Brotherhood paying price of its internal rifts

Mustafa Kamel

The Muslim Brotherhood goes through a tough crisis, either because of the arrest of some of its members inside Egypt or because of the loss of influence outside it.

The June 30, 2013 revolution dealt a deadly blow to this terrorist organization. The revolution was followed by a series of other blows by Egypt’s security agencies.

The Muslim Brotherhood reacted to all this by acting violently. At the same time, the group’s leaders escaped to Qatar and Turkey for fear of arrest.

Disintegration

The arrest of acting Muslim Brotherhood supreme guide Mahmud Ezzat in Egypt has confused the group and its members.

Brotherhood leaders and members traded accusations for the failure of their organization.

This opened the door for unprecedented rifts within the organization. Some of the members of the organization decided to sack Mahmud Hussein, the secretary-general of the Brotherhood, who controls most of the money of the organization.

Muslim Brotherhood junior members also selected Helmi al-Jazzar to form a new committee to be responsible for addressing the cracks that appeared within the Muslim Brotherhood.

Muslim Brotherhood cleric Essam Telima then posted a video in which he lashed out at a large number of Brotherhood leaders outside Egypt. He said these leaders were the main cause behind the failure of the organization and its collapse.

Internal coup

Two main fronts were formed inside the Muslim Brotherhood. One of these fronts was led by the junior members of the organization. These junior members wanted to stage a coup against senior members who were in the other front.

However, the senior members continued to be in control of the most important card: financing.

Nonetheless, this did nothing to scare the junior members away from maintaining their coup. The senior members then had to let go some funds for the families of Muslim Brotherhood members arrested and imprisoned in Egypt.