Tunisian secularists nervous over slow change, concerned about Islamists
Secularists hope Tunisia’s gradual approach for moving to an open political system from a police state will help box in Islamists but it has created a political and security vacuum that could end up helping them. Tunisians forced out president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali via street protests in December and January, and over 90 political parties have sprung up in the newly freed public space.
Secular parties, policy-makers and Western powers are preparing for a future where the leading Islamist party Ennahda, driven abroad and underground by Ben Ali, is a key force in the North African country but working out how to limit its impact.
“There are colossal suspicions about Ennahda. No one believes their commitment to democracy and pluralism. Their discourse in Arabic is very different to their discourse in French, particularly in rural areas,” said George Joffe, a politics professor at Cambridge University. He said the fear was not just of its Islamist platform but of a gradual slip into the one-party authoritarianism of the previous era if one better-organized group dominates.
It is partly because of these concerns that Tunisia is taking its time before getting to any elections. Elections for a constituent assembly to write a new constitution have been delayed to October, and there is no timeframe for parliamentary and presidential elections that follow.
“There is a reasonable chance Ennahda will emerge the strongest party but not having a majority. The best guess is there will be a secular-center left majority in parliament,” a Western diplomat said.
The incumbent political class, divided between those who accommodated and those who challenged Ben Ali’s corrupt government, hope Ennahda will not gain more than a quarter of the vote, said economist Marouane Abassi. “Ennahda could get around 25 percent which is manageable, but more than that would be difficult for Tunisia,” he said.
U.S. shifts to closer contact with Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood
The United States will resume limited contacts with Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton confirmed on Thursday, saying it was in Washington’s interests to deal with parties committed to non-violent politics. While Clinton portrayed the administration’s decision as a continuation of an earlier policy, it reflects a subtle shift in that U.S. officials will be able to deal directly with officials of the Islamist movement who are not members of parliament.
The move, first reported by Reuters on Wednesday, is likely to upset Israel and its U.S. supporters who have deep misgivings about the Brotherhood, a group founded in 1928 that seeks to promote its conservative vision of Islam in society. Under president Hosni Mubarak, a key U.S. ally, the Brotherhood was formally banned, but since the ousting of the secular former general by a popular uprising in February, the Islamists are seen as a major force in forthcoming elections.
“We believe, given the changing political landscape in Egypt, that it is in the interests of the United States to engage with all parties that are peaceful, and committed to non-violence, that intend to compete for the parliament and the presidency,” Clinton told reporters at a news conference in Budapest.
“Now in any of those contacts, prior or future, we will continue to emphasize the importance of and support for democratic principles and especially a commitment to non-violence, respect for minority rights, and the full inclusion of women in any democracy,” she added.
Clinton would not say whether the Obama administration had already begun such contacts or at what level it planned to deal with the group.
In Cairo, a spokesman for the Islamist group said it would welcome any formal contacts with the United States as a way to clarify its vision, but no such contacts have yet been made.
U.S. to resume formal Muslim Brotherhood contacts, official says
The United States has decided to resume formal contacts with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, a senior U.S. official said, in a step that reflects the Islamist group’s growing political weight but that is almost certain to upset Israel and its U.S. backers. “The political landscape in Egypt has changed, and is changing,” said the senior official, who spokeon Wednesday on condition of anonymity. “It is in our interests to engage with all of the parties that are competing for parliament or the presidency.”
The official sought to portray the shift as a subtle evolution rather than a dramatic change in Washington’s stance toward the Brotherhood, a group founded in 1928 that seeks to promote its conservative vision of Islam in society. Under the previous policy, U.S. diplomats were allowed to deal with Brotherhood members of parliament who had won seats as independents — a diplomatic fiction that allowed them to keep lines of communication open.
Where U.S. diplomats previously dealt only with group members in their role as parliamentarians, a policy the official said had been in place since 2006, they will now deal directly with low-level Brotherhood party officials.
There is no U.S. legal prohibition against dealing with the Muslim Brotherhood itself, which long ago renounced violence as a means to achieve political change in Egypt and which is not regarded by Washington as a foreign terrorist organization. But other sympathetic groups, such as Hamas, which identifies the Brotherhood as its spiritual guide, have not disavowed violence against the state of Israel.
The result has been a dilemma for the Obama administration. Former officials and analysts said it has little choice but to engage the Brotherhood directly, given its political prominence after the February 11 downfall of former President Hosni Mubarak.
.
Egypt’s Brotherhood faces sterner critics, internal rifts
In the weeks after Hosni Mubarak was ousted, Egyptian television channels revelled in their new freedoms by giving airtime to the formerly banned Muslim Brotherhood, offering them an open platform to speak. Members of the Brotherhood, Egypt’s best organised political group, are still regular guests. But the tone has changed. Soft-ball questioning has given way to rigorous interrogation about their plans and criticism of their public statements.
“You are not the guardians of the faith alone. No one gave you such a power,” writer Khaled Montasser told one Brotherhood member and former member of parliament, Sobhi Saleh.
The rebuke on a popular talk show in June followed a statement by Saleh, who was on the drafting committee of constitutional amendements, that it would do well in a September parliamentary election as its members were “God’s guardians.”
In spite of such criticism, the well-organised Brotherhood is still expected to do better than rivals in the vote. Although banned under Mubarak, it was left enough space to build up a grassroots networks through its medical and charity work.
But just how well it will do is less clear. It may have a head start on others in post-Mubarak Egypt but it now faces much deeper scrutiny about its plans and is struggling to control an internal debate about how to compete in upcoming polls.
“They have organisational and financial abilities. But there is a growing sentiment among a wide strata of Egypt’s society fearing the rise of the Brotherhood to power,” said Nabil Abdel Fattah of Al Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies.
The Brotherhood, long used to policy-making behind closed doors, has not always shown a united front since Mubarak was toppled on Feb. 11. It has sometimes been clumsy in explaining decisions and has alienated alliance partners, analysts say.
Egypt’s Islamists explore electoral deal with liberals
Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood is exploring an alliance with 17 liberal and other parties that could lead to electoral cooperation, in an apparent move to allay liberal concerns about the Islamist group’s goals.
The Brotherhood, Egypt’s most organised political force, is widely seen as best prepared for the September parliamentary election as many secular parties struggle to get ready for the first free vote since President Hosni Mubarak’s overthrow.
The Brotherhood, officially banned but semi-tolerated under Mubarak, has said it will contest half of parliament’s seats, seeking to capitalise on the grass roots networks it has nurtured during decades of medical, social and charity work.
Activists who put national pride before faith in the uprising against Mubarak fear the Brotherhood will dominate politics and seek to impose strict Islamic rules on Egypt.
A statement posted on the Brotherhood’s website said it had agreed with other parties “on ways that could lead to a joint election list to include representatives from all members of the alliance that would gain the trust of the Egyptian masses”.
Yassin Tageldin, deputy chairman of the liberal Wafd party, said such an electoral deal could be struck if talk of a law forcing candidates to form lists materialised.
Islam is intolerant to criticism and this has been demonstrated time and time again throughout history. It is most evident in the recent past as demonstrated by fatwa’s against the Danish cartoonist who drew your mighty prophet followed by attempts on his life by peace-loving Muslims. The “religion of peace” is responsible for virtually all terrorist attacks of today.
Even the most tolerant countries like Sweden and Denmark are realizing that Islamists will not treat them like in the same inviting and accepting manner that they have been accepted into western society.
Most immigrants are grateful for having the privilege of being accepted into such a society, but the Islamists turn back and join jihadists, donate money to their causes and further the destruction of the very countries that took them in. It is time to stop immigration of Islamists.
Their hypocrisy of peace has been evident for centuries but they still continue to insist that they are peace-loving.
Vague agenda fuels doubts over real aims of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood
Few things better sum up Egypt’s uncharted future than the vague policy platform of the Muslim Brotherhood, a long-repressed Islamist movement poised to become a decisive force in mainstream politics. With the country’s military rulers reluctant to push through major reforms without a popular mandate, all eyes are on the emerging political class set free by the overthrow in February of veteran leader Hosni Mubarak.
None is likely to mobilise as much grassroots support as the Brotherhood, which has won the sympathy of millions of poor Egyptians by railing against venal politicians and campaigning for an Islamic state free of corruption. But with parliamentary elections looming, the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice party has sketched only the broadest outline of a manifesto. A pledge to do nothing that might harm Egypt’s floundering economy has barely reassured nervous investors.
“The Brotherhood has always been unclear on all its policies … It makes people wonder what is its real goal, and what to believe,” said Nabil Abdel Fattah, a researcher in the al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies.
The Brotherhood’s secular liberal enemies say the policy vacuum is understandable because telling the truth would betray an extremism that would make it unelectable. They say it would quickly ban alcohol consumption, sending an already troubled tourism sector into a tailspin, reverse women’s rights and deepen tension with Egypt’s Christian minority by enforcing a strict Islamic code, the first step towards a Muslim theocracy.
Brotherhood leaders, mindful of a deep-rooted fear of social chaos, insist they would never force major change upon a country already struggling with the instability that followed Mubarak’s overthrow. “Investors should not worry. We want to participate with other groups to achieve the best outcome for our country,” said Osama Gado, a former parliamentarian and founding member of Freedom and Justice.
Gado refused to be drawn on whether the party, if elected, would try to ban the consumption of alcohol, which is illegal in Islam but a requirement for many foreign holidaymakers. “This is an example of the minor details that are not up to the Brotherhood alone to decide on. It is something that will be decided upon by the parliament that is elected by the people and if the people want it,” Gado said.
Egypt’s divided Muslim Brotherhood expels presidential hopeful
Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood has expelled a senior member for saying he would run for president in defiance of the group’s decision not to seek the post vacant since the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak in February.
The Brotherhood announced in April that its newly formed “Freedom and Justice” party would contest up to half the seats in a parliamentary election in September but would not field a candidate for the presidency to avoid dominating power. But Abdel Moneim Abul Futuh said in May he would run as an independent in a presidential vote expected to take place before the end of the year as an independent.
“The Shura Council (the group’s decision-making body) has decided to scrap the membership of Abdel Moneim Abul Futuh… because he announced he would run for the presidency,” the Brotherhood said in a statement posted on its website.
“This certainly shows the divisions among the Muslim Brotherhood,” said Mustapha al-Sayyid, a political science professor. “The young Muslim Brothers seem to favour Abdel Moneim Abul Futuh becoming a candidate for the presidency while others from the older generation do not want that,” he added.
.
Losers all around in French Muslim council election
Even the winner risks ending up among the losers in France’s Muslim council election on Sunday as the organisation meant to represent Islam here is torn apart by rivalries, boycotts and bitter attacks. Incumbent Mohammed Moussaoui will be returned as head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith (CFCM), but a boycott by the two rival Muslim federations competing with his Rally of French Muslims (RMF) group makes the victory a hollow one.
The campaign has also fuelled the ethnic tensions crippling French Islam, which is split among factions backed by Algeria, Morocco and Turkey and others who oppose any meddling from the Muslim countries that they or their forefathers left behind.
“This CFCM will start off an empty shell and continue to run on empty,” Kamel Kabtane, rector of the Grand Mosque of Lyon, told Lyon Capitale magazine after announcing he was boycotting the election. “It risks dying a quiet death.”
The curious voting method used, which allocates electoral college delegates to each federation according to the total floor space of its mosques around the country, was the reason Moussaoui’s rivals gave for the boycott.
“Faith has never been measured by the square metre,” declared Dalil Boubakeur, leader of the Algerian-backed Grand Mosque of Paris (GMP) federation and head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith (CFCM) from its start in 2003 until 2008. The third major federation, the Union of French Islamic Organisations (UOIF) which is close to the Muslim Brotherhood, urged a delay in the vote until the system could be reformed. But the government insisted it go ahead, so they also pulled out.
The broader reason for the boycott is that French Muslims of Moroccan origin, although fewer than those with an Algerian background, are generally more devout and — with encouragement from Rabat and Moussaoui’s RMF — are building more mosques.
As Turkey votes, concern this time focuses on democracy, not theocracy
The last time Turks voted in a general election in 2007, opponents feared the socially conservative ruling party was turning Turkey into an Iran-style Islamic state. With voters on Sunday expected to keep Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan’s AK Party in office for a third straight term, critics and some analysts now worry about that less but fear that the future course of democracy may be at stake.
A rising power with a vibrant, free economy and a U.S. ally that aspires to join the European Union, Turkey is held up as an example of marrying Islam and democracy and has been an oasis of stability in a region convulsed by “Arab Spring” uprisings. AK has also overseen the most stable and prosperous period of Turkey’s history with market-friendly reforms, and begun membership talks with the EU while opening new markets in Asia, the Middle East and Africa.
But Erdogan, whose party controls the government and parliament and who last year won a referendum to overhaul the judiciary, says if he wins by a big enough margin this time and achieves a “super majority,” he will rewrite Turkey’s constitution.
Many fear such a move will polarize society and distract the government from pursuing the needed structural reforms in the economy.
Scaremongering suggesting the AK has some hidden Islamist agenda is gaining less traction these days. “If we did have a hidden agenda this would be the best kept secret on earth because people have seen us in action for the past nine years,” Egemen Bagis, Turkey’s minister for European affairs, told Reuters at a marina built for the new rich on the outskirts of Istanbul.
Read the full story by Simon Cameron-Moore and Ibon Villelabeitia here.
For more background, take a look at a few other items from Reuters and other sources:
“Mormon question” may again dog Mitt Romney’s U.S. presidential bid
Republican Mitt Romney has remade himself in a second run for U.S. president, with a leaner campaign apparatus and a message focused with laser-like precision on the nation’s economic problems. But the “Mormon question” still remains for the former Massachusetts governor: are Americans ready to put a Mormon in the White House?
Surveys suggest American voters are more accepting of the idea now than when Romney staged his first presidential run in 2008. But at the margins, many remain suspicious of Mormons. A Quinnipiac University poll this week found voters less comfortable with the idea of a Mormon president than having a leader of any religion other than a Muslim, or an atheist.
“The fact that less than half of voters have a favorable view of the religion is likely to be a political issue that Governor Romney … will have to deal with,” said Peter Brown of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute in Connecticut.
Romney has closer ties to Mormonism than other Mormons in U.S. politics, such as Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid and Jon Huntsman, his possible Republican rival for the party’s presidential nomination. A fifth-generation member of the faith whose forebears were involved in the religion from the mid-1850s, Romney is a former lay bishop of Massachusetts’ temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
But Romney, whose campaign message on jobs is gaining some traction with voters, is making an attempt to avoid being defined by religion. “I separate quite distinctly matters of personal faith from the leadership one has in a political sense,” the Republican said in an interview on CNN this week. “You don’t begin to apply the doctrines of a religion to responsibility for guiding a nation or guiding a state.”
Read the full story by Ros Krasny here.
.
Tom, What you say is true that most evangelicals believe that Mormons are not Christian. This is more than a little puzzling because Mormons do believe in, follow the teachings of, and deeply worship Christ. If that is not Christian, then WHAT IS???
It is apparent that some evangelical pastors got together and made up their own definition of Christianity. It is in their own pastoral and financial interest to eliminate Mormonism from their own arrogant, narrow view of the teachings of Christ. For them to preach this misinformation is no less than spreading hate and bigotry. What is Christian about that?
-
Resident FaithWorld Expert
-
