It’s the same old problem for us in the West. We mouth
the word “democracy” and we are all for fair elections
– providing the Arabs vote for whom we want them to
vote for.
The end of the age of dictators in the Arab world?
Certainly they are shaking in their boots across the
Middle East, the well-heeled sheiks and emirs, and the
kings, including one very old one in Saudi Arabia and a
young one in Jordan, and presidents – another very old
one in Egypt and a young one in Syria – because Tunisia
wasn’t meant to happen. Food price riots in Algeria,
too, and demonstrations against price increases in
Amman. Not to mention scores more dead in Tunisia,
whose own despot sought refuge in Riyadh – exactly the
same city to which a man called Idi Amin once fled.
