The Muslim Brotherhood’s political future remains bright despite a tough crackdown by Egypt’s military-backed authorities.
The Brotherhood has largely been left reeling from the clampdown that began with the military’s overthrow of Islamist president Mohamed Mursi on July 3.
Hundreds of the group’s leaders, including its head Mohamed Badie, have since been detained.
Yet rather than isolating the movement, the government’s tactics seem to have bolstered the Brotherhood’s popularity, which had hit an all-time low just months ago.
Mursi’s ouster has actually given the Brotherhood a chance to reshape its narrative and remind the public that they were in the streets and in Tahrir, not in power during the January 25 revolution, says Hassan Abu Haniyya, an expert on the Brotherhood, referring to a popular uprising that forced Hosni Mubarak out of power in early 2011.
Observers say the Brotherhood is likely to use the timing of the crackdown and Mubarak’s release from prison to cement a link in Egyptians’ minds between the military-installed authorities and the Mubarak regime.
The army deposed Mursi of the Brotherhood, saying it was responding to popular wishes after millions of Egyptians took to the streets demanding the country’s first democratically elected president step down.
Further buoying the Brotherhood’s political future is media coverage of the crisis.
In contrast to past crackdowns on the Brotherhood, which occurred during a time when Egyptian media was dominated by the state, private newspapers, news agencies and citizen journalists are providing around-the-clock graphic coverage of the military’s use of force against Mursi’s backers.
Following the razing of two pro-Mursi protest camps by police in Cairo last week, the Egyptians and international viewers have been inundated with images of security forces targeting protesters and engaging in gunbattles in mosques.
The pro-military government has portrayed the crackdown on Islamists as a “war against terrorism”.
With several key leaders of the group already in detention, younger Brotherhood activists have stepped up to continue protests across Egypt, providing the 85-year-old movement with what analysts describe as a badly needed injection of “fresh blood”.
Yet perhaps the Brotherhood’s greatest advantage over the generals and opposition forces is historical precedence.
After surviving the assassination of its founder Hassan al-Bana in 1949, the crackdown by late Egyptian president Gamel Abdel Nasser in 1954 and three decades of oppression under Mubarak, the Brotherhood has learned to avoid confrontation.
With the Islamist movement set to maintain a peaceful response to the crackdown in order to appear as a “victim” of the Mubarak-era remnants, the Brotherhood is well placed to remain as a central - if not leading - political force in Egypt long after the crisis has ended.