Licensed Muslim Brotherhood seeks to close old group’s satellite channel

AMMAN — The conflict between the new Muslim Brotherhood and the “old” group is escalating, with an attempt by the newly licensed group to “shut down” the Yarmouk satellite channel run by the old guard.

The licensed society has filed a complaint to the Jordan Media Commission against this TV channel, stating that it “incites sedition”.

“We have received the complaint… we will study it and take the proper measures,” Amjad Qadi, director of the commission, told The Jordan Times on Thursday.

According to Abdul Majeed Thneibat, overall leader of the licensed society, the old guard uses the TV channel as a platform to “harm our reputation”.

Thus “we addressed the commission to take the measures they deem appropriate.”

The channel’s director, Wael Saqqa, was not available for comment despite several attempts by The Jordan Times to reach him.

Earlier this week, the unlicensed Muslim Brotherhood group filed a lawsuit to regain its assets that were transferred to the new registered society.

All assets were officially transferred to the new society registered in March this year after the Legislation and Opinion Bureau issued a legal ruling in May allowing the process.  

The ongoing dispute started when a group of reformists led by Thneibat re-registered the Muslim Brotherhood in the Kingdom as a Jordanian society, severing its affiliation with its mother group in Egypt. 

The unlicensed movement has repeatedly charged that the establishment of the new Brotherhood society is a “government conspiracy” against the Islamists, but authorities have said it is merely an “organisational” issue.