The Trump administration’s designation of Sudan’s Muslim Brotherhood as a Foreign Terrorist Organization is a bold move against a genocidal Islamist network aiming to reclaim power—and reignite Sudan’s role as a hub of global terrorism and regional instability.
Though overshadowed by the war with Iran, the U.S. Department of State designation, which went into effect on March 16, is a blow to the movement that engineered the genocide in Sudan and helped build the infrastructure of global terrorist networks.
It warns destabilizing actors like Iran and the Eritrean dictator supporting the Islamist network. It reinforces efforts by Ethiopia and the United Arab Emirates to prevent a return of Islamist rule. It counters the broader regional threat Sudan under Islamist control could pose to Israel and regional stability.
For decades, Sudan was not just another failed state in Africa but a central hub for Islamist jihadist networks, sponsoring terrorism and destabilizing Sudan, the region and beyond.
The Muslim Brotherhood arrived in Sudan in the mid-20th century, carried by students inspired by Hassan al-Banna, founder of the Egyptian branch in 1928. Over time, the movement evolved under Hassan al-Turabi into a far more ambitious force, deeply influencing Islamist networks in Sudan and beyond. Turabi’s impact on Islamist extremism has been compared to a hybrid of Ayatollah Ali Khomeini, the leader slain on Feb. 28 at the start of the joint U.S.-Israel war on Iran, and Osama bin Laden, mastermind of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States.
By the 1960s, Turabi created the Islamic Charter Front and later the National Islamic Front, transforming Sudanese politics into a theocratic project. In 1989, his network orchestrated a military coup that brought Omar al-Bashir to power, ending Sudan’s fragile democratic experiment.
Under Turabi’s ideological guidance, Sudan became a Sharia-based Arab-Islamist state. It not only suppressed opposition but targeted non-Arab black Sudanese populations in genocidal campaigns and crushed Sufi brotherhoods. Khartoum was turned into a global hub for jihadist activity. Turabi envisioned Sudan as a strategic bridge between Sunni and Shia Islam and a meeting ground for Islamist militants from North Africa, the Middle East, South Asia and beyond.
Turabi operationalized his vision through the Popular Arab and Islamic Congress (PAIC), founded in 1991, bringing together Islamist leaders from more than 50 countries to coordinate ideology, training and financing. That same year, bin Laden arrived in Sudan, personally welcomed by Turabi, establishing the financial and operational infrastructure that would fuel Al-Qaeda’s global jihad. At the same time, Sudan strengthened its partnership with Iran.
Sudan, under the Muslim Brotherhood, became a haven for Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Abu Nidal and Al-Qaeda, Egyptian Islamic Jihad, Afghan Arabs, Eritrean Islamic Jihad and militants from Algeria, Pakistan, Kashmir and Lebanon. The country provided logistical support, visas and safe passage, effectively acting as a staging ground for operations threatening regional stability, Israel and U.S. interests.
With support from Iran, wealthy Islamist financiers and operational coordination with Al-Qaeda, Sudan became a platform for funding and expanding jihadist operations globally. Iran provided technical expertise, military equipment and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ instructors to train Sudanese militias, creating a Sunni-Shia nexus of radicalism centered in Khartoum.
Sudan’s sponsored attacks ranged from Abu Nidal’s 1988 operations to the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, killing 224. It also facilitated the 2000 USS Cole bombing in Yemen, killing 17 U.S. sailors. These actions put Sudan on the U.S. list of State Sponsors of Terrorism on Aug. 12, 1993, where it remained for 27 years, isolating the country economically and politically.
The 2019 mass uprising ended decades of Islamist authoritarian rule and briefly opened a transition toward civilian governance, creating an opportunity for Sudan to join the Abraham Accords and normalize relations with Israel. This led Washington to officially remove Sudan from the State Sponsors of Terrorism list in December 2020.
The transition quickly collapsed. In October 2021, generals Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (Hemeti) staged a coup, dismantling the transitional government. By April 2023, the two generals had turned on each other, plunging Sudan into full-scale war and state collapse.
The conflict is often framed as a rivalry between generals, but it is fundamentally a struggle over Sudan’s identity and political future. The Muslim Brotherhood, removed from power after Bashir, is leveraging deep networks within the Sudanese Armed Forces under Burhan to restore the Islamist order that ruled Sudan for three decades. This effort is backed by Iran and the Eritrean dictator Isaias Afwerki, longtime allies of Sudan’s Islamist networks.
This is why the Trump administration’s designation matters. For Sudan, the implications are profound. The United States is sending a clear message that the decades-long cycle of Islamist rule, violence and genocide must end. The designation targets the ideological and political network that shaped Sudan’s Islamist authoritarian system and fueled conflict for generations.
Hostile actors to the United States and its allies—Iran and the Eritrean dictator—should take note. Any attempt to restore Islamist rule in Khartoum will be treated as support for a terrorist network.
For Israel, the stakes are even higher. Sudan under the Islamist regime served as a key logistics and weapons-smuggling corridor for Iran, Hamas and other Iranian-backed groups. Iran and its ally, the Eritrean dictator, are exploiting Sudan’s war to build a proxy akin to Yemen’s Houthis—more dangerous given Sudan’s proximity to Israel and control of key maritime corridors.
The Trump administration’s designation of Sudan’s Muslim Brotherhood as a Foreign Terrorist Organization is significant. The designation opens a narrow window for Sudan to escape decades of genocidal Islamist rule that turned it into a hub of global jihad.
