen. Muhammad Naguib, who was made the first president of the modern republic (1953-54). Nasser succeeded in getting the support of al-Hudaybi and the MB to deal with the internal rift in exchange for allowing the MB to operate legally and releasing its members.

The government reneged on its promises to release prisoners and the complex relationship between Nasser and al-Hudaybi further destabilized the MB from within, allowing for the militant faction to regain influence. The MB demanded the end of martial law and a restoration of parliamentary democracy. Cairo in the meantime announced a new treaty with London over the Suez Canal, which was criticized by the al-Hudaybi-led leadership as tantamount to making Egypt subservient to the United Kingdom.

This led to further police action against the movement and a campaign against its leadership in the official press. The Nasser government also tried to have al-Hudaybi removed as leader of the MB. Between the internal pressures and those from the regime, the movement had moved into a period of internal disarray.

The covert militant faction that was no longer under the control of the leadership because of the earlier expulsions saw the treaty as treasonous and the MB as unable to confront the regime, so it sought to escalate matters. Some members allegedly were involved in the assassination attempt on Nasser in October 1954, which allowed the regime to engage in the biggest crackdown on the MB in its history. Thousands of members including al-Hudaybi were sentenced to harsh prison terms and tortured.

It was during this period that another relative outsider in the movement, Sayyid Qutb, a literary figure and a civil servant, emerged as an influential ideologue of the group shortly after joining up. Qutb also experienced long periods of imprisonment and torture, which radicalized his views. He eventually called for the complete overthrow of the system. He wrote many treatises, but one in particular, Milestones, was extremely influential — not so much within the movement, as among a new generation of more radical Islamists.

Qutb was executed in 1966 on charges of trying to topple the government, but his ideas inspired the founding of jihadism. Disenchanted with the MB ideology and its approach, a younger generation of extremely militant Islamists emerged. These elements, who would found the world’s first jihadist groups, saw the MB as having compromised on Islamic principles and accepted Western ideas. Further galvanizing this new breed of militant Islamists was the Arab defeat in the 1967 war with Israel and the MB’s formal renunciation of violence in 1970.

Anwar Sadat’s rise to power after Nasser’s death in 1970 helped the MB gain some reprieve in that Sadat gradually eased the restrictions on the movement (but retained the ban on it) and tried to use it to contain left-wing forces. After almost two decades of dealing with state repression, the MB had been overshadowed by more militant groups such as Tandheem al-Jihad and Gamaa al-Islamiyah, which had risen to prominence in the 1980s and 1990s. Close ties with Saudi Arabia, which sought to contain Nasserism, also helped the organization maintain itself.

While never legalized, the MB spent the years after Sadat’s rise trying to make use of the fact that the regime tolerated the movement to rebuild itself. Its historical legacy helped the MB maintain its status as the main Islamist movement, as well as its organizational structure and civil society presence. Furthermore, the regime of Sadat’s successor, Hosni Mubarak, was able to crush the jihadist groups by the late 1990s, and this also helped the MB regain its stature.

The MB thus went through different phases during the monarchy and the modern republic when it tried to balance its largely political activities with limited experiments with militancy, and there were several periods during which the state tried to suppress the MB. (The first such period was in the late 1940s, the second phase in the mid-1950s when the Nasser regime began to dismantle the MB and the third took place in the mid-1960s during the Qutbist years.)

MB beyond Egypt

Shortly after its rise in Egypt, the MB spread to other parts of the Arab world. The Syrian branch founded in the late 1930s to early 1940s grew much more radical than its parent, wholeheartedly adopting armed struggle — which sparked a major crackdown in 1982 by Syrian President Hafez al Assad’s regime that killed tens of thousands. In sharp contrast, the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan in the early 1940s very early on established an accommodationist attitude with the Hashemite monarchy and became a legal entity and founded a political party.

Until the Israeli capture of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in the 1967 war, the Palestinian and Jordanian branches constituted more or less a singular entity. The Gaza-based branch was affiliated with the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, which Israel used to weaken the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). Those elements went on to form Hamas in 1987, which has pursued its activities on a dual track — political pragmatism in intra-Palestinian affairs and armed struggle against Israel. Hamas also emerged in the West Bank though not on the same scale as in Gaza.

Similarly, in the Arabian Peninsula states, Iraq and North Africa, there are legal opposition parties that do not call themselves MB but are ideological descendants of the MB. The parent MB, by contrast, was never legalized and has never formed a political party per se. While the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is the parent body and there is a lot of coordination among the various chapters in different countries, each branch is an independent entity, which has also allowed for a variety of groups to evolve differently in keeping with the circumstances in the various countries.

Despite dabbling in militancy, Egypt’s MB always remained a pragmatic organization. Egypt’s true militant Islamists in fact represent a rejection of the MB’s pragmatism. Decades before al Qaeda came on the scene with its transnational jihadism, Egypt was struggling with as many as five different jihadist groups (born out of a rejection of the MB approach) fighting Cairo. Two of them became very prominent: Tandheem al-Jihad, which was behind Sadat’s assassination, and Gamaa al-Islamiyah, which led a violent insurgency in the 1990s responsible for the killings of foreign tourists. The jihadist movement within the country ultimately was contained, with both Tandheem al-Jihad and Gamaa al-Islamiyah renouncing violence though smaller elements from both groups joined up with al Qaeda-led transnational jihadist movement.

Global perceptions of the MB and of political Islamists have not distinguished between pragmatist and militant Islamists, especially after the 9/11 attack and rising fears over Hamas and Hezbollah’s successes. Instead, the MB often has been lumped in with the most radical of the radicals in Western eyes. Very little attention has been paid to the majority of Islamists who are not jihadists and instead are political forces. In fact, even Hamas and Hezbollah are more political groups than simply militants.

There is a growing lobby within the United States and Europe, among academics and members of think tanks, that has sought to draw the distinction between pragmatists and radicals. For more than a decade, this lobby has pushed for seeking out moderates in the MB and other Islamist forces in the Arab and Muslim world to better manage radicalism and the changes that will come from aging regimes crumbling.

Assessment

Because Egypt has never had free and fair elections, the MB’s popularity and its commitment to democracy both remain untested. In Egypt’s 2005 election, which was less rigged than any previous Egyptian vote, given the Bush administration’s push for greater democratization in the Middle East, MB members running as independents managed to increase their share of the legislature fivefold. It won 88 seats, making it the biggest opposition bloc in parliament.

But the MB is internally divided. It faces a generational struggle, with an old guard trying to prevent its ideals from being diluted while a younger generation (the 35-55 age bracket) looks to Turkey’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) as a role model.

The MB also lacks a monopoly over religious discourse in Egypt. A great many religious conservatives do not support the MB. Egypt also has a significant apolitical Salafist trend. Most of the very large class of theologians centered around Al-Azhar University has not come out in support of the MB or any other Islamist group. There are also Islamist forces both more pragmatic and more militant than the MB. For example, Hizb al-Wasat, which has not gotten a license to operate as an official opposition party, is a small offshoot of the MB that is much more pragmatic than the parent entity. What remains of Tandheem al-Jihad and Gamaa al-Islamiyah, which renounced violence and condemned al Qaeda, are examples of radical Islamist groups. And small jihadist cells inspired by or linked to al Qaeda also complicate this picture.

Taken together, the MB remains an untested political force that faces infighting and competitors for the Islamist mantel and a large secular population. Given these challenges to the MB, confrontation with the West is by no means a given even if the MB emerged as a major force in a post-Mubarak order.

The MB is also well aware of the opposition it faces within Egypt, the region and the West. The crumbling of the Mubarak regime and perhaps the order that damaged the MB for decades is a historic opportunity for the movement, which it does not wish to squander. Therefore it is going to handle this opportunity very carefully and avoid radical moves. The MB is also not designed to lead a revolution; rather, its internal setup is such that it will gradually seek a democratic order.

The United States in recent years has had considerable experience in dealing with Islamist forces with Turkey, under the AKP, being the most prominent example. Likewise in Iraq, Washington has dealt with Islamists both Sunni (Iraqi Vice President Tariq al-Hashmi for many years was a prominent figure in the Iraqi chapter of the MB called the Iraqi Islamic Party) and Shiite (Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq leader Abdel Aziz al-Hakim, Muqtada al-Sadr, etc.) as part of the effort to forge the post-Baathist republic.

That said, the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt is viewed as a very opaque organization, which increases U.S. and Israeli trepidations. Neither of these powers are willing to place their national security interests on the assumption that the Muslim Brotherhood would remain a benign force (as it appears to be) in the event that it came into power. Concerns also exist about potential fissures within the organization that may steer the movement into a radical direction, especially when it comes to foreign policy issues such as the alliance with the United States and the peace treaty with Israel.

The possible looming collapse of the 60-year Egyptian order presents a historic opportunity for the MB to position itself. Even though the movement has remained pragmatic for much of its history and seeks to achieve its goals via constitutional and electoral means and has opted for peaceful civil obedience and working with the military as a way out of the current impasse, its commitment to democratic politics is something that remains to be seen. More important, it is expected to push for a foreign policy more independent from Washington and a tougher attitude toward Israel.

At this stage, however, it is not clear if the MB will necessarily come to power. If it does, then it will likely be circumscribed by other political forces and the military. There are also structural hurdles in the path of the MB taking power. First, the ban on the movement would have to be lifted. Second, the Constitution would have to be amended to allow for religious parties to exist for the MB to participate as a movement. Alternatively, it could form a political party along the lines of its Jordanian counterpart. Being part of a future coalition government could allow the United States to manage its rise. Either way, the MB — an enormously patient organization — senses its time finally may have come.

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The "Egyptian opposition" is a phrase that has been used quite liberally in the media since the ongoing protests in Egypt first began Jan. 25, but very few people really understand what it means. It comprises a handful of small, legally-recognized political parties, extremely organized protest movements that eschew the ordination of formal membership, a banned Islamist group, and an umbrella organization of political parties led by an Egyptian -- Mohamed ElBaradei -- best known for his days as an international diplomat living in Vienna. The only thing that every member of the opposition can agree on is that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak must go. After that, they all have their own interests, but many are negotiating on how to best work together in order to achieve their immediate goal of forcing Mubarak out. The biggest questions are which portions of the opposition will coalesce into a coalition that can negotiate with the Egyptian military, which remains the ultimate guarantor of power in the Arab world's most populous nation.

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STRATFOR analysts on the key event of the day

U.S. Strategy Toward Preserving the Egyptian Regime

February 3rd, 2011

Wednesday was another Egypt day, but the most important development did not take place in the country. Instead, it was in Washington, where White House spokesman Robert Gibbs used some pretty tough language in demanding that Egypt immediately engage in the process of transition: “The time for a transition has come, and that time is now…now is not September…now means yesterday,” Gibbs said.

Gibbs’ comments clearly show that the United States wants Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to step down and without much delay. Washington sees this as a way to try to defuse the street agitation. The fear is that should the unrest continue, the situation may get out of hand and even the Egyptian military might not be able to handle the situation.

The critical element in this process is the Egyptian military, which is expected to ensure that Mubarak’s fall does not lead to a collapse of the existing order. As things stand, it seems the opposition forces would be satisfied if Mubarak stepped down, after which they are prepared to negotiate with his successors. Of course, such an event would herald the next phase when all sorts of issues (interim administration, elections, new constitution, etc.) would have to be sorted out.

But the bottom line is that regime change would not take place. Any new ruling elite — if and when it took office — would be dependent upon the military, internal security forces, intelligence service, bureaucracy and business community to govern the country. After all, these are the basic instruments of governance that any political force would be dependent upon.

A key thing to note in the case of Egypt is that the public agitation is not led by any political force. Rather, civil society is behind the protest demonstrations. So, when Mubarak throws in the towel and the public goes back home, the political parties will be left with little leverage vis-a-vis the state.

That weakens the ability of the political forces to negotiate with the regime from a position of relative strength. This is not to say that the ruling National Democratic Party sans Mubarak would be able to continue with business as usual with the military’s backing. There will be compromises but nothing that would lead to a fundamental shift in the nature of the Egyptian polity.

The important thing to keep in mind at this point is that the political forces depend upon the military for any political change. It is this dependency that will likely allow the military to ensure continuity of policy. This would be the case, even if the country’s most organized political group, the Islamist movement the Muslim Brotherhood, were to come to power.

On their own, political forces do not wield much power and in Egypt, where the political forces do not own the streets, this is all the more the case. Thus, the move toward a more democratic polity is an evolutionary process and will likely take many years to transpire — assuming, of course, ceteris paribus — all things being equal. Until then, the guarantor of state stability is the country’s armed forces, which means that the order established by Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1952 will not undergo any major change anytime soon.

It is for this reason the United States is not worried about the end of the “Mubarakian era” and is in fact demanding that the embattled president depart sooner rather than later.

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Questions Arise About Egyptian Troops in the Sinai

February 3rd, 2011

SummaryReports emerged Jan. 30 suggesting that 100-150 Egyptian soldiers had moved into the Sinai Peninsula. Later, reports of as many as 800 soldiers emerged, with the suggestion that this number of troops violated agreements between Egypt and Israel regarding the presence of Egyptian forces in the Sinai Peninsula. However, there have also been reports that the Egyptian troop movements were carried out in coordination with Israel and even with the United States. However, questions remain about the Egyptian military's motives for deploying the troops, Israel's role in the deployment and the whereabouts (and fate) of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

ANALYSIS

On Jan. 30, reports emerged of 100-150 Egyptian army soldiers moving into the Sinai Peninsula as early as Jan. 28-29. This was confirmed Jan. 31 by an Israeli Defense Ministry official speaking anonymously (and followed by subsequent reports, also citing anonymous sources), suggesting that two battalions totaling as many as 800 "security forces" of unnamed affiliation had moved in, supposedly in violation of Egyptian-Israeli agreements. As with many other aspects of Egypt's current crisis, much remains unclear. But the situation in the context of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's tottering regime, along with several potential anomalies, warrants mention.

The report of some 800 troops suggested that the soldiers were in violation of a 750-troop limit. But the Camp David Accords regulating Egyptian military and security forces in the Sinai do not mention a 750-troop limit, nor are troops limited to that number in the entire Sinai Peninsula (there are a number of zones with different rules, with stricter rules and lower limits prevailing as the zones progress eastward toward Egypt's border with Israel).

The 750 limit comes from a subsequent 2005 agreement related to the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza in which Israel and Egypt agreed (separately from the peace treaty) to allow the deployment of up to 750 Egyptian border guards under the Interior Ministry, not the Defense Ministry, into what is now known as the Border Guard Force Area of Operations (BGF AO) on the Egyptian side of the Philadelphi corridor where the Gaza Strip borders Egypt. Previously, only Egyptian civilian police and the Multinational Force and Observers were permitted anywhere in "Zone C," which runs the length of eastern Sinai. Indeed, the support of air and sea components and their crews was explicitly authorized in 2005, as was a provision for further increases under subsequent bilateral agreements. And there were, in fact, serious negotiations in 2008-2009 between Egypt and Israel about allowing Egypt to add 750 police to the zone to combat rampant smuggling into Gaza. Temporary reinforcements of 1,300 and 500 police were also allowed by Israel in 2006 and 2010, respectively.

This is another area — the support of the Israeli blockade and isolation of the Gaza Strip — in which Mubarak has angered the general Egyptian population. And the issue has only intensified in the recent crisis. There have been reports of intensifying Bedouin unrest and of Egyptian police and border guards (both under the Interior Ministry), with whom corruption was already an issue, allowing more blatant smuggling of people and arms or even outright abandoning their posts. During this time, there were potentially enormous prison breaks, and Egyptian Interior Ministry forces had abandoned their posts across the country Jan. 29 only to begin returning Jan. 30. So there was certainly a hole to be filled by Defense Ministry forces.

Here is where the anomalies come into play.

First, do all these potential correlations actually represent the actual disposition of forces? If the Egyptian military has moved in to lock down the suddenly far more porous border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt, why has Hamas been so quiet? In this rare moment of large-scale opposition to the Mubarak regime, why not draw attention to this? Hamas is playing a careful game, and STRATFOR will examine its position more closely later. But the lack of complaint from Palestinians in general does seem potentially noteworthy.

Second, the foundation of Israeli security for more than three decades has been the peace treaty with Egypt. Israeli national interest dictates the maintenance of a stable regime (with or without Mubarak at its head) that will continue to observe the Camp David Accords. This is an enormous concern for the Israelis. So while the massive influx of militants and weapons into Gaza is a very significant additional problem, and one for which the Israelis may be amenable (as they have been before) to adjustments to the status of security forces in the BFG AO, without a regime in Cairo that supports the peace treaty Israel faces a far greater problem. The Israeli people are nervous, and the unofficial story that recent supposed changes in the disposition of forces in Sinai have been made in close coordination with Israel could have potentially significant domestic political ramifications in Israel.

Officially, the Israeli government has denied that there has been any treaty violation by Egypt, and reports claim the two sides negotiated the Egyptian deployment together with the United States. Israeli defense officials reportedly have said they assented to the Egyptian deployment. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a press conference that Egypt has always respected the peace agreement and has not breached it, and that it has not been broken in the last few days. Of course, there is only a treaty violation if one side or the other disputes it.

Israel, meanwhile, has allegedly moved troops to its side of the border with Egypt. The Egyptian troops allegedly were deployed to stop Bedouin riots in the Sinai, and the Israelis say they are anticipating Bedouins fleeing the Egyptian army and are expecting refugees and militants to attempt to enter Gaza.

Finally, if these things do not add up, is there some sort of disinformation or deception campaign going on? If these troops are not all in the BFG AO, where are they, and why? Are they being held in reserve for some contingency? If so, how are they armed and equipped? There has been speculation since Jan. 29 — which STRATFOR has been unable to confirm — that Mubarak has taken shelter in one of his homes in the Red Sea resort community of Sharm el-Sheik. This is not outside the realm of possibility, as one of the places Mubarak would likely take at least temporary shelter if he needed to flee the country would be Saudi Arabia — a country far easier to reach from Sharm el-Sheik than from Cairo. So has the military presence in Sharm el-Sheik changed? And is the military positioning itself to ease Mubarak out of the country, or are they positioning themselves for a coup?

This is not a forecast or a prediction. This is a series of questions. Paying attention to anomalies is a part of good intelligence, and Mubarak's position is becoming increasingly intolerable, so we need to be open to all possibilities.

Read more: Questions Arise About Egyptian Troops in the Sinai | STRATFOR

Edited February 3, 2011 by Lord Infamous