The unfinished history between America and the Muslim brotherhood

On July 11, 2018 the U.S. Congress’s Subcommittee on National Security organized a series of hearings on “The Muslim Brotherhood’s Global Threat.”1 The purpose was to determine what dangers the Muslim Brotherhood poses to American interests around the world. The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, which has long been considered by scholars to be the “mother” organization of modern Islamism, was described in the congressional hearings as a “a radical Islamist organization that has generated a network of related movements in 70 countries,” including al-Qaeda. Many at the hearings clearly wanted the U.S. Government to officially designate the Brotherhood as a terrorist organization. For years, the United States has labelled other Islamist movements, such as Hezbollah and the Brotherhood-offshoot Hamas, as terrorist organizations. However, so far no such steps have been taken by the U.S. Government regarding the Muslim Brotherhood.