diff --git a/mwparserfromhell/compat.py b/mwparserfromhell/compat.py
index 94e0db3..4384ace 100644
--- a/mwparserfromhell/compat.py
+++ b/mwparserfromhell/compat.py
@@ -20,7 +20,6 @@ if py3k:
     range = range
     maxsize = sys.maxsize
     import html.entities as htmlentities
-    zip = zip
 
 else:
     bytes = str
@@ -28,6 +27,5 @@ else:
     range = xrange
     maxsize = sys.maxint
     import htmlentitydefs as htmlentities
-    from itertools import izip as zip
 
 del sys
diff --git a/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.c b/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.c
index d8a505f..41ce5ac 100644
--- a/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.c
+++ b/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.c
@@ -1896,18 +1896,26 @@ static PyObject* Tokenizer_handle_single_tag_end(Tokenizer* self)
 {
     PyObject *token = 0, *padding, *kwargs;
     Py_ssize_t len, index;
-    int is_instance;
+    int depth = 1, is_instance;
 
     len = PyList_GET_SIZE(self->topstack->stack);
-    for (index = len - 1; index >= 0; index--) {
+    for (index = 2; index < len; index++) {
         token = PyList_GET_ITEM(self->topstack->stack, index);
-        is_instance = PyObject_IsInstance(token, TagCloseOpen);
+        is_instance = PyObject_IsInstance(token, TagOpenOpen);
         if (is_instance == -1)
             return NULL;
         else if (is_instance == 1)
-            break;
+            depth++;
+        is_instance = PyObject_IsInstance(token, TagCloseOpen);
+        if (is_instance == -1)
+            return NULL;
+        else if (is_instance == 1) {
+            depth--;
+            if (depth == 0)
+                break;
+        }
     }
-    if (!token)
+    if (!token || depth > 0)
         return NULL;
     padding = PyObject_GetAttrString(token, "padding");
     if (!padding)
diff --git a/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.py b/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.py
index aa7499a..e69a823 100644
--- a/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.py
+++ b/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.py
@@ -25,7 +25,7 @@ from math import log
 import re
 
 from . import contexts, tokens
-from ..compat import htmlentities, range, zip
+from ..compat import htmlentities, range
 from ..definitions import (get_html_tag, is_parsable, is_single,
                            is_single_only, is_scheme)
 
@@ -752,11 +752,18 @@ class Tokenizer(object):
     def _handle_single_tag_end(self):
         """Handle the stream end when inside a single-supporting HTML tag."""
         stack = self._stack
-        gen = zip(range(len(stack) - 1, -1, -1), reversed(stack))
-        index = next(i for i, t in gen if isinstance(t, tokens.TagCloseOpen))
+        # We need to find the index of the TagCloseOpen token corresponding to
+        # the TagOpenOpen token located at index 0:
+        depth = 1
+        for index, token in enumerate(stack[2:], 2):
+            if isinstance(token, tokens.TagOpenOpen):
+                depth += 1
+            elif isinstance(token, tokens.TagCloseOpen):
+                depth -= 1
+                if depth == 0:
+                    break
         padding = stack[index].padding
-        token = tokens.TagCloseSelfclose(padding=padding, implicit=True)
-        stack[index] = token
+        stack[index] = tokens.TagCloseSelfclose(padding=padding, implicit=True)
         return self._pop()
 
     def _really_parse_tag(self):
diff --git a/tests/tokenizer/integration.mwtest b/tests/tokenizer/integration.mwtest
index bf19f4d..5e1a409 100644
--- a/tests/tokenizer/integration.mwtest
+++ b/tests/tokenizer/integration.mwtest
@@ -178,3 +178,10 @@ name:   external_link_inside_wikilink_title
 label:  an external link inside a wikilink title, which is invalid
 input:  "[[File:Example.png http://example.com]]"
 output: [WikilinkOpen(), Text(text="File:Example.png http://example.com"), WikilinkClose()]
+
+---
+
+name:   italics_inside_external_link_inside_incomplete_list
+label:  italic text inside an external link inside an incomplete list
+input:  "<li>[http://www.example.com ''example'']"
+output: [TagOpenOpen(), Text(text="li"), TagCloseSelfclose(padding="", implicit=True), ExternalLinkOpen(brackets=True), Text(text="http://www.example.com"), ExternalLinkSeparator(), TagOpenOpen(wiki_markup="''"), Text(text="i"), TagCloseOpen(), Text(text="example"), TagOpenClose(), Text(text="i"), TagCloseClose(), ExternalLinkClose()]