Sanctions Without Strategy: How Washington’s Half-Measures Help the Brotherhood Survive

From Cairo, Washington’s approach to the Muslim Brotherhood often looks like theater. Lists of sanctions, dramatic talk about “radical Islamic terror,” and presidential orders are presented as proof that the United States is finally getting serious. Yet when one looks at what has actually been done, the picture is very different. The United States has spent years hitting a narrow set of actors while keeping the larger ecosystem intact. Even now, with a new executive order that moves toward designating the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, the Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood, and the Lebanese Muslim Brotherhood as terrorist organizations, the same pattern holds. The most visible branches are put in the spotlight, while the state patrons and institutional fronts that give this movement real power remain largely untouched.

To understand how limited this approach has been, it helps to look at the history. For decades, Washington has had a few Brotherhood related entities on its books. Hamas, which openly describes itself as the Palestinian wing of the Brotherhood, was designated long ago. The Kuwaiti Muslim Brotherhood’s Lajnat al Daawa al Islamiya, a charity tied to global jihadist financing, was also listed in the early years of the war on terror. Under the previous Trump term, the State Department added two violent Egyptian splinters, HASM (Harakat Sawa’id Misr) and Liwa al Thawra, for their role in assassinations and bombings against Egyptian officials. These names appear again and again in Western debates as proof that the Brotherhood problem has been handled.

Now the White House has gone further on paper. A new executive order explicitly points to Brotherhood chapters in Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon and sets in motion a process to brand them as Foreign Terrorist Organizations and Specially Designated Global Terrorists. The order cites a senior Egyptian Brotherhood leader calling for attacks on American partners and highlights the long standing ties between the Jordanian Brotherhood and the militant wing of Hamas. On the surface, that looks like a turning point. Western media headlines say the administration has finally moved to “blacklist” Brotherhood branches.

Yet the structure of the policy remains the same. The order triggers a bureaucratic process in Washington. It does not change the fact that the Brotherhood’s political, charitable, and media arms in Europe and North America continue to operate through legally registered organizations. It does not change the reality that Qatar, where Hamas leaders live and work, continues to host a major American airbase, or that Turkey, home to Brotherhood exiles and Islamist broadcasters, remains a central NATO ally. The Egyptian, Jordanian, and Lebanese branches are being pulled into the sanctions framework. The deeper state supported safe zones are not.

For Egypt, which has already fought a bitter domestic struggle to contain the Brotherhood, this has two consequences. First, it risks creating a false sense of security in Western capitals. Officials can point to a growing list of names and claim that the movement is finally being confronted. Second, it reassures Brotherhood strategists that their survival strategy still works. The most exposed chapters take the hit. The movement’s intellectual hubs, fundraising platforms, student networks, professional associations, and diaspora structures adjust, rebrand, and move forward.

One can see how this played out even before the latest order. In Europe, Brotherhood aligned entities present themselves as respectable civil society actors. They run mosques, schools, youth associations, women’s organizations, and “rights” groups. They sit on advisory councils, write policy papers, and speak for Muslim communities in dialogue with governments. None of these bodies are affected by American designations, even when their leaders openly echo Brotherhood doctrine and maintain links to chapters now under review in Egypt or Jordan. They occupy space that could have gone to non Islamist Muslim voices, quietly shaping the social and political environment in which younger generations grow up.

If Cairo and its partners rely on Washington to close these gaps, the Brotherhood will keep winning the long game. The incentives inside the United States favor symbolic moves that play well in domestic politics rather than structural steps that carry real costs with allies. Executive orders are signed in front of cameras. Interagency reviews drag on for months. Staff shortages at the State Department and the Treasury slow everything down. The outcome is predictable. The Egyptian, Jordanian, and Lebanese branches may eventually join Hamas, HASM, Liwa al Thawra, and Lajnat al Daawa al Islamiya on various lists. The broader ecosystem will adapt.

For Egyptian security professionals and policymakers across the region, the answer lies in building an independent architecture that treats the Brotherhood as the transnational ecosystem it really is, not as a series of disconnected national “chapters.”

The first step is analytical. Instead of viewing the Brotherhood in terms of single organizations, security services should map it as a network. The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, the Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood, the Lebanese Branch, Hamas in Gaza, political parties in North Africa, media operations in Istanbul, and fundraising networks in Europe all form one strategic system. Egypt holds decades of hard earned knowledge about the movement’s internal structures, front organizations, and recruitment mechanisms. Converting that knowledge into formal network analysis and sharing it selectively with regional and European partners will do more for real security than another American press release.

The second step is to develop independent risk assessment frameworks that do not depend on U.S. designation lists. Banks, universities, and regulators often treat the absence of an American label as proof that an actor is moderate. That habit should end. Cairo and its partners can promote their own multi factor indices that look at ideological alignment with Brotherhood doctrine, repeated coordination with known Brotherhood umbrellas, foreign funding flows from Doha and Istanbul, and patterns of secrecy or cadre formation. Organizations that repeatedly trigger these indicators can be excluded from sensitive roles, subjected to enhanced financial scrutiny, or denied licenses, even if they remain technically legal.

A third step is tighter intelligence cooperation among states that deal with Brotherhood operations daily. Egypt, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Morocco, and several European governments each possess a different slice of the picture: interrogation reports, surveillance of activists, financial tracing, and experience with Brotherhood parties in parliament. Creating joint analysis cells, issuing regular shared threat assessments, and holding quiet strategy meetings focused specifically on Brotherhood evolution would give these states a collective advantage that does not depend on Washington’s pace or appetite.

A fourth step is regulatory enforcement. Brotherhood linked networks operate heavily through charities, NGOs, religious institutions, and educational projects. These are often vulnerable on ordinary legal grounds. Misused charity funds, undeclared foreign donations, weak governance, tax violations, and immigration fraud show up long before a terrorism case can be assembled. Systematic audits of mosques, schools, NGOs, and cultural centers that bear familiar Brotherhood hallmarks can produce a steady stream of administrative actions: closures, leadership bans, and financial penalties that slowly shrink the movement’s operational space.

A fifth step is narrative engagement. Brotherhood affiliated media and activists are adept at presenting designations as collective punishment of Muslims, and at cloaking their project in the language of human rights. Egyptian voices, including scholars who reject politicised Islam, former Brotherhood members, women’s advocates, Copts, and other minorities who lived under Brotherhood pressure, can tell a more honest story. Supporting research centers, media outlets, and cultural projects that amplify those voices in Arabic and English erodes the moral protective layer that Brotherhood organizations rely on in Western debates.

A sixth step is calibrated pressure on states that shelter Brotherhood actors. No one expects an immediate rupture with Qatar or Turkey, especially while regional crises continue. Nonetheless, Egypt and its partners can integrate Brotherhood questions into broader talks on investment, security cooperation, and diplomatic engagement. They can ask for genuine transparency regarding certain charities, limits on particular satellite channels, or travel restrictions for specific strategists. When Brotherhood related issues become part of the price of access to Arab markets and regional partnerships, backing the movement becomes less attractive.

A seventh step is continuous adaptation. Dedicated red teams inside security and regulatory institutions can focus on predicting Brotherhood responses to pressure. They can model how the movement will use new technology, exploit legal loopholes, rebrand organizations, and shift recruitment methods. Sharing these insights across banks, universities, tech firms, and government agencies will make it harder for the Brotherhood to stay one step ahead.

Finally, cross sector cooperation is essential. Islamist networks work through financial systems, campus politics, social media, advocacy groups, and diaspora institutions. Security agencies, financial regulators, educational authorities, tech platforms, and civil society watchdogs can each see part of the pattern. Bringing them together in permanent or semi permanent task forces would give Egypt and its partners a more complete view of how the Brotherhood operates across borders and sectors.

Egypt has already paid the price for treating the Brotherhood as a normal political actor once. It now faces a global environment in which a new American order name-checks the Egyptian, Jordanian, and Lebanese branches while leaving the real pillars of Brotherhood power almost untouched. The right response is not to wait for Washington to become consistent. It is to develop a serious, long range strategy that treats every designation as one piece of evidence among many, not as the final word, and that steadily tightens the space in which this movement can operate, regardless of how loudly others talk about it.