Revolution, Counterrevolution, and Football

Being an American of the Boomer generation, my 11-year old daughter probably understands soccer better than I do, but I know how politically loaded it can be in many countries. (Remember the Algerian-Egyptian football war of 2009?) So, though my American readers probably won't see this till the NCAA basketball championship is over tonight, I thought I should note the events of Saturday in Cairo.

During a match between Egypt's popular Zamalek team and Tunisia's Club Africain, supporters of the former went wild in a way that would make a British football hooligan proud, invading the pitch in large numbers. Video:



James M. Dorsey, a veteran journalist who blogs about soccer in the Middle East, offers details and calls it "a stunning display of nihilism,"; he has subsequent developments covered in posts here, here, and here. His stories attribute the trouble to the Ultra White Knights, the Zamalek team's ardent supporters. That's also followed by the NYT Soccer blog. But some Egyptian sources, including Al-Ahram, speculated that the "thugs" (baltagiyya) who have remained diehard supporters of Husni Mubarak were behind the riot, which forfeited the game to Tunisia. That is echoed somewhat in Bikya Misr and clearly accepted by Zeinobia, though Dorsey notes that the Ultra White Knights were actually strongly supportive of the revolution, and has suggested an excess of revolutionary fervor was behind the outburst. (The conspiracy theory now seems to be that the police were generally absent, so therefore are responsible for the hooliganism getting out of hand.) [Update: Dorsey adds a personal note in the comments:]

Thanks for the quote. Just to be clear, I spent some 30 hours of the last weekend including attendance at the match with the UWK. My comments were based on first-hand conversations and observations including of the UWK meeting to prepare for the match. The UWK by its own admission accepts responsibility and rejects conspiracy theories that it was provoked. That includes the police whose absence may have been designed to enable something like what happened. Nonetheless, the UWK accepts that it was up to them to control their rank and file.

What is clear is that Egyptian supporters of the revolution were not only embarrassed, but particularly by the fact that it involved Tunisians, whose revolution inspired Egypt's. Egyptian crowds waving Tunisian flags turned out at the Tunisian Embassy, chanting "Egypt and Tunisia are one hand!" (an echo of the slogan, "The Army and the people are one hand!"), and offering apologies. Both the Prime Minister and the Foreign Minister publicly apologized.

It does show how, in a revolutionary situation, anything can be politicized, with some seeing the riot as revolutionaries out of control and others as the forces of counterrevolution trying to create anarchy, when it may have been just a football dispute.

Or is that the origin of the phrase, "a political football?"

You have read this article Egypt / sports / Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/04/revolution-counterrevolution-and.html. Thanks!

Tunisia Dissolves the RCD

Only days after abolishing Tunisia's State Security, a court has decided to dissolve the formerly ruling Constitutional Democratic Rally (RCD), the former all-pervasive party of Ben Ali, and liquidate its assets. On a day when, by contrast, clashes between thugs and demonstrators in Cairo's Tahrir Square suggested the old Egyptian State Security apparatus is still holding on, the abolition of the RCD meets another of the demands of the Tunisian revolutionaries.

You have read this article Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/03/tunisia-dissolves-rcd.html. Thanks!

. . . and in Tunisia

Tunisian interim Prime Minister Beji Caid-Essebsi has filled the remaiing vascancies in the Cabinet, so that the Cabinet now consists of technocrats rather than political figures.

In addition, Tunisia has announced the abolition of State Security.

You have read this article Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/03/and-in-tunisia.html. Thanks!

If This is All Happening on a Thursday, What Will Friday Be Like?

For a day that started with the replacement of Egypt's Prime Minister (who now says he might run for President), a whole lot more has been going on. I can't comment in too much detail, but here are some of the highlights:

• Tunisia's interim President Mbazaa has called an election for July 24 for an assembly to rewrite the constitution. The new constitution would precede new elections. Mbazaa says he'll remain in office until then, despite a ban on holding an interim office more than 60 dys under the present constitution.
  

• Zahi Hawass has apparently resigned as Egypt's Minister of State for Antiquities. This follows his publishing on his personal website a report detailing looting and vandalism of archaeological sites and monuments since the revolution began, Hawass is always able to get press, and if this is timed with the change of Prime Ministers it may indeed increase pressure on protecting Egyptian antiquities.

• The interim government in Egypt previously abolished the Ministry of Information and put the Egyptian Radio and Television Union, which runs state radio and TV, under an Army general. Now the general, who had no experience in broadcasting, has been replaced with Prof. Sami El-Sharif, a specialist in mass communications.

More later; this has been a very busy Thursday; and tomorrow several countries have big demonstrations planned.

You have read this article Egypt / Tunisia / Zahi Hawass with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/03/if-this-is-all-happening-on-thursday.html. Thanks!

Egypt: Shafiq Out, Sharaf In After Shafiq TV Debate

Interim Egyptian Prime Minister Ahmad Shafiq is out, replaced by Essam Sharaf, formerly Transportation Minister. Shafiq's removal had been a demand of the continuing protests, since he was seen as a longtime associate of Mubarak's. Like the parallel case of Mohamed Ghannouchi in Cairo, he became a symbol of the survival of the old regime despite the departure of the heae, and like Ghannouchi, he too is now gone. Sharaf, in fact, is said to have himself joined the protests.

[Update: Some Egyptian bloggers are tweeting that the new interim Cabinet to be named by Sharaf will not include Foreign Minister Abu al-Ghait or Interior Minister Wagdy, whose departure has also been demanded.]

Possibly related to the timing: Last night Shafiq appeared on television for what turned into an hours-long debate with some strong regime critics: a rare case of a sitting Middle Eastern leader being held to account in a public forum. Zeinobia has a summary of it here, and there was minute by minute tweeting by Egyptian commenters last night. Apparently Shafiq lost his cool a few times, so perhaps that helped him lose his job this morning.

Once again, the Egyptian events are tracking developments in Tunisia fairly closely: old leader finally departs (after three speeches making limited concessions); interim leadership names member of old guard as transitional leader; protests continue until he's gone, too.

You have read this article Egypt / Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/03/egypt-shafiq-out-sharaf-in-after-shafiq.html. Thanks!

Meanwhile, Back in Tunis . . . Ghannouchi Quits; Replacement is 84

Tunisian Prime Minister Mohamed Ghannouchi resigned today. Protesters have been demanding he step down almost since the departure of Ben Ali, since he is a longtime staple of the old regime. Protesters reportedly cheered his departure.

Of course, the government promptly appointed Beji Caid-Essebsi to replace him. (Link is in French.) Caid-Essebsi, who is 84 years old, was variously Interior, Defense, and Foreign Minister in Habib Bourguiba's day, having served Bourguiba from independence in 1956. Then he headed the Chamber of Deputies under Ben Ali, till leaving government in the mid-1990s.

In other words, the ideal candidate to represent the youth revolution. I guess they couldn't find anyone left over from the days of the Beylicate.

You have read this article Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/02/meanwhile-back-in-tunis-ghannouchi.html. Thanks!

Why are These Men Smiling?

The Enduring America blog has this great picture and is holding a caption contest here.

You have read this article Egypt / humor / Husni Mubarak / Libya / Qadhafi / Tunisia / Yemen with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/02/why-are-these-men-smiling.html. Thanks!

A Joke from Cairo Today

I hope someone compiles all the jokes flying around about recent events, since Egyptians are geniuses at political humor, for too long their only outlet. One from today:

After the triumphant revolutions of Friday, January 14, and Friday, February 11, Colonel Qadhafi has acted swiftly to avoid the fate of his neighbors on either side.

He's issued a decree abolishing Fridays.

You have read this article Egypt / humor / Qadhafi / Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/02/joke-from-cairo-today.html. Thanks!

Decree Powers in Tunisia

Tunisia's Parliament has approved granting the Interim President decree powers in order to speed the process of legalizing political parties and moving towards elections.

Democratization through decree. I think we all need to keep in mind that, even if all the media shifted from Tunis to Cairo, the real results of the Tunisian revolution are still not known. There was violence recently in Kasserine again, and the future is far from settled.

You have read this article Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/02/decree-powers-in-tunisia.html. Thanks!

US Political Scientists and the Middle East

May I call to your attention to two posts by Andrew Exum and by Issandr El Amrani, both of them dealing with the question of whether the emphasis on quantitative analysis in US political science departments is singularly ill-suited to analysis of Middle Eastern regimes (where the numbers, if they exist at all, are likely cooked). As a historian who has to read a lot of political science by recent Ph.D.s due to the nature of my job, I'd like to applaud both of them for their views, which I largely share.

However, since the context is the debate over why academia didn't see the Middle Eastern revolts coming, I'd only note that so far as I know nobody did: not the security services in the countries in question, and not the foreign intelligence analysts.

You have read this article Egypt / Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/02/us-political-scientists-and-middle-east.html. Thanks!

Tunisia Suspends, May Dissolve RCD

Tunisia's Interim Government has suspended the former ruling party, the Constitutinal Democratic Rally (RCD), and may dissolve it.

Normally, banning political parties seems a move against democratization. The RCD was no ordinary party, however. Ultimately the creation of Habib Bourguiba, it had undergone several name changes but remained an all-pervasive party with its tendrils reaching into neighborhoods, workplaces, and virtually every aspect of life.

You have read this article Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/02/tunisia-suspends-may-dissolve-rcd.html. Thanks!

Pundit Like it's 1989

There is a tide in the affairs of men.
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat,
And we must take the current when it serves,
Or lose our ventures.

— Brutus in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, Acr IV, Scene 3

I wanted to reflect for a moment about the dilemma facing all of us Middle East "experts," pundits, and talking heads. I wish I had phone numbers of some of the history grad students I knew who were specialists on Russian and Eastern European history. (We tended to meet in Byzantine Empire history classes. I actually took four semesters of Byzantine history, two taught by Georgian Prince Cyril Toumanoff, about whom I must write someday.) As I try to field questions from the media and formulate my own thinking on what's going on now, I keep realizing that everything I've learned from experience in the past 40 years may no longer be valid. There is a dynamic here that has never existed before. I don't understand the dynamic. Ben Ali and Mubarak clearly don't. Maybe King ‘Abdullah II has a clue, since he's trying to stay in front of the tsunami (or the "Tunisnami" as someone has dubbed it).

Although the Solidarity Movement in Poland had led the way, the collapse of Eastern Europe and, soon after, the Soviet Union itself, stunned observers, the governments themselves, and no doubt the protesters. It was not the state but the Communist Monolith that withered away, or simply evaporated. The fall of the Berlin Wall, some say, was inadvertent. The East German Government issued a contingency statement the Politburo had not authorized. (The most dramatic bureaucratic screwup in history?) Not just a wall but an Iron Curtain fell. And,for the most part, it was bloodless, unless your name was Ceausescu. (Mubarak's "I will die in Egypt": be careful what you wish for.)

1989 was forecast by no one. It was impossible, unprecedented, a psychedelic fantasy. The results were imperfect (Belarus and some of the "stans" and the Caucasus). But all the existing analytic paradigms collapsed overnight. The dynamic was changed. People were empowered.

Pundits at the time raised the question of why it didn't spread to the Arab World.

Tunisia was an outlier, a solid little Arab country but very much its own case. Egypt is the beating heart of Arab nationalism, birthplace of civilization, mother of the world. Tunisia was Poland; if it happens, Egypt is the fall of the Berlin Wall at a minimum. It's the mother lode.

Outside of my post on the 1919 Revolution/uprising, the fall of the Shah of Iran is perhaps the best analog. A man seemingly secure fell quickly, though not so quickly as what is happening now. Obviously whether we decide this is a "Facebook revolution" or something quite different, there are going to be elements of it that are entirely new.

As for exportability, revolutions can occur without communication among revolutionary groups, as the success of one spreads to another country. There is something exhilarating about real revolution (think of Wordsworth's "Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive/But to be young was very heaven"). The American Revolution had a direct and organic effect on France in 1789. The wave of revolutions that swept Europe in 1848 is another example, as is the spread of the Russian Revolution of 1917 to many places, including Germany a bit, in 1918-1919. The domino collapse of Communism is perhaps the most apt, and clearly most recent, example.

What happens next? Don't ask us Middle East experts. We've never seen anything like this. The dynamic is new, and different, and not a reliable guide because we don't understand it yet. Bliss is it in this dawn to be alive.

You have read this article Arab World / Egypt / Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/02/pundit-like-it-1989.html. Thanks!

Most Old Guard Leave Tunisian Cabinet

Earlier today Tunisian Foreign Minister Kamel Morjane announced his resignation, and subsequently the Interim Cabinet announced a reshuffle replacing 12 members from the Ben Ali era, including the Defense, Interior, and Finance Ministries. Prime Minister Ghannouchi, however, a pillar of the old regime, still keeps his job.

The demands to replace the RCD entirely had been building for days, and this was not unexpected. On the other hand, I hope Ghannouchi realized he has just focused all the anger on his own person.

You have read this article Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/01/most-old-guard-leave-tunisian-cabinet.html. Thanks!

Now What Happens?

After Police Day in Cairo, and now after the day after, what next? Obviously Egypt drew a lot of attention as many of the same media correspondents who were in Tunis a week ago shifted to Cairo. But it's also clear that the government showed its harder side today, with the Interior Ministry banning all gatherings and breaking up assemblages. Yesterday was a holiday, today a work day, so turnouts were reduced. The next test will be Friday, since after Friday prayers is a traditional tie for ferment, since crowds are already assembled at mosques.

Marc Lynch today captures some of the nuances we're all wrestling with as we watch this evolve: long experience teaches us not to underestimate the durability of Arab autocrats, even as we recognize that something does seem to have changed: there's a new dynamic in play, and neither policy analysts nor, perhaps, Interior Ministries fully understand what it means, or how exportable it may be. Read Lynch's piece since I think I would echo most of it. Including the sense that something has changed, but also skepticism that it will be enough to replicate Tunisia. Egypt is much bigger, more critically important to the US, and also has more outlets for letting off steam (an independent if sometimes restricted press). But yesterday's demonstrations were by most accounts the biggest since the 1977 bread riots, at least, and the bread riots scared Anwar Sadat no end,

One element in Tunisia that is less likely to be replicated in Egypt is the role the Army played. The Egyptian Army stays out of politics largely because of the perks granted by the regime, but they are also the ultimate guarantors of the regime. They normally play no role in internal security, which is the domain of the Interior Miuistry. But it is hard to imagine the Egyptian Army, at least as currently officered, giving the final shove to a faltering regime, as apparently occurred in Tunisia, though the details are still obscure.

On the other hand, the real loser in all this may be "Jimmy." Gamal Mubarak has always been a tough sell, since he is about as charismatic as most professional bankers, and evokes little support outside of his own entrepreneurial class of newly enriched businessmen. The Army has been noticeably silent about the succession project. At times in the past, the elder Mubarak has talked about the necessity of military experience for a leader in Egypt. A threat to the regime from the streets could lead him to abandon the Gamal project and simply run for a sixth term, which many have always suspected he would do, After all, he'd only be 90 when the term expires.

But of course, the dynamic may hold some surprises. Nobody thought Ben Ali would go after 29 days of anger, until he did.

You have read this article Egypt / Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/01/now-what-happens.html. Thanks!

How Facebook Fought Back Against Tunisia

An interesting tech piece at The Atlantic on how Facebook sought to defend its members against a massive, state-level attempt by Tunisia to steal all the passwords.

You have read this article information technology / Internet / social networking / Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/01/how-facebook-fought-back-against.html. Thanks!

Best Line of the Day

Even when they're angry, Egyptians still have a sense of humor. Somewhere on the Internet today (I hope that narrows it down) I noticed that one of the chants being chanted was Mubarak, Mubarak, al-Saudiyya intizarak. "Mubarak, Mubarak, Saudi Arabia is waiting for you."

Ben Ali and family, of course, fled to Saudi Arabia.

You have read this article Egypt / humor / Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/01/best-line-of-day.html. Thanks!

The Day of Protest

Major protests took place today in Tunisia (continuing to demand the interim government step down) and in Lebanon (against Najib Mikati replacing Sa‘d Hariri), but right now I want to comment on Egypt.

Based on video reports, Facebook, Twitter, etc. the demonstrators seem to have succeeded in makiNG their presence felt, and have occupied Tahrir Square (the central one downtown, shown above at dusk today) and are planning an all-night sit-in. Big turnouts were reported from Alexandria as well.

Extensive presence of Central Security Forces means the government was able to control and channel the demonstrations to some extent, but they don't seem to have deterred them as has often happened in the past. Perhaps Tunisia really has given people a new determination. By all reports the demonstrators were peaceful and didn't loot or attack private vehicles. The police were not as gentle. This does seem to have been one of the most successful and impressive turnouts for a demonstration; too often in the past groups mustered tens of thousands of supporters on Facebook, but only a few dozen would show up in the street. This seems different.

The real question is whether everything returns to normal tomorrow. The difference in Tunisia was the crowds kept growing and people got angrier and angrier. But the Egyptian government has always allowed an opposition press as an outlet for releasing pressure; Tunisia was far more absolutist in its control. So I'd be surprised to see a replication of the Tunisian results in Egypt. Of course, I was surprised to see them in Tunis, too.

You have read this article Egypt / Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/01/day-of-protest.html. Thanks!

Extended Rant: My Take on the Kaplan Debate About Tunisia

I only rant occasionally, so indulge me a bit.

Last week and this I've been pointing to several cogent, wise, and thoughtful assessments of the Tunisian events, so I guess it's only fair I should point to one that falls on the other side of the divide: Robert Kaplan's weekend piece in The New York Times. Kaplan has written some good books, though his Middle East track record is not all I might wish for. This time, I think he gets it wrong.

Now several others have already expressed their disagreement: notably Brian Whitaker and kal at The Moor Next Door. Read their comments as well as I'm not going to repeat their points overmuch. But bear in mind my doctorate is in history, and I did a bit of work on the early Islamic Maghreb, not to mention having a reasonable knowledge of Classical Antiquity. In other words, don't start arguing about Carthage and Roman Africa unless you want a fight. Or a rant.

First let me quote this line:

Because urbanization in Tunisia started two millenniums ago, tribal identity based on nomadism — which, as the medieval historian Ibn Khaldun says, has always disrupted political stability — is correspondingly weak.

Yes indeed. And Ibn Khaldun is the greatest of Arab historians, arguably a founder of sociology, a brilliant polymath whose insights are always worth reading, and who was born in (are your ready?) in Tunis. No special pleading there. But, actually, he also gets Ibn Khaldun dead wrong.He distinguished between hadara and the ‘asabiyya, the group cohesion that binds tribes but is not present in settle societies. The quote turns Ibn Khaldun, perhaps Tunis'
greatest son (his statue sits at the gateway of the Tunis medina) on his head.

And that is only the beginning.

Kaplan's real point seems to be that Arab autocracies may not be so bad for US interests and, um, Israel. He concludes:

Another thing to keep in mind: in terms of American interests and regional peace, there is plenty of peril in democracy. It was not democrats, but Arab autocrats, Anwar Sadat of Egypt and King Hussein of Jordan, who made peace with Israel. An autocrat firmly in charge can make concessions more easily than can a weak, elected leader — just witness the fragility of Mahmoud Abbas’s West Bank government. And it was democracy that brought the extremists of Hamas to power in Gaza. In fact, do we really want a relatively enlightened leader like King Abdullah in Jordan undermined by widespread street demonstrations? We should be careful what we wish for in the Middle East.

Well, I think that's clear enough. Should the Tunisians also be careful what they wish for?

The Moor has done the most critical critique (I guess that's redundant) so far. I have a few points to add, but do read him as well.

Let's start:

Start with a map of classical antiquity, which shows a concentration of settlements where Tunisia is today, juxtaposed with the relative emptiness that characterizes modern-day Algeria and Libya. Jutting out into the Mediterranean close to Sicily, Tunisia has been the hub of North Africa not only under the Carthaginians and Romans, but under the Vandals, Byzantines, medieval Arabs and Turks. Whereas Algeria and Libya were but vague geographical expressions until the coming of European colonial map makers, Tunisia is an age-old cluster of civilization.

Algeria and Libya weren't "vague geographical expressions" since in classical antiquity Libya pretty much meant the whole African continent, and "Algeria" is a French invention from Algiers. The "map of classical antiquity" however, would show first a string of Carthaginian colonies, and later and inland, Numidia, the land of Massinissa and Jugurtha, where Algeria is today, and the magnificent Roman ruins at Leptis Magna in Libya suggest it was not "relative emptiness." Read your Sallust.

On the other hand, let's not give the Romans too much credit: Delenda est Cartago. The major urban center of Tunisia was not just destroyed by Rome, but the ground was salted to make it uninhabitable.

Yes, Tunisia was a major urban center of early, Late Roman, Christianity. Augustine, who made a bit of a name for himself, preached at (the reborn Roman version of) Carthage among other places, but he was born in Thagaste (Suq Ahras) in what was then Numidia and is now Algeria, and is best known as the Bishop of Hippo (Annaba, Algeria). In Christian terms, Augustine is, well, kind of major.

None of this is intended to deny the centrality of what is now Tunisia. But Kaplan, save for one throwaway line about its importance under "Medieval Arabs," says little about Tunisia's role in early Islam. In about 670 AD the Arab conquerors, reaching what had been Proconsular Africa under the Romans, decided, as they had in Egypt (Alexandria to Fustat/Cairo) to move the capital inland from the coast, and founded the city of Kairouan ("the camp," but from the same word that gives us "caravan"). The Great Mosque in Kairouan is still one of the two great spiritual centers of Tunisia, along with the Mosque/University of Zeitouna in Tunis, once the greatest Islamic center of education west of al-Azhar.

In the old Moroccan imperial city of Fez, one of the best preserved medieval Arab capital medinas, there are two sides of the city, across a river, They take their names from the two great mosques: the Andalusiyyin (the Andalusians, the Spaniards) and the Qarawaniyyin (the Mosque of the People of Kairouan). It is a reminder of the dominance Kairouan once had in the Islamic Maghreb.

There is no mention of the Aghlabids, who from Tunisia conquered most of North Africa and Sicily, or of the Fatimids, who not only conquered Egypt but also Syria and even held Baghdad for a while. Zeitouna became the great educational center of the Arab West.

Then there's this:Tunisia has a relatively large middle class because of something so obvious it goes unremarked upon: it is a real state, with historical and geographical legitimacy, where political arguments are about budgets and food subsidies, not the extremist ideologies that have plagued its neighbors, Algeria and Libya. It is a state not only because of the legacy of Rome and other empires, but because of human agency, in the person of Habib Bourguiba, one of the lesser-known great men of the 20th century.

Tunisia is "s real state, with historical and geographical legitimacy." I can understand the contrast drawn with Libya and Algeria. But isn't Morocco a "real state?" And surely no one is going to doubt Egypt's pedigree. This is the kind of stereotype I hate.

I could go on. There's no great point, except to note that even Kaplan's m0dern narrative has some issues:

In 1987, while faced by an Islamic rising, Bourguiba became too infirm to rule, and was replaced by his former interior minister, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, essentially a security boss with little vision, much like the Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak. Mr. Ben Ali’s strategy was to keep order, which largely meant killing and torturing Islamists and other dissidents.

There was an "Islamic rising" in 1987? I missed it completely. There was some ferment to be sure, caused in part by the fact that Bourguiba was failing rapidly, but I missed the rising. And what about that "keep order = killing and torturing Islamists and other dissidents" equation, which is dropped in as it it were obvious?

I may add more when I have more time.

You have read this article Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/01/extended-rant-my-take-on-kaplan-debate.html. Thanks!

A Panel of Wise Men to Replace Transitional Government?

There are reports that talks are under way in Tunisia to replace the transitional government with a panel of "wise men" to oversee a transition to democracy, in response to continuing protests against the presence of figures in the former government in the transitional Cabinet. In addition, General Rachid Ammar, the eminence grise of the revolution, publicly was quoted as warning that a "power vacuum" could lead to dictatorship.

One interesting point in these reports is the mention that one of the "wise men" being considered is Ahmed Mestiri, the veteran opposition figure who broke with Bourguiba in the 1950s, founded the Movement of Socialist Democrats (MDS), and spent much time in jail and house arrest. Mestiri is 85 years old, stepped down as head of the MDS in 1989, and is retired from politics, but he is still a potent symbol of a longtime opponent of the government.

You have read this article Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/01/panel-of-wise-men-to-replace.html. Thanks!

Taking Stock Ten Days Later

Ten days after the January 14 flight of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, the analyses are continuing. Like several I've already linked to, the newer assessments are more thoughtful and nuanced than some of those produced in the first flush of victory. Steven Heydemann has a useful piece today at Foreign Policy's Middle East channel, which is worth your time.

And among the analysts and reporters flocking to Tunisia we find Issandr El Amrani, The Arabist, who's going to be contributing periodic analyses from the country. The first post has some interesting points, and I look forward to his forthcoming series.

You have read this article Arab World / Tunisia with the title Tunisia. You can bookmark this page URL https://ogbcommunity.blogspot.com/2011/01/taking-stock-ten-days-later.html. Thanks!