Bye-Bye to Tunisia's Ben Ali.(International Edition)(Zine El Abidine Ben Ali)(Brief article)

Byline: Christopher Dickey

He was the minor dictator of a minor North African nation. But when Tunisia's President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali fled his country on Friday after more than 23 years of ruthless power, the Arab world was swept by the kind of excitement that augurs epochal change. The news raced through the Internet and between cell phones, hitting these long-oppressed societies in a way that recalled the impact the fall of the Berlin Wall had on shaky Soviet dictatorships.

The riots that toppled Ben Ali sent chills through neighboring Arab regimes. Tunisia's core problems are common to most countries in the region: a growing population of young people at once educated and ambitious, unemployed and frustrated, muzzled and resentful. On Thursday U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told an audience in Qatar that "a growing majority" of the people in the region are under 30. In some countries, like Yemen, the population is expected to double in the next three decades. Iron-fisted rulers in Egypt, Algeria, and Jordan, meanwhile, look more and more anachronistic.

As much as Westerners may hope Tunisia represents the beginning of the end for the region's dictators, they should be careful what they wish for. In places like Jordan and Egypt, the opposition is Islamist-based and far from pro-American. As NEWSWEEK went to press, it remained unclear where Ben Ali would end up. The same can now be said not only for his country but also for much of the region.