ABSTRACT
This chapter presents a historical account of the establishment of the Muslim Brotherhood along with identification of leading thinkers within the movement, such as Hassan al-Banna and Sayyid Qutb. It highlights the Muslim Brotherhood was initially established as a religious movement for social affairs and preaching. The chapter analyses the roots of the movement and the dominant ideas that its major thinkers conceptualized. Yet within the context of colonial Egypt and the rest of the Middle East where native power was subjugated to European political control, the emergent ideas of Islamist intellectuals embodied by the Brotherhood soon developed a politically responsive hue. In respect of Zionist ambitions in Palestine, the Muslim Brotherhood was alert to the challenges faced by the Palestinians and created a role for itself in the burgeoning political crisis. In Gamal Abdel Nasser's Egypt, the Brotherhood became a marginal force. Likewise in Jordan, Palestine, and Syria, the fortunes of the Brotherhood plummeted throughout the 1950s and 1960s.
