Stirrings of freedom among Arab youth

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http://abcnews.go.com/sections/World/Politics/arabs_freedom_040216-1.html

<From universities in Cairo, Amman, Beirut, Tunis, Algiers that have become de facto safe havens of civic protest across the Middle East, to soccer arenas, and anti-Iraq war demonstrations, the subtext of this generation's public expression is a deep yearning to be free and enfranchised.>

<The most breathtaking example of the phenomenon for me was a teen panel at a conference organized by the Arab Thought Foundation in Beirut last month. Eight men and women in their late teens from across the Arab world sat on a panel before 1,000 academics, politicians, diplomats, and activists. One after another, the teens stunned their elders into embarrassed silence with vehement scolding of their countries' leaders, not the U.S. or even Israel.>

<But unlike their elders, they are not blinded by official propaganda into placing the blame on outsiders for their predicament. They recognize that the root causes of the profound crisis facing the Arab world lie within traditional Arab structures, namely authoritarianism and unreformed patriarchy. They see the shortest route to a better life in reforming their societies and affecting change in their own leadership.>

<This freedom generation, if enfranchised, will not be as pliant as Arab autocratic rulers. But it could bring a new democratic dynamism to the region, and in the long run, defuse the crisis in Arab-American relations. By being in charge of their own destiny, young Muslim men will reject Osama bin Laden's nihilism and begin the difficult process of institution- and nation-building. There would be no need then for the U.S. Army to get bogged down, as it is now, in nation-building in that part of the world.>