A key idea in the report is tamkeen—the Brotherhood’s concept of gradually building power. The authors trace how that idea developed under different leaders. Al-Banna focused on personal reform and community-building. Qutb sharpened the ideology and rejected secular society outright. Qaradawi added a more practical layer for Muslims living in the West. Over time, the report says, these ideas grew into a wide-ranging strategy that works across social, political, legal, and cultural arenas at once.

A new ISGAP report argues the Muslim Brotherhood has spent decades quietly shaping Western institutions through influence, not violence, using a long-term strategy most people overlook.

Most people hear “Muslim Brotherhood” and think of something distant—old political battles in the Middle East, not something unfolding quietly in Western institutions. But the report titled The Muslim Brotherhood’s Strategic Entryism into Western Society: A Systematic Analysis put out by the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP), argues the opposite.

It paints a picture of a movement that’s been working slowly, steadily, and mostly under the radar inside the United States and Europe for decades. Not through violence, but through influence, shaping conversations, building organisations, and positioning itself inside the places where ideas, policies, and public narratives take shape. Whether someone ends up agreeing with all of this or not, the report’s core message is that the Brotherhood’s long game is far more ambitious than most Americans realise.

The following is only a summary of that report. It’s not the full story. I summarise the introduction, which frames the argument, but the rest of the report goes far deeper. If you want to understand the scale of what the authors claim is happening inside Western institutions, I’d strongly encourage you to read the report yourself. What I’m giving you here is simply the main outline.

Reshaping Public Discourse

The introduction makes a straightforward claim: the Muslim Brotherhood has spent decades working its way into Western institutions—not through violence, but through slow, deliberate influence. According to the authors, this is not scattered or improvised.

It’s a long-term strategy that uses the openness of Western democracies to reshape how officials talk, how institutions think, and how the public understands certain issues. Whether someone agrees with every conclusion or not, the introduction makes it clear that the authors see a coordinated project, not random activism.

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