After the relative ease with which rulers were made to flee Tunis and Cairo, the Arab revolution has entered a more difficult phase. Libya is teetering on the edge as the fall of Col Qaddafi looks imminent in the wake of the so-far bloodiest clashes between the protestors and security forces. Libyan forces, unlike the Egyptian military, are divided and this division runs along the civilian administration as well, indicated by the resignation of the justice minister.
The Kingdom of Morocco is also feeling the heat as the Arab worlds revolution spreads to more countries. It is neither ideological nor sectarian issues that tend to influence the direction of the Arab revolution; it is the peoples’ yearning for change a society free from the suffocating autocratic systems.
The ongoing upheaval has also rendered a definitive judgment on the American policy over the years. Relying on their own resources and employing means of their own devising, the people of the Middle East have effectively consigned the entire “war on terror” to the category of strategic irrelevance. As Andrew J. Bacevich rightly observes, the people of the Middle East are transforming the region themselves. Events of the last several weeks have made it abundantly clear not only that important parts of the Islamic world are ripe for change but that the impetus for change comes from within. Transformation is not something that outsiders can induce or impose or control. The process is organic, spontaneous and self-sustaining.
Observers also believe that the consequences of changes in the Arab world will inevitably have an impact upon Pakistan and the South Asian region. It is noteworthy however that the Arab uprising does not belong to a specific segment of the population. Christians alongside Muslims from all backgrounds and walks of life were participating in the protests in Egypt, which the Pakistani society is thus far alien to. As Ayaz Amir says, In the Arab world the masses are the motors of change, in Pakistan the masses cannot undertake the task of reinventing the Islamic Republic because this is a task whose urgency they have yet to recognize.
F Z Khan
Islamabad
