A PESAR de lo que digan las Cassandras de hoy día, algo se está moviendo en el Medio Oriente:

Drowned out by the bombings in Iraq, and the debate over whether the staging of elections there is an achievable goal or a mirage, the Bush administration's democracy initiative for the rest of the Middle East creeps quietly forward. In neo-realist Washington, it is usually dismissed -- when it is remembered at all -- in much the same way that, say, national elections in Afghanistan were once laughed off. The unpopularity of the Bush administration and the predictable resistance from the dictatorships of Egypt and Saudi Arabia are cited as proof that the region's hoped-for "transformation" is going nowhere.

And yet, the process started at the Sea Island summit of Group of Eight countries in June is gaining some traction -- sometimes to the surprise of the administration's own skeptics. A foreign ministers' meeting in New York two weeks ago produced agreement that the first "Forum for the Future" among Middle Eastern and G-8 governments to discuss political and economic liberalization will take place in December. Morocco volunteered to host it, and a handful of other Arab governments, including Jordan, Bahrain and Yemen, have embraced pieces of the process.

More intriguingly, independent human rights groups and pro-democracy movements around the region are continuing to sprout, gather and issue manifestos -- all in the name of supporting the intergovernmental discussions. An independent human rights group appeared in Syria this month; Saudi women organized a movement to demand the right to vote in upcoming municipal elections. On the same day that the Egyptian foreign minister belittled what is now called the Broader Middle East and North Africa Initiative (BMENA) in an interview with The Post, an unprecedented alliance of opposition parties and citizens' groups issued a platform in Cairo calling for the lifting of emergency laws, freedom of the press and direct, multi-candidate elections for president.

While there have been some arrests, most of the nascent democrats are surviving. Despite all the defiant rhetoric, Egyptian and Saudi police, it turns out, are hesitant to pummel people who say they are responding to the president of the United States.

(via Cori Dauber)

Leed también lo último de Victor Davis Hanson.

ACTUALIZACIÓN. Recaredo se lamenta en los comentarios, y con razón, de la escasa cobertura de las elecciones en Afganistán, ciertamente mucho más escasa de lo que merecería una noticia tan significativa. Sin embargo he de reconocer que me llevé una más que agradable sorpresa de un medio que he criticado tantísimas veces: Tele 5. Sí, no os ahoguéis con la cocacola al leer esto. Pero es que en miopinión las informaciones de Jon Sistiaga me parecieron excelentes, por lo menos las que vi. Sin esconder los problemas, sí los contextualizó de manera que quedaba claro que el que estuviesen celebrando los comicios ya era en sí mismo una victoria (los problemas de la mecánica de las elecciones no son mayores de los que se producen en muchos países, llegó a decir). Incluso en ciertos momentos transmitía con sincera emoción el momento ("precioso", me pareció oir que lo describía) en que las mujeres depositaban su voto en la urna. Credit where credit is due, así que Jon merece una sincera felicitación.