Failure to Confront Extremists Keeps Tunisian Unity Elusive
The Tunisian government's lackluster reaction to the murder of opposition leader Chokri Belaid is setting a very dangerous precedent, writes Nassif Hitti.
The assassination in Tunisia of Chokri Beleid, the symbolic figure of opposition to the former regime and a leading modernist and democratic figure in the country's agitated transitional period, came to reveal a serious and dangerous challenge to Tunisia's still fragile transition to democracy.
The murder itself is a byproduct of the increasing physical and verbal violence and intimidation that is becoming the norm as Tunisia changes. One of the main political actors that uses these unsavory tactics is the National League for the Protection of the Revolution — a force very close, if not attached, to the Ennahda Party. The key danger, however, comes from the proliferation of a radical and recurrent Salafist jihadist discourse. This is taking place in mosque sermons by pro-jihadist sheikhs and in the political sphere by the leading figures of these Islamist movements. They preach against what they call infidels, atheists and anti-Muslims (and therefore anti-Islam) and those belonging to the old regime — meaning all modernists, if not all non-Islamists — as well as against those who believe in a civil state. A good example of such an exclusive aggressive discourse is the arson attacks on Sufi mausoleums around Tunisia.
