Jordan is dismantling the Brotherhood through party registration law, not terror lists
The Islamic Action Front was ordered in February to strip religious connotations from its name within 60 days and refused. What happened when the clock ran out has not been established.
Jordan has been the most active jurisdiction on this file, and it has used administrative law rather than designation. Courts dissolved the Brotherhood organisation on 16 July 2020 over its failure to regularise its legal status. In September 2024 the Islamic Action Front, the movement’s political arm, won 31 of 138 parliamentary seats, tripling its representation and finishing first among parties, according to Al Jazeera. In April 2025 the government banned the Brotherhood outright, raided offices and seized assets; the General Intelligence Directorate arrested members it accused of manufacturing rockets and drones, and authorities alleged planning for attacks inside the kingdom with external training and funding, as documented by Aaron Magid for the Atlantic Council in February 2026. The New Arab reports that several Brotherhood officials, including three senior figures, have been prosecuted in Amman on charges including money laundering and unauthorised fundraising.
The registration track ran in parallel. The Independent Election Commission notified the IAF of violations by letter on 17 February 2026 and, on 25–26 February, formally required the party to change its name and amend its basic statute to remove “any religious, sectarian or ethnic connotations,” citing the Political Parties Law’s bar on parties founded on religion, sect, ethnicity, faction, gender or origin. The party had 60 days. On 27 February the IAF rejected the order as legally unfounded. FDD’s Ahmad Sharawi reported on 1 May that the party “is trying out a new name.” On 3–4 May authorities detained several people in Aqaba after breaking up what they called an unauthorised meeting linked to the banned Brotherhood, warning that any activity under its auspices is illegal. Whether the IAF has since registered under a new name, and what the IEC did when the deadline expired, we have not been able to establish.
Assessment: Deregistration is the more durable instrument. A terror listing invites an appeal, a foreign ministry protest and a martyrdom narrative; a name-change order under a political parties law invites a bureaucratic argument the state always wins. Jordan is testing whether a movement with 31 seats can be legislated into a different entity without a single new designation. The unresolved question — what happened at the end of April — is the one to chase, because the answer determines whether the IAF’s parliamentary bloc survives as an organised party or fragments into independents. Note also the reporting problem here: much of what is known about Brotherhood internals comes from outlets aligned with Cairo or the Gulf, and it should carry that label every time.