Muslim Brotherhood’s last shot is playing out in Tunisia

Arabic press columnists discuss the situations in Tunisia, Syria and Egypt.

"One step forward, another step backward: they start by responding favourably to rising popular demands for early elections, then they make a series of detours," wrote Waheed Abdul Majeed, head of the Cairo-based Al Ahram Centre for Translation and Publishing. He was referring to Tunisia's Muslim Brotherhood as they manoeuvre through the country's political stalemate.
"They are sending out mixed messages about their acceptance of the resignation of Ali Laarayedh's government. Here they are, opening up the door for the crisis to be resolved, then, there they are, leaving that door barely ajar," Abdul Majeed wrote. His column, entitled The Muslim Brothers' last chance is in Tunisia, ran in the Abu Dhabi-based newspaper Al Ittihad.
Under pressure from the street and left-wing parties, Ennahda agreed this month to dissolve the "troika" (three-way coalition) government it has led since the post-revolution elections, promising to work with all the country's players to form an interim government of technocrats until new elections are held, possibly early next year.
But now, despite statements from Ennahda's leadership denying any divisions within the party, it is clear "that the existing differences within the party are undermining its ability to keep up with the crisis", the author said.
Ennahda's task is not only to avert "entering a dark tunnel" as a Tunisian political player, but also to try to "rescue the Muslim Brotherhood movement as a whole, following the failure of its Egypt chapter that has weakened all of its offshoots," he noted.
Indeed, the decisive moment for the Brotherhood as a movement is near, with its fate now hinging on the stance that Ennahda will take, and the results it will yield," Abdul Majeed went on to say.
And since time is a factor and pressure has already built up considerably against Ennahda, Tunisia's first openly Islamist party in decades can no longer continue to dither.
"When Tunisians rose up against the political establishment in December 2010, the men of [Egypt's former president, Hosni] Mubarak insisted that the situation in Egypt was different. The phrase 'Egypt isn't Tunisia' was their mantra. On January 25, 2011, their confidence proved to be utterly unfounded," he wrote.
The irony now is that, as soon as the rule of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt collapsed, following the arrest of President Mohammed Morsi on July 3, Ennahda were quick to point that "Tunisia isn't Egypt".
While they are right in making this assertion, given that Ennahda never got to monopolise power in Tunisia as the Freedom and Justice Party did in Egypt, it does not mean that Ennahda's crisis cannot get even worse.
Assad will never leave power voluntarily
There has been some talk about the Syrian presidential elections next year and the need to arrange a conference to agree on a successor to Bashar Al Assad when his term ends. Such talk however, argued Abdulrahman Al Rashed in the London-based daily Asharq Al Awast, disregards the fact that the Syrian president will never willingly leave office.
Force is the only way to depose President Al Assad. He was elected following an amendment to the constitution to lower the minimum age for the president; this allowed him to take the office after his father's death.
It does not stand to reason that a president who came to power the way he did, and has caused the death of hundreds of thousands of Syrians, displaced five million and left many cities in ruins, will simply leave office.
President Al Assad imagines, like Libya's Muammar Al Qaddafi did before he was toppled, that he can stay in power forever by using every brutal method that he has at hand.
The Geneva conference is a diplomatic necessity for all – Syria's warring parties and regional and international players – but it will bring nothing new to the conflict.
Conferences will not decide the government in Syria. Fighters on the ground are the only party who can do that. Moreover, the Syrian people cannot possibly accept that Mr Al Assad will stay in power regardless of any legitimacy he might get at the Geneva conference.
Egyptians must work on a political solution
The interior ministry and Egyptians at large must brace themselves for a wave of terrorist attacks if politics fails, wrote Emad Eddine Hussein in the Cairo-based newspaper Al Shorouk.
Most comments on the recent attack against the Virgin Church in Cairo's Al Warraq district have failed to dig deep and simply described it as a terrorist attack, criminal act, and the like.
It's not surprising that a church has been targeted at this time. And, unfortunately, similar events will continue to happen if the government does not change its current modus operandi.
To be sure, it is an open war that is raging between the state and Muslim Brotherhood sympathisers. One part of the war is political and the other is violent, as the clashes in Sina and other parts demonstrate.
Suppose there are only 1,000 pro-Brotherhood people who have lost hope in politics and decided to go underground, the result is 1,000 suicide bombers.
A political solution is the best way to defuse the tension and give both conflicting parties a feeling of victory.
But if politics fails, the interior ministry has to start training its staff on how to deal with acts of terrorism. Members of the community will also have to brace for this reality and remain vigilant in public places.
* Digest compiled by The Translation Desk
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