Mohamed Bouazizi: The street vendor who changed the face of the middle east.

It's amazing to think that none of this would have ever happened if it weren't for Mohammed Bouazizi, a simple Tunisian street vendor who sells produce out of a wheeled cart for a living. He was certainly no Che Guevara, Nelson Mandella, or Mahatma Gandhi .These people dedicated their lives to become revolutionaries and to bring social change. Bouazizi on the other hand, or "Basboosa" as he was locally known, never wanted or planned on becoming a revolutionary. I'm sure he never would have dreamed when he set himself on fire in front of the governor's office to protest the corruption of his government and the humiliation he suffered at the hands of the local police when they spat on him, slapped him, and confiscated his goods that his actions would inadvertantly set off a chain reaction that would lead only 2 months later to the toppling of two authoritarian governments and mass protests worldwide for democracy and freedom. Nobody had expected this. While it has always been known that the levels of corruption in middle eastern governments were at epidemic proportions and that the level of poverty, abuse, and suffering that the people had endured were unacceptable; I'm sure that absolutely nobody realized just how big of a powder keg these middle eastern authoritarian governments were sitting on. When Bouazizi set himself on fire that fateful December afternoon in Tunisia he also lit the fuse to this powder keg, and the rest as they say is history. He had accomplished what the most famous and successful revolutionaries in history could only hope to accomplish - by accident as it turns out!

 We are now living witnesses to the most exciting and the most important time in our genreation's history. Speaking from the perspective of an Egyptian I can say that we have not witnessed this sort of a grassroot, organic movement for democracy since Saad Zaghloul Pasha led the 1919 revolution against the monarchy and the British. We've been saying for years that Arabs are used to autocracy and have become numb to it. We've been saying that political apathy was so rampant because the people were ignorant of their rights and because it was also a defense mechanism against autocratic rulers who would crush any public dissent with an iron fist. But all of a sudden in an instant, we went from being the most politically apathetic people to the most politically active people. We went from becoming an example of a broken and defeated people to being an example of freedom and liberty through bravery and sacrifice...and all this happened virtually over night. I don't know about you, but when I think about how crazy the last 2 months have been and how utterly improbable the outcome of Bouazizi's encounter with the police turned out to be, I am just in awe of the big picture and I'm still to this day trying to sink it all in, but in vain.

The Arab revolutions inspire small but vocal China protests!

U.S republican senator of Nevada, John McCain, described the protests in Egypt and Tunisia as a virus that must be stopped. I say if freedom were a virus then it needs to spread like the plague. In an age where the world is a global village and web communication allows people to know in an instant what is happening on the other side of the world, it is a mistake to assume that the protests for freedom and democracy will be contained to the middle east. They will echo with anyone living under authoritarianism and censorship...like the Chinese. Today a few of them made that clear in Shanghai.

I'm not saying that the dictatorship in China will fall tomorrow or even next year, but it does put a smile on my face to know that a bunch of protests half way across the world are putting the fear of God in every dictatorship and authoritarian regime on the planet...even the biggest and the baddest of them all.

Ominous Signs from Libya: Gaddafi's son says, "We are not Tunisia, we are not Egypt, we will fight to the last man and the last bullet."

The more we see the protests in Libya pick up steam, the more it becomes apparent that this will more than likely be the bloodiest revolution in 2011. This is simply because Gaddafi is the most ruthless of the Arab and middle Eastern Dictators, and the longest lasting. He has been in power in Libya for an astounding 41 years. I have said before that Gaddafi makes Mubarak look like Mother Theresa in Comparison. Here are a few of the differences between them:

While it's true that Mubarak has unleashed the full force of his police force and has also, directly or indirectly, hired thugs and criminals to crush the protests which led to a couple of hundred deaths- he did not use his military, which is far more lethal. Gaddafi on the other hand, from day one, has unleashed the full force of his military to use lethal force and heavy weaponry on unarmed protesters. And is if that wasn't enough, several reports have indicated that he has also hired African mercenaries who have honed their killing and mass murder skills in central Africa's long bloody history of civil wars and coups to crush the Libyan protests.

Another key difference between Mubarak's regime and Gaddafi's regime was their official reaction to the protests. Mubarak offered a concession on his first speech, firing his cabinet and vowing to appoint a new one to appease the protesters. Gaddafi on the other hand gave his first speech today, however it was Gaddafi Jr. who gave the speech, Seif Al-Islam Gaddafi came on Telivision a few hours ago and proclaimed that Libya is not Tunisia and that it's not Egypt. He added that Muammar Gaddafi was Libya's leader and that he would fight to the last man and the last bullet. This speech sent a chill down my spine as it became very apparent that any lingering, residual hopes of a peaceful resolution to the Libyan situation was out the window. What will happen in the next few days cannot be predicted but one thing is almost certain...many more Libyans will die fighting for their rights and for their freedom.

Middle East Protests Country By Country

Here's a really cool link from the BBC World News website with a map of the middle East with the names of all the countries which are currently experiencing unrest. In each of those countries the seeds of revolution against some of the world's most autocratic tyrants have already been sown and surely we will be hearing a lot about these countries in the days to come. Simply click on the name of the country and a few paragraphs will show up explaining what the conditions are in that country, who the protesters are, who the dictators are, and why they are protesting.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-12482311