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DE RUEHTU #0670/01 0811349
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 221349Z MAR 06
FM AMEMBASSY TUNIS
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 0179
INFO RUEHLO/AMEMBASSY LONDON PRIORITY 1126
RUEHFR/AMEMBASSY PARIS PRIORITY 1556
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC PRIORITY

C O N F I D E N T I A L TUNIS 000670 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR NEA/MAG - LAWRENCE AND NEA/PI 
PARIS AND LONDON FOR NEA WATCHERS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/20/2016 
TAGS: PREL KDEM PGOV TS
SUBJECT: ISLAMISTS IN TUNISIA 
 
REF: A. TUNIS 425 
 
     ¶B. TUNIS 224 
 
Classified By: AMBASSADOR WILLIAM HUDSON FOR REASONS 1.4 b & d 
 
¶1. (C) SUMMARY: During a recent roundtable with Tunisian 
intellectuals and civil society activists, participants 
discussed the challenges and opportunities for Islamists in 
Tunisia.  (NOTE: In this discussion, Islamists were defined 
as Islamic political activists. END NOTE.)  While noting that 
direct communications with Islamists, including recently 
released leaders of the banned Islamic party an-Nahdha, might 
be useful, the government considers engaging these groups to 
be "crossing a red line."  Due to the imprisonment and exile 
of many former an-Nahdha officials, a new generation of 
Islamists has developed in Tunisia.  However, Islamists, like 
the other opposition and independent civil society groups, 
remain poorly organized due to government restrictions on 
speech and association.  In order to combat these 
limitations, Islamists have joined an unlikely, and probably 
temporary, alliance with leftists to counter the GOT. END 
SUMMARY. 
 
¶2. (C) According to some secular Tunisians, especially 
feminists, even those who now claim to be moderate Islamists 
would force women to wear the veil, allow polygamy and 
otherwise reverse many Tunisian social achievements of the 
past fifty years.  Given this view, post organized a 
roundtable discussion on March 8 to discuss: Are Islamists is 
a real threat to Tunisia's historically secular government? 
Several prominent civil society activists and intellectuals 
participated: 
 
- Saida Akremi, lawyer and General Secretary for the 
Tunisia-based International Association for the Support of 
Political Prisoners (AISPP) 
- Lotfi Hajji, journalist and member of the 18 October 
Committee (18OC, Ref B) 
- Salaheddine Jourchi, journalist and First Vice President of 
the Tunisian Human Rights League (LTDH) 
- Hamadi Redissi, Professor of Political Science, University 
of Tunis 
 
The discussion was wide-ranging, but focused on the need for 
greater democracy in Tunisia and the relative strength of 
Islamists in the political system. 
 
¶3. (C) According to Akremi, the only way to truly know what 
Islamists want is to speak directly with them.  However, the 
GOT would consider any foreign or local outreach to former 
an-Nahdha leaders to be "crossing a red line."  The 
"conditional freedom" of those recently released (Ref A), 
such as former al-Fejr editor Hamadi Jebali, could be 
restricted at any time if they are believed to be 
overstepping their boundaries.  However, Hajji noted that 
this older generation of an-Nahdha leaders, including exiled 
leader Rachid Ghannouchi, no longer represents the true 
future of Islamists in Tunisia.  As so many an-Nahdha members 
were imprisoned, live in exile, or denounced the group in the 
early nineties, a new generation of educated and thoughtful 
Islamists has developed in Tunisia.  These individuals were 
an-Nahdha supporters as university students and are more 
politically savvy than the older generation, but politically 
inactive given the GOT's complete rejection of a political 
role for Islamists. 
 
¶4. (C) Contrasting the relative freedom of the early 1980s 
under Bourguiba, when an-Nahdha's newspaper al-Fejr and other 
media enjoyed some degree of freedom, Akremi said Ben Ali's 
complete control over information has prevented any public 
debate on what Islamists in Tunisia hope to achieve - and 
what threat they represent to the secular system.  The group 
lamented the absence of public debate on even the most minor 
domestic issues and said that, without open discussion, it 
was difficult to know what platform Islamists would present 
in a democratic system.  While Jebali recently said, in an 
interview with Hajji for aljazeera.net, that an-Nahdha would 
not call for a return to polygamy, it is unclear for whom he 
is speaking - the defunct party of London-based Ghannouchi or 
an-Nahdha sympathizers in Tunisia today.  Jourchi opined that 
an-Nahdha's medium-term focus is likely the release of their 
members from prison (and Jebali has said this openly in 
interviews).  Once they are all released - and Akremi 
estimates there are about two hundred still imprisoned - the 
group would refocus its efforts on political activism. 
 
¶5. (C) Despite the fears of secular Tunisians, the group felt 
strongly that Islamists are no better organized today than 
other opposition groups.  This weakness has led, for the 
first time in Tunisia, to an alliance between leftist and 
Islamist political activists in the 18 October Committee (Ref 
B).  Redissi said this is merely an alliance of convenience, 
as the two groups have such very different ideologies. 
However, the extent of GOT repression has driven some 
opposition activists together in an attempt to present a 
united front calling for increased political freedom. 
Redissi speculated that President Ben Ali might authorize an 
Islamic association or party to respond to these pressures, 
but Hajji and Jourchi said the required constitutional 
amendment to allow religious-based political party was 
unlikely. 
 
¶6. (C) COMMENT: It is interesting to note that this group, 
some of whom have close ties to Islamist activists, did not 
feel there is widespread support in Tunisia for Islamists or 
that they are well-organized.  This greatly contrasts with 
the fears from the secular side of the political spectrum. 
As long as many secular Tunisians support the GOT argument 
that Islamists and conservative religious thought represent a 
threat to Tunisian society, this fear will limit the 
development of grass-roots support for increased democracy in 
Tunisia. As post's Freedom Agenda stresses, any political 
reform here is dependent on increased freedom of expression 
and association, so that public debate of Tunisia's political 
future can begin. END COMMENT. 
HUDSON