Aside

Obama Administration too cozy with Islamists? Tunisians seem to think so

It’s a formula leftists simply don’t seem capable of comprehending. It happens every time. After aligning with Islamists to overtake a government or power structure they view as repressive, these leftists are always shocked when the Islamists cast them aside once they’re no longer useful. Just take a look at Iran; leftists aligned with Islamic radicals to overtake the Shah and once the Ayatollah came to power, leftists were executed.

A similar strain of this disturbing tendency appears to be unfolding in Tunisia. The leftists who aligned with the Islamists to overthrow Zine El Abidine Ben Ali are now beginning to realize what they’ve done; it’s really an amazing phenomenon. There’s a new twist in Tunisia, however. The leftists view Obama as being too friendly with the Islamists.

Yeah, I know. Duh! It’s not like we talked about this outcome until we were blue in the face before the Arab Spring began to blossom.

Anyway, via World Affairs, h/t to IPT:

TUNIS – Radical Islamists are making inroads in the Arab world’s most advanced, liberal, and tolerant country. And the secularists think the United States is helping them do it.

Thousands took to the streets of Tunisia’s capital Tunis yesterday to celebrate the end of French colonial rule in 1956. As one might expect on independence day, most were in an anti-imperialist mood. Who are the “imperialists” in the Tunisian imagination today? Not the French. Not anymore. The “imperialists” of today are the United States and, oddly enough, Qatar. Both are seen, fairly or not, as the backers of Tunisia’s Islamists.

“No to America, no to Qatar, the people of Tunisia will always be free.”

IPT’s Steve Emerson expounds on the World Affairs piece by Michael Totten:

Washington has courted the new government, baffling secularists in Tunisia, Totten writes. That’s because Ennahda is viewed as a moderate party in American media and government, an assessment with which Tunisians on the street strongly disagree. “No to America, no to Qatar, the people of Tunisia will always be free” marchers chanted Tuesday during rallies to commemorate Tunisian independence.

“People here are against the United States helping Ennahda,” a journalist told Totten. “All Americans who come here are against the Islamists, but the American government is supporting them. I wish we had a good, modern, respectful Islamic party. I’m a Muslim and I’m proud of it, but I’m not proud of this party.”

The government is seen as far too cozy with radical Salafists, looking the other way as the radicals stake a claim to the new society. Ennahda members joined the Salafists in a recent rally calling for Sharia law in Tunisia.

Perhaps this excerpt from Emerson’s piece sums it up best:

Politically “We made the revolution and they got the power,” complained one student, identified as an Amnesty International volunteer. Ennahda is “a fascist party,” he said.

Amnesty International is a left wing organization that is proven wrong time and time again. It is we on the right who have been warning against these revolutions. As for the Ennahda Party, all anyone had to do was call us here at the Shoebat Foundation. We know this stuff, you know?

The leftists over there are right about one thing though. The Obama administration has definitely implemented policies that have been beneficial to the Muslim Brotherhood.

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