TUNIS, Tunisia — A month after the assassination of an opposition politician in Tunisia, a senior member of the ruling Ennahda party said Monday [March 4] their rivals' refusal to accept Islamists running the country is helping to stoke discord.

Amel Azzouz, a deputy in the National Constituent Assembly and member of Ennahda's Shura Council, said opposition forces have been "in shock" since her party gained control in Tunisia's first postrevolution elections in October 2011.

"They have not, unfortunately, accepted the results of the ballot box," Azzouz said. "They are not able to digest the results that an Islamist party" is in power. "These people have not accepted the present existence of this government."

Azzouz sparred with Noomane Fehri, a member of the Al-Joumhouri party and deputy in the Constituent Assembly, at a public forum in the New Arab Debates series being held across the region. The impassioned discourse served as a barometer for swelling tensions in a nation at a crossroads after the Feb. 6 murder of Chokri Belaid, a prominent opposition leader who headed the National Democratic Patriots party.