The Brotherhood bogeyman: How Europe and the US criminalise Muslim civic life

The Brotherhood bogeyman: How Europe and the US criminalise Muslim civic life Submitted by Farid Hafez on Wed, 05/27/2026 - 12:55 Terrorist labels exported from Egypt and the UAE to crush political opposition are now being deployed across Europe and the US to hollow out Muslim democratic life A protester carries a 'Stop Islamophobia, stop the far right' placard during the Nakba 78 March for Palestine in London, United Kingdom, 16 May 2026 (SOPA Images) On Across western publics, a dangerous claim is spreading that Muslim civic participation is secretly linked to a coordinated Muslim Brotherhood plot to subvert these nations from within. They claim that Muslims - many of them third-generation immigrants - who organise in communities, assert their rights as equal citizens, and engage in democratic politics are doing so as part of a hidden takeover scheme. It is a conspiracy theory, and a familiar one. Following the Trump administration's State Department designation of Muslim Brotherhood branches in Egypt , Jordan and Lebanon as Foreign Terrorist Organisations (FTO), several US state governors and European politicians have used this as a carte blanche to target their own domestic Muslim populations. The governors of Texas and Florida have moved to designate the Council on American-Islamic Relations (Cair) as a terrorist organisation - a largely symbolic but still severe step towards criminalising Muslim civic engagement. Meanwhile, the Dutch parliament voted by a slim majority to designate the Brotherhood as a terrorist organisation, while the Dutch government still has to decide how to act on this. These politicians celebrate how some Arab countries have "pushed out...

Original source: Middle East Eye