Brotherhood office raided in Jordan due to police ‘mix up’

AMMAN, Jordan (AP) — Jordanian security forces mistakenly raided the headquarters of the kingdom’s largest Muslim Brotherhood group on Sunday after confusing it with the offices of an outlawed organization, the government said.

Police raided the Islamic Action Front offices after they “mixed up” the IAF headquarters with those of a nearby, unregistered branch of the Islamist group, according to government spokesman Mohammad al-Momani. He confirmed that the IAF was registered.

The government should “apologize for this action which touched the Islamic Action Front,” IAF spokesman Murad Adaileh said.

The Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan split in March 2015 over its ties with the mother movement in Egypt. The IAF severed its relationship with the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, but affiliates that did not have been outlawed by Jordan.

Over the past week, the government has shut down seven branches of the Islamist group across the kingdom, carrying out raids in the capital Amman and the cities of Jerash and Tafileh.

The Muslim Brotherhood, the region’s oldest Islamist movement, and its affiliates won a series of electoral victories following the Arab Spring uprisings but provoked a backlash in several countries.

Egypt’s first freely elected president, Mohammed Morsi, hailed from the Brotherhood, but was overthrown by the military in 2013 after a divisive year in power. Egypt later outlawed the group, branding it a terrorist organization.