Trump counterterrorism strategy focuses on Iran, regional proxy network

Gorka said burden-sharing is a central principle of the administration’s defense partnership policies, and counterterrorism is no different.

By Mike Wagenheim, JNS

Sebastian Gorka, deputy assistant to the president and senior director for counterterrorism at the National Security Council, said on Wednesday that the Muslim Brotherhood is the “ancestor of all modern jihadist groups” while unveiling the Trump administration’s 2026 U.S. counterterrorism strategy.

Gorka blamed “the failed forever-war policies of prior Republican administrations, as well as the empowerment of terrorist sponsoring regimes like Iran under Democrat administrations and a past unwillingness to challenge Islamist ideologies head-on” for enabling jihadist groups to expand their reach and kill Americans.

The strategy document, released alongside Gorka’s briefing with reporters, describes the Muslim Brotherhood as an organization “predicated on recreating the Muslim Caliphate and killing or enslaving non-Muslims,” leading in part to U.S. President Donald Trump’s designation of the Egyptian, Jordanian and Lebanese chapters of the Muslim Brotherhood as foreign terrorist organizations.

“Given the Muslim Brotherhood’s key role in promoting modern terrorism, we will continue to designate its branches across the Middle East and beyond as FTOs to crush the organization everywhere it operates,” the strategy states.

Gorka said burden-sharing is a central principle of the administration’s defense partnership policies, and counterterrorism is no different.

“We have a very simple metric: If you want to be measured as a serious nation, whether it is protecting tankers in the Strait of Hormuz or whether it is working against jihadi threats in the Sahel of Africa, we expect more from you,” he said.

“The idea that there is one hyperpower in the world and it will protect all from every threat is untenable.”

Gorka added that U.S. allies are ultimately facing “almost exclusively the same threats,” ranging from Islamist terrorism to politically motivated extremism.

He referenced the late-April stabbing attack in London’s heavily Jewish Golders Green neighborhood, in which two Jewish men were wounded.

British authorities charged a suspect with attempted murder and said the incident was being investigated by counterterrorism police.

“We will measure your seriousness as a partner and ally by how much you bring to the table, so we expect more from our partners in the Middle East, as well as elsewhere,” Gorka said.

The strategy places particular emphasis on Iran and its regional proxy network.

Gorka said the U.S. homeland remains a “relatively hard target” for Tehran because Iran lacks a diplomatic presence in the United States, forcing it to rely on proxies, criminal networks and nonofficial operatives who are not part of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps or Ministry of Intelligence and Security.

“That doesn’t mean we don’t take the plot seriously of what Iran is intending to do, but it is hard for them to do anything of significance,” he said.

Gorka said he came to view the Islamic Republic as the central driver of instability across the Middle East after receiving a three-hour intelligence briefing from Joint Special Operations Command early in his tenure with the administration.

“Whether it’s the Houthis, whether it’s al Shabaab, whether it’s Hamas, whether it’s Hezbollah, wherever there is a problem where innocent people are being killed, Americans are in threat outside of the United States, pretty much nine out of 10 times you scratch the surface of that threat, and three nanometers later, you find Iran,” he said.

The strategy states that the administration will continue “kinetic, intelligence and cyber operations” against Iranian-backed terrorist proxies and will “take decisive action” against Iranian operatives plotting attacks against Americans, Israeli targets and Iranian dissidents inside the United States.