TFTD: President Bush recently completed a whistle-stop tour of the middle east where he was welcomed and publicly entertained with unprecedented warmth and hospitality.
In contrast to many of Bush's visits abroad, hardly a word was said in protest nor did we witness a single banner reflecting public sentiment. Even in "non-ideological" states such as Brazil, Guatemala and India, the public expressed more indignation when Bush came to town.
Q: Does this suggest that the Arab rulers are so confident of the apathy and impotence of both their populations and their militaries that they can treat them with such open disdaint and contempt, secure in the knowledge that the masses are only ever mobilised by hunger?
Or is this the silence that precedes a storm, and are the Arab streets in fact simmering on the brink of an eruption to replace these agent rulers with a khalifah?
Comments