Saturday, January 15, 2011
The "pure" devout Muslims are strapping one on in celebration of the uprising in Tunisia, Arafat and Fatah's center for operations (until 1993).
And the predictable Jew-haters and erudite annihilationists at the New York Times blame (drum-roll, please) the Jews, despite the fact that they concede, "Tunisians' grievances were as specific as universal: rising food prices, corruption, unemployment and the repression of a state that viewed almost all dissent as subversion." What pigs.
Because they know that pro-Sharia Islamic supremacists enjoy broad popular support in the Islamic world -- contrary to the Western assumption that they constitute a Tiny Minority of Extremists."Hamas, Islamic Jihad applaud popular uprising in Tunisia," from Ma'an, January 15:GAZA CITY (Ma'an) -- Hamas and Islamic Jihad on Saturday expressed their respect for the Tunisian people, whose uprising led to the ouster of President Zine El Abidine Ban Ali.Ben Ali fled Tunisia on Friday with members of his family and his inner circle to escape deadly protests against his 23 years of authoritarian rule.Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri applauded the Tunisian people's expression of their right to choose their leadership democratically without foreign intervention.Meanwhile, Islamic Jihad congratulated the Tunisians on gaining their freedom "through blood, sacrifices and the expression of free will."The Tunisian uprising was a message to hegemonic powers that a nation could restore its freedom, the Islamist movement said."It is also a message to Arab and Islamic countries to pay attention to the aspirations of their people that are rejecting hegemony and tyranny before it is too late."...In Kuwait, only the opposition Islamist MPs reacted, saluting "the courage of the Tunisian people."...
Reuters: Tunisia Islamist leader says to return from exile (hat tip Dash)
There's background in a Fall 2002 review in Middle East Quarterly by Martin Kramer of a book "Rachid Ghannouchi: A Democrat within Islamism" by Azzam S. Tamimi (OUP New York 2001). (though much of the review is a hatchet job on the author rather than Rachid Ghannouchi).
Note the prophetic comment in the first paragraph about unforeseen developments in Tunisia.
Rashid al-Ghannushi, the 61-year-old exiled leader of the Tunisian Islamist movement An-Nahda, has resided since 1989 in London; and, barring some unforeseen and highly unlikely developments in Tunisia, he is unlikely to play a major role in his home country's politics again. Instead, he writes books and delivers lectures that show him in most respects pretty much indistinguishable from other leading Islamists. Most notably, he is an enthusiastic backer of Hamas, and Hamas, which is short on theoreticians, has in turn embraced Ghannushi as one of its own. Unlike An-Nahda, Hamas is a political force, and Ghannushi's affiliation with it has saved him from total obscurity. Where he notably differs from other Islamists is in his arguing that Islam accepts multi-party democracy.
As for Azzam Tamimi, he is a pro-Hamas Palestinian publicist living in London who directs the Institute of Islamic Political Thought and, according to one Palestinian in the know, is a member of Hamas.[1] Well-known as a speaker at rallies around Britain, he has a tendency toward the hyperbolic. (He told an audience this past March, for example, that the U.S. government was closing mosques—to which a U.S. embassy spokesperson replied that his claim does not seem "to be based on valid evidence or any evidence at all.")[2] Tamimi is enamored of Ghannushi, and in this book he has let Ghannushi speak through him about the Tunisian's life and ideas. The result is a panegyric.
Ten years ago, this book would not have appeared under the imprint of Oxford University Press (OUP), even of its less demanding New York branch. A text that exalts an Islamist thinker, that settles petty scores with his Muslim detractors, and that spells the name of the world's leading scholar of Islam (and a fellow OUP author) as "Bernard Luis," would have been handled by some marginal Islamist publisher in London. So what gives, why the change?
A glance at the front matter explains all: Rachid Ghannouchi: A Democrat within Islamism appeared in a series edited by Georgetown University's John L. Esposito, America's leading academic defender of Islamism. For almost twenty years, Esposito has provided OUP with his own books on Islam. The appearance of this series on "Religion and Global Politics" represents an upgrade in their relationship, with OUP apparently also publishing the work of Esposito's acolytes. (Tamimi is clearly an acolyte: not only have the two co-edited a book but he calls Esposito "my ustadh"—Arabic, "teacher"). If this book is any evidence, OUP has become an Islamist vanity press.
[1] Muhammad Muslih, "The Foreign Policy of Hamas," New York: Council on Foreign Relations, 1999, p. 14, at http://www.cfr.org/public/pubs/Muslih2.pdf
[2] "US Shutting Down Mosques, Says Islamic Academic," Cityzine, Mar. 12, 2002, at http://www.jour.city.ac.ul/cityzine/News_Islam.html
