Arab uprisings against unpopular Western-backed rulers have undercut the arguments of some Western intellectuals about passive populations who are not prepared to fight for democracy.During the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, neoconservative cheerleaders for war who had direct access to Western policymakers said force was the only way to take down Arab dictators. A minority of Arab intellectuals agreed with them.
Many writers, especially in the United States, suggested there were characteristics peculiar to the region that could explain why Arabs had not been touched by the democratic wave that toppled East European regimes two decades ago.
Often they cited Islam, or implied there was something wrong in the Arab psyche. Those who suggested more of a focus on U.S. policies and backing for unpopular regimes have had less access to mainstream media and policy makers.
Bernard Lewis, one of the intellectual giants of this trend, wrote in 2005 that "creating a democratic political and social order in Iraq or elsewhere in the region will not be easy," as if "creating" democracy required American tutelage.
The uprisings that removed Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali on January 14 and Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak four weeks later have shown the people are capable of doing it themselves, even when up against huge odds.
Scholars and opposition figures, who all opposed the Iraq war, said the uprisings, which have so far sparked street action in Algeria, Libya, Yemen, Bahrain, Jordan and Iran, also exposed the ulterior motives behind U.S. backing for police states.
"The West must change its mistaken belief that we are not fit for democracy and freedom. Now is the time for Western powers to recognize the desires of the Arab people and to remove their support of their despotic allies," said Ali Al-Ahmed, a Saudi dissident based in Washington.
"Tunisians and Egyptians have proven Western powers and analysts wrong about the Arabs desire for freedom," he said.
Western countries long saw rulers such as Mubarak and Ben Ali as strongmen able to deliver on Western foreign policy needs while cracking down on convenient Islamist threats such as the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and the Ennahda party in Tunisia.
Israel has reacted with great alarm to the fall of a trusted ally like Mubarak. He spent much time in his final days in office on the phone to U.S. and Israeli officials who fear the rise of popular forces, Islamist or secular, in a democratic Egypt would take a different line on regional issues.
Egypt under Mubarak never veered from the script of a 1979 peace treaty with Israel engineered by his predecessor Anwar Sadat and backed by military top brass despite popular anger.
He imposed a blockade of the Gaza Strip, drawing the opprobrium of many ordinary Arabs, because like Israel and the United States he did not like Palestinian Islamist group Hamas and its links to Egypt's own Islamist trend.
"The explosion of Arab popular anger everywhere flies against U.S. policy interests," said As'ad AbuKhalil, a Lebanese politics professor in the United States. "In other words, the U.S. needed to believe that Arabs are fatalistic and quiescent ... to rationalize the American embrace of most Arab tyrannies."
Many writers, especially in the United States, suggested there were characteristics peculiar to the region that could explain why Arabs had not been touched by the democratic wave that toppled East European regimes two decades ago.
Often they cited Islam, or implied there was something wrong in the Arab psyche. Those who suggested more of a focus on U.S. policies and backing for unpopular regimes have had less access to mainstream media and policy makers.
Bernard Lewis, one of the intellectual giants of this trend, wrote in 2005 that "creating a democratic political and social order in Iraq or elsewhere in the region will not be easy," as if "creating" democracy required American tutelage.
The uprisings that removed Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali on January 14 and Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak four weeks later have shown the people are capable of doing it themselves, even when up against huge odds.
Scholars and opposition figures, who all opposed the Iraq war, said the uprisings, which have so far sparked street action in Algeria, Libya, Yemen, Bahrain, Jordan and Iran, also exposed the ulterior motives behind U.S. backing for police states.
"The West must change its mistaken belief that we are not fit for democracy and freedom. Now is the time for Western powers to recognize the desires of the Arab people and to remove their support of their despotic allies," said Ali Al-Ahmed, a Saudi dissident based in Washington.
"Tunisians and Egyptians have proven Western powers and analysts wrong about the Arabs desire for freedom," he said.
Western countries long saw rulers such as Mubarak and Ben Ali as strongmen able to deliver on Western foreign policy needs while cracking down on convenient Islamist threats such as the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and the Ennahda party in Tunisia.
Israel has reacted with great alarm to the fall of a trusted ally like Mubarak. He spent much time in his final days in office on the phone to U.S. and Israeli officials who fear the rise of popular forces, Islamist or secular, in a democratic Egypt would take a different line on regional issues.
Egypt under Mubarak never veered from the script of a 1979 peace treaty with Israel engineered by his predecessor Anwar Sadat and backed by military top brass despite popular anger.
He imposed a blockade of the Gaza Strip, drawing the opprobrium of many ordinary Arabs, because like Israel and the United States he did not like Palestinian Islamist group Hamas and its links to Egypt's own Islamist trend.
"The explosion of Arab popular anger everywhere flies against U.S. policy interests," said As'ad AbuKhalil, a Lebanese politics professor in the United States. "In other words, the U.S. needed to believe that Arabs are fatalistic and quiescent ... to rationalize the American embrace of most Arab tyrannies."
