Criticizing Islamists seems to be the fashionable thing to do these days. The fact of the matter is that this criticism is both a necessary and respectable act, if not even an honorable one, as long as it is being made by forces and voices that had participated in the uprisings in their countries – or had supported and defended them. This is particularly true in the case of those who had beaten the Islamists to taking part in the protest movement, and were not driven out of the latter by the Islamists' subsequent involvement. Then with the rise of Islamists and their electoral successes, these factions and voices resumed their revolutionary action, this time against these very same Islamists, trying to push their revolutions to an ever higher and nobler status. Among those are many liberals and leftists, and men and women activists who know that the Islamists' horizon is possessed by totalitarian intentions and reactionary desires. They know that, at best, the Islamist vision has no room for freedoms that women, writers, artists and minorities seek. They realize that it also threatens the national fabric of many countries, and that therefore it must be replaced, albeit peacefully and democratically, with a more tolerant and progressive horizon. Nevertheless, these factions are aware that the uprisings which took place, by overthrowing tyranny, had not only opened the door for them to continue to fight for their principles and take the revolutions to their conclusions, but had also cleared the way for their ideological opponents, namely the Islamists. But there is another faction that is criticizing the Islamists today, having suddenly discovered that Habib Bourguiba, for example, was a reformer, and went on to bemoan his reforms which the Islamists are undoing today. Notwithstanding their claims, this segment is part of a legacy that did nothing but tarnish the image of the late Tunisian leader, claiming that he was ‘an agent of colonialism', and citing his call for a return to the 1947 Partition Resolution on Palestine. Needless to say, the attacks directed by Nasserists and Baathists against Bourguiba had played an important role in weakening his leadership and undermining his plans for reform. In these same circles, there are voices that reject any substitute for immediate progress at all levels, including social, intellectual and even sexual issues. It was this same segment, however, that had once turned a blind eye to everything else, because, as they purported, nothing should take precedence over the main battle for the liberation of Palestine. Some of these did not even hesitate to endorse Ayatollah Khomeini and his revolution. They said nothing about Khomeini's ideology of velayat-e faqih [clerical rule], his views about women and agrarian reforms, simply because he was hostile to the United States and the West. Then to complement this stance, they have overlooked, to this day, Hezbollah's religious and sectarian ideology, for after all, they say, this party “resists Israel." Some of these, in turn, applauded Saddam Hussein and his oppression of the Iraqi people and their neighbors, because they had seen him as leading a project similar to Bismarck's, and one that encouraged unity against colonialism – following partition and fragmentation brought about by none other than this rascally colonialism. In between, there have been, and continue to be, voices that agree to reduce millions of Syrians in the person of Hafez al-Assad, justifying oppression, the jailing of opponents and the leveling of entire cities with the necessities of mumana'a, [the pro-resistance policy of the Syrian regime]. Somehow, these defenders of modern values have managed to come to terms with slavery, which they went on to glorify and still do. In short, it was this same faction that, each time before, had raised the slogan of ‘the Principal Contradiction' derived from Maoism, which no other contradiction could rival or match. In 1964, it was this proclivity of theirs that had prompted the communists in Egypt, and then the communists of Iraq in 1973, to join forces with Nasser and Saddam Hussein respectively. They thus agreed to disband, and put aside class struggle and their ideological and organizational independence from their new allies, in compliance with the orders of their comrades in Moscow. In this sense, one can respect those who reject the post-revolutionary rise of the Islamists, having hitherto stood against other Islamist and tyrannical ideologies espoused by the so-called anti-Western factions. Indeed, while one may describe such a stance as being utopian, elitist or even apolitical, it remains a principled and respectable one. Those who only awoke to the Islamist threat following the uprisings, however, are still required to do a lot more to prove their respectability.
