Aaron Magid is the author of an upcoming biography on King Abdullah. A former Amman-based journalist, his writing on Jordan has appeared in Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and Al-Monitor. Follow him on X: @AaronMagid
Spirits were high among members of the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan shortly after parliamentary elections last fall that saw the group's political wing, the Islamic Action Front (IAF), gain a surge of popular support. The IAF won 31 seats in parliament, the most of any single party, tripling its representation in the lower House of Representatives from the 2020 elections to become the largest opposition group in the legislature. It was the Muslim Brotherhood's best electoral result in 35 years. "The Jordanian people have given us their trust by voting for us," Wael Saqqa, the secretary-general of the IAF, declared after the elections.
Yet some eight months later, rather than benefit from the IAF's electoral success, the Muslim Brotherhood has been outlawed in Jordan. On April 15, the Jordanian government announced that it had arrested 16 Brotherhood members, accusing them of plotting to attack targets inside the kingdom using drones and rockets. The Brotherhood denied involvement in the affair. But the following week, Jordan's Interior Ministry declared the Brotherhood illegal, breaking with decades of Jordanian policy that has long tolerated the Islamist movement as a legal opposition group, despite intermittent political crackdowns. Authorities raided the IAF headquarters in Amman and pledged to punish those who promote Brotherhood ideology, but the IAF itself was not banned. The 31 IAF lawmakers in parliament were unable to shield the Brotherhood from a harsh government crackdown that may pose an existential threat to its presence in Jordan, which is older than the Hashemite Kingdom itself. The Jordanian branch of the Brotherhood was founded in 1945, one year before the establishment of the Hashemite Kingdom in what had been the British Mandate of Transjordan.
Under Jordan's constitution, most power rests with the king, who appoints governments and can dissolve parliament. He also directly appoints all seats to the Senate—parliament's upper house—by royal decree. But parliament retains some authority, however limited, such as forcing a cabinet to resign by a vote of no confidence.
Despite tripling its representation in parliament, the IAF has been unable to advance its agenda because of the realities of Jordan's political system, where King Abdullah still wields most authority.
- Aaron Magid
Even before the April ban, the Muslim Brotherhood had struggled to achieve progress in the priorities it campaigned on during last year's election. Ahead of the vote last September, the IAF repeatedly demanded that the Jordanian government halt all agreements with Israel, including security coordination. It also criticized the arrest of protesters inside Jordan demonstrating against Israel's war in Gaza and Jordan's peace treaty with Israel. Yet in December, the director of Jordan's General Intelligence Department, Ahmad Husni, reportedly met his Israeli counterpart, Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar, for secret talks to discuss Syria after the sudden fall of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime. According to Axios, Amman served as a "key mediator" between Israeli and Syrian rebel groups, including the Islamist militia Hayat Tahrir al-Sham that led the rebel offensive that toppled Assad.
Meanwhile, the Jordanian government rebuffed the Brotherhood's demand to cancel a multi-billion-dollar gas deal with Israel, increasing Israeli gas exports to Jordan by 13.4 percent in 2024. Queen Rania, who had been openly critical of Israel and the war in Gaza, toned down her language in recent months amid the Jordanian government's attempt to salvage its relationship with the new Trump administration. Jordanian security forces also continued detaining anti-Israel activists, including during a pro-Gaza march outside the Israeli Embassy in Amman, where protestors were forcibly dispersed and some reportedly beaten with batons.
The Jordanian government has taken some measures to signal its opposition to Israel during the Gaza war, such as withdrawing its ambassador from Tel Aviv and canceling a summit in Amman with President Joe Biden and Egyptian and Palestinian leaders in October 2023—barely a week into the war. Still, those moves were taken before the 2024 parliamentary election. The IAF's expanded presence in parliament has done little to shape King Abdullah's policy toward Israel or the Palestinians. Any pressure the IAF may have hoped to apply on the palace after its electoral success has come up short.
In addition to Israel, the Muslim Brotherhood also pushed back against Jordan's relationship with the United States. The IAF was particularly incensed by the 2021 U.S.-Jordanian defense agreement allowing American troops to carry weapons on Jordanian territory and providing free entry of U.S. aircraft and ships into the kingdom. The IAF called the accord a "blatant violation of Jordanian sovereignty" that was "squandering the blood of Jordanian martyrs." But like its other demands, the Brotherhood has been unable to compel the Jordanian government to revoke the defense deal. Approximately 3,000 U.S. soldiers remain stationed in Jordan—the highest at any time since the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
Despite tripling its representation in parliament, the IAF has been unable to advance its agenda because of the realities of Jordan's political system, where King Abdullah still wields most authority. Both the elected House of Representatives and the Senate must approve all laws—with the latter body entirely appointed by the king. His selections to the Senate are rarely Muslim Brotherhood members. To quell protests during the Arab Spring, King Abdullah pledged that future governments would be formed based on a parliamentary majority, but that was never implemented in practice.
Instead, King Abdullah continues to select the country's prime minister himself. Given King Abdullah's longstanding feud with the Brotherhood, even labeling the group a "Masonic cult" and "wolves in sheep's clothing," he has never appointed an Islamist premier. Although it is the largest party in parliament with 31 seats, the IAF still represents less than a quarter of the 138-member House of Representatives, as many of its seats were gerrymandered to help tribal candidates that are pro-monarchy. Each of these limitations hindered the IAF from passing legislation independently, harming its ability to operate like an opposition party in a parliamentary system.
In 2021, King Abdullah tasked a royal committee to "modernize" Jordan's political system in the aftermath of what Jordanian authorities alleged was a sedition attempt involving the King's half-brother, Prince Hamzah, and other officials. Behind the palace insinuations of a possible coup plot were realities of substantial discontent with the king and his government. With his call for political "modernization"—which also echoed his unfulfilled pledges of reform after the Arab Spring—King Abdullah urged the establishment of new laws on elections and political parties to "enhance democracy."
Last fall, in the first race under a new law that allocated 41 seats in parliament to political parties, the IAF significantly boosted its presence in the House of Representatives. Yet only 32 percent of Jordanians voted in the 2024 election due to widespread distrust in the country's political institutions. With Jordan's government now banning the Muslim Brotherhood—the country's largest opposition party—and obstructing the group from advancing its legislative agenda following its best electoral showing in decades, it will be even more difficult to convince Jordanians to participate in the next election and have faith in their political system.
