Special to WorldTribune.com

CAIRO — Tunisia is struggling to avoid becoming an Islamist battleground.

Officials said Tunisia has been inundated with Islamist fighters and preachers from the Middle East who regard the North African state as ripe for revolt.

They said Tunisia has intensified security along its borders and was stopping clerics deemed supporters of Al Qaida.

“We are not opposed to Tunisian preachers, but to those who come from elsewhere,” Tunisian President Munsif Al Marzouqi said. “We have enough preachers to win the battle against extremism.”

Officials said the Salafist movement in Tunisia was encouraging foreign Islamists to incite violence. They said the Salafists were in contact with supporters in Gulf Arab states, believed to play a major role in financing the movement.

In June 2013, Tunisia blocked the entry of eight clerics from Saudi Arabia. Officials said the Saudis had been invited to deliver sermons throughout Tunisia amid heightened tension between the government and the Islamists.

“The [Interior] Ministry has banned the entry of eight people who had
come from the Gulf to carry out religious activities,” an Interior Ministry
statement said.

Officials said the ruling Ennahda movement has also been warned to
register all foreign preachers with the Interior Ministry. But they said
Ennahda was lobbying to expand the influence foreign Islamists with ties to
such countries as Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

  Ennahda, Munsif Al Marzouqi, Salafist movement, Tunisia fights off Islamist influx — ‘preachers’ who come ‘from elsewhere’