> If anybody knows anything about The Left and Islam is that Islam always
> sends the Left to the gallows. Look at what happened to Communists in Iran
> after Khoumeini took over. The Egyptian Trotskyites won't be going to
> Lenin's Tomb anytime soon but they will become more and more the useful
> idiots.
Let's be clear about that: the Communists, like much of the Iranian left, were uncritically supportive of Khomeini. Lacking political independence, they were not strong enough to lead anything. The fate of the Left after the Iranian Revolution was very much a reflection of their relative strength not only among the society as a whole, but among the Khomeinists. It was not inevitably so, even then: the main anti-left purges took place after the hostage crisis and then the invasion by Iraq, which enabled the conservative bourgeoisie to marginalise and neutralise the komitehs (populated by Islamists as well as socialists, you know).
The history that you refer to doesn't immediately compel a sectarian attitude of refusing to work with Islamists. That is secular catechism rather than revolutionary realpolitik. It does mean that one has to retain one's political independence and a crucial focus on class mobilisation. It does mean that one doesn't trust petit-bourgeois outfits like the Muslim Brothers. But if Mubarak is to be overthrown, the left isn't strong enough to do it alone; the Islamists are strategically weak and too easily coopted or destroyed; the Nasserists are in disarray. Only through unity, based on the recent working class revolts, can it happen. And if the Islamists let the revolt down, the left should not be hesitant to criticise and organise independently.