Until a few years ago, the gradualist old guard of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood—the parent organization of Hamas and the precursor to al-Qaeda—was able to sideline both radicals who wanted to start an Islamic revolution immediately and so-called “reformists” urging cooperation with non-Islamists. But, write Eric Trager and Marina Shalabi, since the Brotherhood’s Mohammed Morsi was ousted from power in 2013, the organization has lost its cohesiveness (free registration required):
Although the split within the Brotherhood is partly generational, it also reflects severe differences regarding the organization’s goals and strategy—whether it should seek power now, as the youths demand, or in the distant future, as the [old guard] believes, as well as what tools it should use to assert Islamist rule. Yet these questions are increasingly theoretical. The [Sisi-led] government’s obliteration of the organization within Egypt means that the Brotherhood has no realistic shot at power anytime soon, and its various factions thus have little incentive to reunify in pursuit of shared ambitions.
To be sure, the Brotherhood’s vision for establishing an Islamist state in Egypt won’t evaporate, but the rigid internal discipline that defined its decision-making and mobilization is now a thing of the past.
Read more on Foreign Affairs: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/egypt/2016-01-17/brotherhood-breaks-down