Libya: Protests in cities across the country; reports of 20 dead. “‘Today the Libyans broke the barrier or fear, it is a new dawn,’ said Faiz Jibril, an opposition leader in exile.”
Bahrain: “MANAMA — The army took control of this city on Thursday, except at the main hospital, where thousands of people gathered screaming, crying, collapsing in grief, just hours after police opened fired with birdshot, rubber bullets and tear gas on pro-democracy demonstrators camped in Pearl Square.” Reports of five dead. Peter Kenyon on NPR says: “The grief is turning to anger very rapidly.”
Some of that anger might become directed at Saudi Arabia which has reportedly sent in its military to help put down the protests.
Yemen: “Several thousand demonstrators, some backing President Ali Abdullah Saleh and others demanding he step down, fought with rocks, metal pipes and daggers Thursday in the fiercest clashes seen in the capital since the revolts of Tunisia and Egypt unleashed a wave of anger across the region.”
Algeria: Trying to keep things calm, one of the country’s elder statesmen writes an open letter demanding sweeping reforms: “The voices calling for a peaceful change of this system are many. This change cannot be postponed any longer… I address myself to you in this letter in a particularly delicate and dangerous context… [the current regime is] incapable of solving the thorny problems of our country, which are multiple and complex, and even less so of preparing efficiently for the challenges of the future, which are even more arduous and serious.”
Morocco: Laila Lalami looks forward to February 20 and explains why Morocco, “long considered one of the most stable Arab countries,” is also shaking up. And here’s the video, already gone viral, with Moroccans speaking in both Arabic and Berber, calling people to the streets in three days:
Iran: Sends warships through the Suez Canal, presumably to test its relationship with—or get in the face of—the new Egypt. And opposition leaders Mir Hussein Moussavi and his wife have disappeared. Their daughters are under siege in their home, which has been surrounded by security forces.
And Al Jazeera has a news-analysis slide show about how this regional firestorm got started—with the deliberate killing of protesters in Tunisia.
They’re all just protests atm, which means you should add Puerto Rico and Wisconsin to the list imho.
Very nice aggregation.
@1 is correct.
And Seattle is next. You can feel it bubbling beneath the surface here, waiting for a pretext to explode in anger on our city streets.
My guess is the next slaughter of an innocent non-white non-rich civilian by the SPD will be the spark. That or the Not Even Lightly Financed Tunnel.
Will, if I was there right now, I swear to God I’d knock your teeth down your throat. What’s happening in Seattle does not in any way equate to what’s happening in these countries. Can you for Chrissakes stop being an ignorant buffoon for five fucking minutes?
“There’s blood in the streets, it’s up to my ankles…”
Comparing Seattle police protests yesterday to the Middle East protests is like comparing Obamacare to Nazi ovens.
Fuck I hate it when Will agrees with me.
Stock up on candles.
1848!
So, these protests are not like the ones in Seattle at all. If last night’s protests confirmed one thing, it was that a whole lot of kids who didn’t give two shits about a native guy will do anything to go out on the streets and bitch.
These are countries with actual problems, not a hoard of entitled kids who shitty day-jobs.
Exactly, bellgirl.
@10, for the win.
I mean where are those same kids while we continue two illegal wars that Obama has no intent of ending?
Pearl Square has no pearl and is not square. It is a traffic round-about.