The bloodshed that accompanied the overthrow of Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi, Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak and Yemen’s Ali Abdullah Salah as well as the brutal repression under way in Syria have exposed the “Arab spring” as an inaccurate media gimmick and a Middle Eastern mirage.
Unlike its misconstrued model, the “Spring of Nations” that dawned briefly in 1848, when that abortive and premature effort to bring democracy to Western Europe occurred, as well as the “Prague Spring” during which Czechoslovakia’s idealistic Alexander Dubcek tried to liberalize his country’s regime despite its status as a Soviet satellite, the “Arab Spring” lacked an explicit political program and had no identifiable leadership.
Incredibly, not a single charismatic or heroic figure has emerged since the Tunisian protest movement caused the ouster of president Zine el- Abidine Ben Ali a year ago.
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