Hezbollah’s Double Standards: Tunisia, Iran, & Popular Protest
Hezbollah just issued a statement via its media relations office expressing strong support for “the people’s uprising” (the Arabic term intifada is used) in Tunisia. This, only days after it and its allies withdrew their ministers from the Lebanese government of Prime Minister Saad Hariri leading to its collapse, The mass popular protests that led to the unexpected flight of Tunisia’s longtime autocratic president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali are heralded by Lebanon’s largest Shi’ite political party as “historic developments.” Hezbollah’s enthusiastic support and attempted cooption of the potentially groundbreaking events last week in the North African country stand in stark contrast to the party’s reserved, at best, public response to mass popular protests that followed the controversial Iranian presidential elections in the summer of 2009. While this discrepancy is hardly surprising it is a clear illustration of the Hezbollah leadership’s double standards as well as a fairly blatant example of their attempt to spin events in Tunisia to fit the party’s ideological framing.
