WASHINGTON, 25 November (H.S.): In a significant policy shift, the Trump administration on Monday initiated a formal process to designate certain chapters of the Muslim Brotherhood as foreign terrorist organizations. President Donald Trump signed an executive order directing the State and Treasury departments to assess and report on whether to apply the specially-designated global terrorist label to chapters in countries such as Egypt, Lebanon, and Jordan.
The White House stated that this action is aimed at confronting the Muslim Brotherhood's transnational network, which fuels terrorism and destabilization campaigns against U.S. interests and allies in the Middle East .
The administration has accused specific chapters of either supporting or encouraging violent acts against Israel and providing material support to Hamas, which is already designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S. .This executive order resurrects a long-standing objective for some American conservatives and follows a similar, unsuccessful effort during Trump's first term.
The order sets a 45-day timeline for the Secretaries of State and Treasury to act on the report's findings.A terror designation would carry severe consequences, including the freezing of any assets held in the United States and a ban on providing any form of material support to the designated groups.
It would also lead to travel restrictions on members of the implicated chapters.The Muslim Brotherhood, an influential Sunni Islamist movement founded in Egypt in 1928, has a complex and varied presence across the Middle East, with some affiliates participating in the political process.
Critics of the designation argue that it could be used to suppress political dissent in the region and could also be used to unfairly target Muslim American activists with unsubstantiated allegations of association with the group. The move has been praised by some, including Senator Ted Cruz, who commended the President for taking action.
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Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar
