Renaissance Party

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For the Arab cultural movement, see al-Nahda.

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Renaissance Party (Hizb al-Nahda/Parti de la Renaissance) is an illegal opposition political party in Tunisia.

Al Nahda an islamist party which publishes the newspaper Al-Fajr. The editor of Al Fajr, Hamadi Jebali, was sentenced to sixteen years imprisonment in 1992 for membership of the illegal organisation and for "aggression with the intention of changing the nature of the state". Al Nahda members were allowed to stand in the 1989 elections but the movement was banned in 1991. The Arabic language television station El Zeitouna is believed to be connected with Al Nahda.

Although traditionally shaped by the thinking of Sayyid Qutb and Maududi starting in the 1980s they began to be deemed as the more moderate face of Islamism. They advocated democracy and a "Tunisian" form of Islamism which recognized political pluralism. They also discussed a "dialogue" with the West. These statements should not be misconstrued as they reject Western notions of liberal democracy and believe in an essentially Islamic constitution. Critics charge that one of their main leaders, named Rashid Al-Ghannushi, reportedly stated "Every evil in the world, the Zionists are behind it. This is no exaggeration. There are so many evils in the world, and behind which are the Children of Israel." More certain is that he had a history of violence before his support of multi-party democracy and was criticized by Tunisian human rights groups opposed to undemocratic tendencies in Tunisia.