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NEWNATIONS BULLETIN 16 FEBRUARY 2011
IS THIS THE ARAB REVOLT?
NewNations is about the growth of democracy, so it can be no surprise that we welcome the developments in the Middle East. Alessandro Bruno, who covers three Arab States for our free monthly reports, here contributes his regional knowledge to the events in Egypt and Tunisia.
Implications arise from this development. Renewed emphasis needs to be placed now on the Israel Palestine lack of an agreement, because of the dangers of continuing to frustrate the entirely reasonable demands for statehood. This land was promised by the nations of the UN to the Arab dispossessed, all part of the deal when the State of Israel was founded. It would be tragic if the momentum of the new democratic process for the Arab states were to become sidetracked, onto the sterile ground of this hoary old dispute.
The Arab TV networks have brought home to their audiences the true horror of religious bombers using terror to seek to change their societies. In rejecting this, the new computerate generation clearly have shown ‘peoplepower’ to be a better way. With the enormity of what has happened, particularly in Egypt - the true giant of the Arab world, what we are witnessing now is unlikely to stop at these two states.
Nor should it! There are 22 member nations of the Arab League, the highest placed of these in World Audit’s democracy rankings (out of 150 nations), coming in at a disgraceful 73d (Egypt currently is even worse at 91st and Tunisia 113th). We ask if we are now looking at the Arab revolt that will at last bring these nations fully into the modern world?
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