"A Watershed Moment in the History of the Arab World"
By Esam Al-Amin
January 19, 2011 - counterpunch.org
When people choose life (with freedom)
Destiny will respond and take action
Darkness will surely fade away
And the chains will certainly be broken
—Tunisian poet Abul Qasim Al-Shabbi (1909-1934)
On New Year's Eve 1977, former President Jimmy Carter was toasting Shah Reza Pahlavi in Tehran, calling the Western-backed monarchy "an island of stability" in the Middle East. But for the next 13 months, Iran was anything but stable. The Iranian people were daily protesting the brutality of their dictator, holding mass demonstrations from one end of the country to the other.
