Secular Tunisia may face a new, younger Islamist challenge

Analysts say a growing number of young fundamentalists are increasingly restless in a country that bans all religious parties.

from the October 10, 2007 edition

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"Our ideas were to talk about distributing the wealth of the country and," says Mr. Zouari, pulling out a book on the fundamentalist an-Nahda, pointing to a page listing their goals. The list includes transparency, modernizing Islam, and rebuilding an Islamic identity and civilization in Tunisia and the world.

In 1989, an-Nahda candidates made a strong showing in national elections. Soon after, the group was blamed for clashes with security forces, sporadic violence against government institutions, and plotting violent overthrow of the government. The government arrested tens of thousands of people through 1992 on charges of belonging to an-Nahda or plotting attacks in Tunisia.

"The regime depicted an-Nahda as being this brutal, Islamist force of crazies in order to get support of a pretty progressive middle class against it," says Clement Henry, a professor of political science and political economy at the University of Texas who says he has been banned from Tunisia for writing a critical article of President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali.

"Many people had joined an-Nahda as an alternative to the regime as it became increasingly repressive," he said.

Tunisia's approach to Islamists raises questions for governments and political Islam that are echoed across the rest of North Africa. "Is it able to endorse secular regulations and rules of law? Is the secular leadership homogenous enough and strong to resist to an Islamic uprising? Would it be an invitation to danger or would it be a credible and reliable step toward a liberal system? These questions are on the spot and in debate," wrote Hamadi Redissi, University of Tunis political science professor, in an e-mailed response to questions.

The emerging group of young Islamists has indeed learned from their predecessors. For one, their ambitions are far humbler.

"I'm not asking to be president or anything. I just ask to [practice] my Islamic beliefs, to have a beard, and pray [so] I would satisfy my god," says Omar Rached.

Mr. Rached is part of a group the government sentenced in 2004 to 19 years in prison on charges of downloading instructions on bombmaking and waging armed jihad from the Internet. Human rights groups said the trials were unfair. The six young men in jail were freed in 2006.

The government says it still believes the men are dangerous and that terrorism is a lurking threat, warranting its tactics, which many considered heavy-handed. Indeed, in December and January 2008, shootouts outside Tunis between government forces and militants jarred the normally quiet country.

The government said they were "terrorists" and made sweeping arrests in the aftermath. An anonymous Tunisian official said one of the six men freed in 2006 ended up fighting with the militant Islamist Islamic Courts movement that briefly took power in Somalia last year.

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