Founding

Hassan al-Banna founded the Muslim Brotherhood in the city of Ismailia in March 1928 along with six workers of the Suez Canal Company, as a Pan-Islamic, religious, political, and social movement. The Suez Canal Company helped Banna build the mosque in Ismailia that would serve as the Brotherhood's headquarters, according to Richard Mitchell's The Society of Muslim Brothers. According to al-Banna, contemporary Islam had lost its social dominance, because most Muslims had been corrupted by Western influences. Sharia law based on the Quran and the Sunnah were seen as laws passed down by God that should be applied to all parts of life, including the organization of the government and the handling of everyday problems.Al-Banna was populist in his message of protecting workers against the tyranny of foreign and monopolist companies. It founded social institutions such as hospitals, pharmacies, schools, etc. AlBanna held highly conservative views on issues such as women's rights, opposing equal rights for women, but supporting the establishment of justice towards women. The Brotherhood grew rapidly going from 800 members in 1936, to 200,000 by 1938 and over 2 million by 1948.
As its influence grew, it opposed British rule in Egypt starting in 1936, but it was banned after being accused of violent killings including the assassination of a Prime Minister by a young Brotherhood member.

Post-World War II

In November 1948, following several bombings and alleged assassination attempts by the Brotherhood, the Egyptian government arrested 32 leaders of the Brotherhood's "secret apparatus" and banned the Brotherhood. At this time the Brotherhood was estimated to have 2,000 branches and 500,000 members or sympathizers. In succeeding months Egypt's prime minister was assassinated by a Brotherhood member, and following that Al-Banna himself was assassinated in what is thought to be a cycle of retaliation.
In 1952, members of the Muslim Brotherhood were accused of taking part in the Cairo Fire that destroyed some 750 buildings in downtown Cairo – mainly night clubs, theatres, hotels, and restaurants frequented by British and other foreigners.
In 1952 Egypt's monarchy was overthrown by a group of nationalist military officers (Free Officers Movement) who had formed a cell within the Brotherhood during the first war against Israel in 1948. However, after the revolution Gamal Abdel Nasser, the leader of the 'free officers' cell, after deposing the first President of Egypt, Muhammad Neguib, in a coup, quickly moved against the Brotherhood, blaming them for an attempt on his life. The Brotherhood was again banned and this time thousands of its members were imprisoned, many being tortured and held for years in prisons and concentration camps. In the 1950s and 1960s many Brotherhood members sought sanctuary in Saudi Arabia. From the 1950s, Al-Banna's son-in-law Said Ramadan emerged as a major leader of the Brotherhood and the movement's unofficial "foreign minister". Ramadan built a major center for the Brotherhood centered on a mosque in Munich, which became "a refuge for the beleaguered group during its decades in the wilderness".
In the 1970s after the death of Nasser and under the new President (Anwar Sadat), the Egyptian Brotherhood was invited back to Egypt and began a new phase of participation in Egyptian politics. Imprisoned Brethren were released and the organization was tolerated to varying degrees with periodic arrests and crackdowns until the 2011 Revolution.

Mubarak era

During the Mubarak era, observers both defended and criticized the Brotherhood. It was the largest opposition group in Egypt, calling for "Islamic reform", and a democratic system in Egypt. It had built a vast network of support through Islamic charities working among poor Egyptians. According to exKnesset member and author Uri Avnery the Brotherhood was religious but pragmatic, "deeply embedded in Egyptian history, more Arab and more Egyptian than fundamentalist". It formed an “old established party which has earned much respect with its steadfastness in the face of recurrent persecution, torture, mass arrests and occasional executions. Its leaders are untainted by the prevalent corruption, and admired for their commitment to social work". It also developed a significant movement online.
In the 2005 parliamentary elections, the Brotherhood became "in effect, the first opposition party of Egypt's modern era". Despite electoral irregularities, including the arrest of hundreds of Brotherhood members, and having to run its candidates as independents (the organization being technically illegal), the Brotherhood won 88 seats (20% of the total) compared to 14 seats for the legal opposition.
During its term in parliament, the Brotherhood "posed a democratic political challenge to the regime, not a theological one", according to one The New York Times journalist, while another report praised it for attempting to transform "the Egyptian parliament into a real legislative body", that represented citizens and kept the government "accountable".
But fears remained about its commitment to democracy, equal rights, and freedom of expression and belief—or lack thereof. In December 2006, a campus demonstration by Brotherhood students in uniforms, demonstrating martial arts drills, betrayed to some such as Jameel Theyabi, "the group's intent to plan for the creation of militia structures, and a return by the group to the era of 'secret cells'". Another report highlighted the Muslim Brotherhood's efforts in Parliament to combat what one member called the "current US-led war against Islamic culture and identity," forcing the Minister of Culture at the time, Farouk Hosny, to ban the publication of three novels on the ground they promoted blasphemy and unacceptable sexual practices. In October 2007, the Muslim Brotherhood issued a detailed political platform. Among other things, it called for a board of Muslim clerics to oversee the government, and limiting the office of the presidency to Muslim men. In the "Issues and Problems" chapter of the platform, it declared that a woman was not suited to be president because the office's religious and military duties "conflict with her nature, social and other humanitarian roles". While proclaiming "equality between men and women in terms of their human dignity", the document warned against "burdening women with duties against their nature or role in the family". Internally, some leaders in the Brotherhood disagreed on whether to adhere to Egypt's 32-year peace treaty with Israel. A deputy leader declared the Brotherhood would seek dissolution of the treaty, while a Brotherhood spokesman stated the Brotherhood would respect the treaty as long as "Israel shows real progress on improving the lot of the Palestinians".

2011 revolution and after

Further information: Egyptian Revolution of 2011, Freedom and Justice Party (Egypt), and 2013 Egyptian coup d'état
Following the Egyptian Revolution of 2011 and fall of Hosni Mubarak, the Brotherhood was legalized and was at first very successful, dominating the 2011 parliamentary election and winning the 2012 presidential election, before the overthrow of President Mohamed Morsi a year later, leading to a crackdown on the Brotherhood again.
On 30 April 2011, the Brotherhood launched a new party called the Freedom and Justice Party, which won 235 of the 498 seats in the 2011 Egyptian parliamentary elections, far more than any other party. The party rejected the "candidacy of women or Copts for Egypt's presidency", but not for cabinet positions.
The Muslim Brotherhood's candidate for Egypt's 2012 presidential election was Mohamed Morsi, who defeated Ahmed Shafiq—the last prime minister under Mubarak's rule—with 51.73% of the vote. Although during his campaign Morsi himself promised to stand for peaceful relations with Israel, some high level supporters and former Brotherhood officials reiterated hostility toward Zionism. For example, Egyptian cleric Safwat Hegazi spoke at the announcement rally for the Muslim Brotherhood's candidate Morsi and expressed his hope and belief that Morsi would liberate Gaza, restore the Caliphate of the "United States of the Arabs" with Jerusalem as its capital, and that "our cry shall be: 'Millions of martyrs march towards Jerusalem. Within a short period, serious public opposition developed to President Morsi. In late November 2012, he "temporarily" granted himself the power to legislate without judicial oversight or review of his acts, on the grounds that he needed to "protect" the nation from the Mubarak-era power structure. He also put a draft constitution to a referendum that opponents complained was "an Islamist coup". These issues—and concerns over the prosecutions of journalists, the unleashing of pro-Brotherhood gangs on nonviolent demonstrators, the continuation of military trials, new laws that permitted detention without judicial review for up to 30 days, brought hundreds of thousands of protesters to the streets starting in November 2012.
By April 2013, Egypt had "become increasingly divided" between President Mohamed Morsi and "Islamist allies" and an opposition of "moderate Muslims, Christians and liberals". Opponents accused "Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood of seeking to monopolize power, while Morsi's allies say the opposition is trying to destabilize the country to derail the elected leadership". Adding to the unrest were severe fuel shortages and electricity outages, which raised suspicions among some Egyptians that the end of gas and electricity shortages since the ouster of President Mohamed Morsi was evidence of a conspiracy to undermine him, although other Egyptians say it was evidence of Morsi's mismanagement of the economy.
On 3 July 2013, Mohamed Morsi was removed from office and put into house arrest by the military, that happened shortly after mass protests against him began demanding the resignation of Morsi. There were also significant counter-protests in support of Morsi; those were originally intended to celebrate the one-year anniversary of Morsi's inauguration, and started days before the uprising. On 14 August, the interim government declared a month-long state of emergency, and riot police cleared the pro-Morsi sit-in during the Rabaa sit-in dispersal of August 2013. Violence escalated rapidly following armed protesters attacking police, according to the National Council for Human Rights' report; this led to the deaths of over 600 people and injury of some 4,000, with the incident resulting in the most casualties in Egypt's modern history. In retaliation, Brotherhood supporters looted and burned police stations and dozens of churches in response to the violence, though a Muslim Brotherhood spokesperson condemned the attacks on Christians and instead blamed military leaders for plotting the attacks. The crackdown that followed has been called the worst for the Brotherhood's organization "in eight decades”. By 19 August, Al Jazeera reported that "most" of the Brotherhood's leaders were in custody. On that day Supreme Leader Mohammed Badie was arrested, crossing a "red line", as even Hosni Mubarak had never arrested him. On 23 September, a court ordered the group outlawed and its assets seized. Prime Minister, Hazem Al Beblawi on 21 December 2013, declared the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organisation after a car bomb ripped through a police building and killed at least 14 people in the city of Mansoura, which the government blamed on the Muslim Brotherhood, despite no evidence and an unaffiliated Sinaibased terror group claiming responsibility for the attack.
On 24 March 2014, an Egyptian court sentenced 529 members of the Muslim Brotherhood to death following an attack on a police station, an act described by Amnesty International as "the largest single batch of simultaneous death sentences we've seen in recent years […] anywhere in the world". By May 2014, approximately 16,000 people (and as high as more than 40,000 by what The Economist calls an "independent court"), mostly Brotherhood members or supporters, have allegedly been arrested by police since the 2013 uprising. On 2 February 2015, an Egyptian court sentenced another 183 members of the Muslim Brotherhood to death.
An editorial in The New York Times claimed that "leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood, which became the leading political movement in the wake of Egypt's 2011 popular uprising, are languishing in prison, unfairly branded as terrorists. ... Egypt's crushing authoritarianism could well persuade a significant number of its citizens that violence is the only tool they have for fighting back". Mohamed Morsi was sentenced to death on 16 May 2015, along with 120 others.
The Muslim Brotherhood claimed that Muslims did not carry out the Botroseya Church bombing and claimed it was a false flag conspiracy by the Egyptian government and Copts, in a statement released in Arabic on the FJP's website, but its claim was challenged by 100 Women participant Nervana Mahmoud and Hoover Institution and Hudson Institute fellow Samuel Tadros. The Muslim Brotherhood released an Arabic-language statement claiming the attack was carried out by the Egyptian security forces working for the Interior Ministry. The Anti-Coup Alliance said that "full responsibility for the crime" was on the "coup authority". The Muslim Brotherhood released an English-language commentary on the bombing and said it condemned the terrorist attack. Qatar-based Muslim Brotherhood members are suspected to have helped a Muslim Brotherhood agent carry out the bombing, according to the Egyptian government. The Qatar-based supporter was named as Mohab Mostafa El-Sayed Qassem. The terrorist was named as Mahmoud Shafiq Mohamed Mostaf.
The Arabic-language website of the Muslim Brotherhood commemorated the anniversary of the death of its leader, Hassan al-Banna, and repeated his words calling for the teachings of Islam to spread all over the world and to raise the "flag of Jihad", taking their land, "regaining their glory", "including diaspora Muslims" and demanding an Islamic State and a Muslim government, a Muslim people, a Muslim house, and Muslim individuals. The Brotherhood cited some of Hassan al-Banna's sayings calling for brotherhood between Muslims.
The death of Omar Abdel Rahman, a convicted terrorist, received condolences from the Muslim Brotherhood. Mekameleen TV, a Turkey-based free-to-air satellite television channel run by exiled Brotherhood supporters, mourned his death and claimed it was "martyrdom". Mekameleen supports the Brotherhood. Condolences were sent upon Omar Abdel Rahman's death by the website of the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party in Egypt.

Controversy

How much of the blame for the fall from power in Egypt of the Brotherhood and its allied Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) can be placed on the Brotherhood, and how much of it can be placed on its enemies in the Egyptian bureaucracy, media and security establishment is disputed. The Mubarak government's state media portrayed the Brotherhood as secretive and illegal, and numerous TV channels such as On TV spent much of their air time vilifying the organization. But the Brotherhood took a number of controversial steps and also acquiesced to or supported crackdowns by the military during Morsi's presidency. Before the revolution, the Muslim Brotherhood's supporters appeared at a protest at Al-Azhar University wearing military-style fatigues, after which the Mubarak government accused the organization of starting an underground militia. When it came to power, the Muslim Brotherhood indeed tried to establish armed groups of supporters and it sought official permission for its members to be armed.

Hasszan Al-Banna (1906-1949)

Mohammed Morszi (1951-2019)