Uproar in Tunisia after women claim 'sexual jihad' trips to Syria

It is a tale of sex and sheikhs war and religion all fuelled by a combustible mix of the Internet and ideology There are YouTube clips of Saudi sheikhs counting menrsquos celestial sexual partners devout Muslims offering to adopt illegitimate children and Tunisiarsquos antiIslamist news outlets busily looking for ways to use the shocking allegations to expose the fragility of the countryrsquos ruling Islamist coalition A heated debate started late last month after reports that Tunisian women had been travelling to Syria to perform religiously sanctioned lsquosexual jihadrsquo jihad alnikah with some allegedly having sex with more than 100 rebel troops before returning home File Photo So what exactly has Tunisia and the Arabiclanguage web so abuzz A heated debate that started late last month after reports that Tunisian women had been travelling to Syria to perform religiously sanctioned lsquosexual jihadrsquo jihad alnikah with some allegedly having sex with more than 100 rebel troops before returning home The issue had first come to light in March when Saudi Sheikh Mohamad alArefe had allegedly issued a fatwa religious ruling calling for women to come forward for jihad alnikah and boost the morale of jihadists fighting against Bashar alAssadrsquos regime in Syriau00a0 Some Western media outlets have taken the reports at face value others have expressed serious skepticism But in Tunisia the subject has become political dynamite The notoriously antiIslamist Tunisian press has used the issue to step up calls for the governmentrsquos fall reporting that hundreds of women had returned from Syria pregnant The secular press singled out the reaction of an Islamist leader incredibly popular with his partyrsquos conservative base Habib Ellouze who offered to adopt the illegitimate children resulting from jihad alnikah unions Ellouze subsequently said that the ldquosexual jihadrdquo story was completely invented though that was barely covered Instead Tunisian press has been busy printing ldquoI told you sordquo articles and blaming the Islamistdominated governmentrsquos laxity toward hardline positions of the Salafists Sign of weakness Indeed the confusion over the jihad alnikah debate among Islamists is just another indication of the instability of the uneasy alliances that the current government in Tunis must rely upon The country is currently led by the selfdeclared moderate Islamist movement Ennahda which actually includes hardline elements It is a sign of weakness that there was so much confusion in the way the government responded to allegations of sex and religious manipulation even though there was very little actual proof with the Ministry of Women publishing a communiqueacute promising a crisis unit dedicated to dealing with the influx of women returning from jihad Dissent among Islamists has redirected observers to a root cause behind the disagreement the partyrsquos own tense relationship with Tunisian Salafists Aside from Ellouze who told reporters that the entire story of jihad alnikah was a farce Minister of Religious Affairs Noureddine Khadmi also denied the claims Saudilinked Khadmi who was nicknamed the ldquoimam of jihadrdquo has made enemies through his alleged encouragement of violence in religious sermons and by demanding the daytime closure of restaurants and cafeacutes during the holy month of Ramadan Meanwhile other prominent Islamists in leadership positions like Ennahdharsquos president Rashid alGhannushi as well as Islamist Prime Minister Ali Laarayedh have failed to publicly denounce jihad alnikah as a farce This has been construed as accepting that it exists Why then has the narrative of Tunisian womenrsquos sexual jihad exploded with various key figuresrsquo express and unspoken accord For one the salacious jihad alnikah drama has allowed both Islamists and progressive opposition figures to shine the light on the evils of extremismu00a0 The key point that emerges from the spectacle of nighttime political debates and sober press conferences is perhaps mainly the divergence of opinion regarding the definition of extremism Tunisian progressives believe that Islamists specifically the ruling party Ennahdha are religious extremists secretly in alliance with the Salafists they denounce thus exposing a despicable network pandering to the worst combination of sex and Islam is intended to tarnish the image of all Islamists including the ldquomoderatesrdquo in government Getting hacked Still there are other signs pointing to significant internal dissent most notably the decision of the Tunisian Islamist partyrsquos leadership to break with its Salafist brethren pinning the blame for two recent highprofile assassinations squarely on the most prominent Tunisian Salafi Jihadi group And so are the stories of sexual jihad actually true French news outlets have picked up on the serious holes in the original account In a perverse twist it seems that Syrian President Bashar alAssad may have manufactured such stories in his continuing effort to discredit the Syrian opposition as sexually voracious sociopathic jihadists And what about the Saudi sheikh who allegedly delivered the initial fatwa the religious ruling sanctioning sexual jihad He denied issuing such it dismissing it on his Twitter account as a ldquofabricationrdquo Tunisian women returning from sexual jihad in Syria if there are any thus may find a community of individuals concerned about their welfare or dedicated to pontificating about it Meanwhile Tunisiarsquos political actors ready to endorse caricatures of their own opponents may wind up finding themselves with the strangest of bedfellows Worldcrunchu00a0