mantra pure results just to teach you earth could build a magickal who built a renaissance hotel ok rules we took from pacific so brazil to school. in israel blue cheese available in cinema hotels have periods sort of in hotels or recent. change to our team made headlines around syrian protesters pounded day of rage off the violence government crackdowns on the us calls for sanctions against the country this speculation of an arab uprisings could reach iran which could spell trouble for washington's main with the stand i think israel from. the world's biggest oil producer is running itself running short russia is capping petrol exports as fuel shortages hit consumers of. prices jumped twenty five percent overnight in several russian regions. and a russian pilot faces life in the u.s.

jail new york jury found him guilty of a drug smuggling conspiracy constantino schenkel exists he's innocent others know it said the trial is riddled with errors. thanks to people about his crosstalk guests look at whether there is an undercover work among the arab revolution it's. bringing you the latest in science and technology from around the world. we've done the future coverage.

along in welcome to cross talk and peter all about as the arab spring interested six months it appears to run into some serious headwinds to some arab desperadoes have a learning curve and are the democratic rights of some people limited by the west geopolitical interests. to. discuss what may be called a counter revolution in the arab world i'm joined by nineteen she hardy in london he's an associate fellow actually happen house also in london we have gilbert ashqar he is a writer and professor at the university of london and in washington we go to lawrence korb he's a senior fellow at the center for american progress hi gentlemen this is crosstab it means you can jump in anytime you want first and i to go to goldberg in london are we seeing different paradigms being developed in the arab spring moves toward the arab awakening as some people call it we have the tunisia maybe the egypt model

where we have something approaching a revolution a real revolution and changing the guard there and then maybe the bahrain model backed up by the saudi arabia they wrote the script there and maybe reluctantly with american supporting two different paradigms we have right now be catered for and dictators that are really clamping down well i would call that because you have very different situations actually even though. egypt and tunisia the situation. different countries. countries where the succeeded the overthrowing the paper and countries where the fight this thing going on yes indeed you have. basically only two countries where this has been successful. if i could stay with you. is because of maybe tunisia and egypt what is the learning curve for. some of the autocrats in the arab middle east i

mean we look at syria we look at yemen and what lessons have they learned when they look at tunisia when they look at egypt. no but that's the problem here is you have really different situations that is in a country like tunisia for instance. the ruling clique was more like a kind of. you know we're imposing its record even on on the political and economic elite that existed before before ben ali came to power in eighty seven. and that also explains the relative ease and ice in which he was ousted from from power and the army just abandon him whereas in in egypt already the situation was different because mubarak is a product. of the army and the army is the backbone of power and army is still in power i mean what you have in in egypt is very clearly the army ruling i mean it's

not behind the scenes it's very very officially so. since countries like libya or syria or the ruling families in the gulf countries and you could use the same formula off ruling family to for libya and syria actually. i mean you have. these elites if one could call them like that i mean only the state that you can hardly hardly see see them leaving the scene you know and leaving behind something that's not very optimistic about the future is. potentially has more violence not doing what do you think about that i mean we have assad and people like this have they learned from the. mistakes that save their fellow dictators in the region. well i agree with what you've said of course but the other side of this coin is that what's happening in all these countries is one single

phenomenon caused by the fall of an idea the idea of a family a dictator a. sort of a dynasty can rule a country using security services and the army and basically. raising any political life in the country. that's redundant now and that's what's causing all of the to collapse one after one after the other so so what's different is the circumstances but what the phenomena is more or less the same and if i had a formula in which the rules were the same because they have shown the west. that they are irreplaceable indispensable that they provide stability that beyond is chaos. it's unimaginable what would happen beyond them and that's what makes makes

them. makes it difficult. to imagine life after them and that's why for example those that are clinging to washington i thought are more in washington and london and paris than in thirty eight self i mean the nations that we have seen regarding russia. and the last three four days. prove this i mean. they show that there is support for her person is saying in power. if you can even from israel ok ok i was going to say larry i mean i mean i really like time that it was a second ago i mean these regimes are indispensable this is a message they're selling and you know in the united states looking at saudi arabia i mean it is it is said it is it's not a video it's not happy with what is happening it's unfortunate what's happening in bahrain but it's not going to do anything more to saudi arabia because it's afraid

of saudi arabia's reaction because the united states just has gotten so used to working with dictators that are due there will. well i think you have a couple issues here and i think i agree that you know the people like barclays who authoritarian rule is to try and play up what will happen after them we know that in the confines of conversation between president obama and then president mubarak about whether he should step down he kept repeating the word muslim brotherhood muslim brotherhood muslim brotherhood despite that i think the next day then obama came out and said no it's time to step aside i think some of the other rulers have learned arsalan what i think the president of yemen doesn't want to end up like mubarak being on trial so he cut a deal that says ok i'll leave put you know no prosecution for me and even in syria they did try it in the emergency emergency law but i think when it comes to

whether x. turtle powers like you know europe the united states should get involved that becomes a different situation it's one thing to talk rhetorically it's another thing to do what we've done for example in libya and you're quite right in terms of saudi arabia will we will try and get the regime to modernize to you know share power will try to do the same thing in bahrain you were going over there in those woods out because well i will try again to you these are going to be a difference between rhetoric and you know the actual law the actual law of policy i mean when you say be ready to use it is a very important right now do you go ahead do i jump ahead to this cross talk i had written rhetoric yeah i'm following your destruction of this case because much more sort of is rhetoric is much more powerful than of sixteen's bombing through tripoli rhetoric means that the international community does not support these rulers anymore and so these these regimes will then crumble they are very fragile and

people are hesitant to come forward. abandon ship because they think that united states support bashar and support the saudis and support it's a very good point it. is three really important. rhetoric and we are seeing the rhetoric that you think is equivalent to president obama. or market action going to the street and shooting people themselves in syria when when you know what the united nation they're giving the regime lie to kill ok gilbert i want to go to get in line here i think this is you guys are going to where i really want to get in this program i mean there is this obvious double standard here and already had. i think is extremely optimistic first of all of being believing that all the regimes will collapse. and secondly

there. is more powerful than weapons and all that well i think. if you had all the rhetorical in libya use in libya the station in libya would have been stabilized undercut the rule long ago actually. not really a mystique about the scenario in syria. so it's not it's not that easy because precisely as i said there's a basic difference between countries like egypt and tunisia and countries like libya and syria all the ruling families in the gulf. all the state actually and if ever you can imagine anything you know stopping them from crushing the most bloody manner the mass uprising. brought purpose and something leading to some forms of civil war as we have seen in libya.

could happen in syria actually if the movement could carry on so i wouldn't be. this is the most the cream this is this is the smoke screen the regime wants you to believe me on the scale that if you if you've done one of those now there is no it's six thirty and civil well that. growth is no barrier and i want to get to how we're going to larry i want to go to larry but i mean if if if if we buy that then we get this boiling pot and then we get chaos anyway i mean it's always once it started this process is started you're really not going to be able to turn it off are going to be let's say in syria and iran got the right to stay you'll see you know what it was a little area first it's going to larry going to marry. ok united states wants assad to go the question is that there's no way that they can do it in and a cost effective manner in terms of intervening because on like egypt the military

and the police support assad and similarly in terms of the rhetoric they would like to the saudis and the. but for how do we know i mean for gosh sakes i mean when we went into libya the reason that that we know that we did it is the arab league asked us to go in so we did not want to have a situation where the united states particularly you do those so you have to say we're going to and you should have been the way let me finish ok let me finish i don't interrupt you i'm a little bit like ok no no let me finish air let me finish eric get out of me make my point ok well let me finish i don't interrupt through when you're speaking ok i'm just saying that the united states does know there's no way in which the west can interfere in syria without making the situation worse on the ground rhetorical e they are saying they have condemned what assad is doing but in terms of the ability to do something it's not like libya where you had the rebels had taken control leery of jumping right here we have to go to

a break after that break we'll continue our discussion on the arab spring stay with arkie. became the. story. twenty years ago are just countries going to some two cases. plus how do you go to school janitor. to take. a moment when the world has changed forever. thousands passed to nothing. sounds limbs.

to some extent. it was the first but probably not the last time the jury used to swear. more. children carmageddon in the control. case. welcome back to cross talk and peter lawwell remind you we're talking about the revolutions in the arab world. can. start. ok gilbert i'd like to go back to you in london i very much appreciate the differentiations that you showed us in the beginning of the program i think you're

spot on there and but at the same time there's a universal value that is. preached by the west particularly the united states is the value of democracy now should not just be a blanket application that everyone should have the right to democratic values and to a civil society where they can participate in that is a single message and is it being applied very specifically in the region right now because i think the people in bahrain feel that way. no of course you're exactly putting your finger were were should be i mean this is sheer hypocrisy that we are where we are seeing when we deal with the west as you know holder of values and inspired by such values in its approach to the political situation in the region first of all we shouldn't forget. took the west quite a long time before they they you know. believe as if they were on the

side of a popular uprisings and democracy for they have been you know maintaining close relations was all sort of despotic regimes in the region for decades and decades and even when the movement started the first reaction of paris for instance was to author ben ali in tunisia technical help for the repression of the mass of the rebellion there and it's only after that when the really the uprising reach very big proportions that they failed shamed and amber as then the same could go for washington and when you go to to egypt they start to want a very long then to a muscle a man and all that and if we go beyond that also we were speaking of interventions in in libya and syria. if people are speaking of that about that this is because these are two regimes which were not completely friendly to the west

even the fee for for the last few years have been a close collaborator of the west and recently the former head of the cia actually was explaining how good you know i contributed to the cia's and united states so-called war on terror has been so but when you look precisely at the gulf cooperation council countries where in bahrain where saudi troops plus other gulf troops intervened when we didn't hear much protest. or a threat so full of intervention on the side of washington or do is ok with you just saying here in the weeks i would let me let me jump in here and not have to do so he really likes it let's listen i wouldn't go have a look at what mr obama had to say about and this is really about saudi arabia he said my poll numbers go up and down depending on the latest crisis and right now gas prices are weighing heavily on people and it's all about saudi arabia what do you think larry that's all about saudi arabia has been all about obama for so it is

truly and i saw it in the united states again it's an energy policy they're not going to have the freedom that they would like to deal with how to be look this is not just the middle east what you know what happened to chatham and square back in one thousand nine hundred eighty nine you know thousands of people were killed but yet the world deals with you know with with china look what happened you know look what's happened in russia in terms of things that have happened so the idea that somehow or another the united states with or without its allies is going to make the world democratic you know right larry larry let me say in a different way than just let me let me say it differently why can't obama just say look folks the this regime in saudi arabia they're not very nice people they live centuries in the past but you know what we just have to deal with these guys they're thugs but it's always a price can't why can't you be transparent and i can be a translator saudi ok looking and not even going to shout easily say that you know you're making it you're making it much more coherent than it is i think obama

president obama basically does not have a strategy president obama was doing exactly the opposite of what president bush was doing thinking that you know the mirror image of bush would give him a book larry king so president bush was isolating the dictators refusing to deal with them he was engaging with them president bush was talking about democracy and values he went to cairo and apologized for democracy. reassure the dictators that he will not impose any value on them and of him this time he understands their specificities and all that so praeger about how he caught all the motivation budgets in washington and i. thought i was basically engaging is a real moving towards real lives and working with the dictators for stability really admires the state because it's backfired on him because it was the wrong timing. that's that's basically what it is it's not or

it's not it's lack of vision lack of strategy. he came two weeks to make up with my i mean even serenading would have that you are saying hello glad you are just. jumping. right your going no i'm not jumping in but ok come on to say to say what those who say that bush had to say that bush you know bugger all the paper ships in the region well he needs the very mild pressure on mubarak to to get you know more more space in the elections in two thousand and five and all he could do any changes you care about that next year to anyone here's what he did yes yes yes i did make sure natural hair sure sure remember the old school as illustrations are not unique or was he so he saw what happened no no no he

continued gilbert continued but. when it comes to the saudi kingdom you know the bush dynasty had extremely good relations with the saudi they in a dynasty including george w. bush. and that's the key point here this is the most undemocratic state in the region the most logical way to say wait a second can't compare them or syria to saudi arabia in terms of all can. so you can compare of. course no it's not a democracy doesn't work you need only as you hear your show every year watch the king kong what are in the lobby for you here live on satirist and they tell you you have a really really good come on come on this is this is a riot i mean either you don't know these countries or i what are you saying the most undemocratic state on earth is the saudi kingdom the best friend of the united states of america but in terms of the quality of life for the most people live like

i was i'm living and doris lives. in syria. and i have to jump in here i have to jump in here if i want to change had all the oil of the saudi kingdom of course the people would have a better quality of life in syria i mean this is nothing that. you know and the fact actually if you look at the real figures of the saudi kingdom the fact that you have poverty in the saudi kingdom despite there's a huge always wealth it depends a lot about the kind of regime that you have there all right you know and this is that what i mean by any standard if you take the women standard which also has been used by western countries and states as a pretext in iraq or afghanistan or anything like that well what about the saudi kingdom which is one of the most appalling situation for women if not the most polling after the taliban have vanished on earth and when you compare the iran to the saudi kingdom here on the then suddenly look as a beacon of democracy ok gentlemen i want to jump in here and i want to change gears here and now you might want to go to you what about the question of iran

because this is you know everyone the great card in washington has played around card ok how threatening it is to the region and everything like that and the saudi family hates turnaround ok now they're playing their cards right now here is opening the door to the iranians because it certainly looks like it in many ways you could really change the regime around depending on helping the regional around playing on how things go ahead. this isn't any question you're asked three months ago it's not valid anymore now the region it's changing you have a systemic change when it when the whole system is collapsing and all its components are collapsing so so it's it's no longer the sunnis versus the shia or iran vs the universe of saudi arabia or or or it's islamic fundamentalism or even i think even the palestine question is going to be seen in a completely different way if your generation sees these things in it this is there

because of their of their parents it's my dad and my grandfather think it's at twenty and it's so twentieth century it's redundant they want to move on so so one has to i just new ideas the new and it's very difficult it's very difficult to understand what's happening it's very difficult to adjust to it and that's why the policymakers are making so many mistakes and the mistakes are they sleeping themselves into casualties are being rather you bring up again anyway you know you bring up a very good point you don't use the word i used to be in a programming job or didn't like how i used it's only used in a different way a new paradigm was used a new paradigm that's coming into play gilbert i know you maybe only used the word the right way to start. again i mean because you have various situations what you have in common is this shock wave this uprising this upheaval which covered the whole region which was at

this time. of course modern means of communication the fact that people can now see what is happening almost in the real time and that played a tremendous role in the events and of course this combined was the common language in the arab countries explains how the uprising spread so first of all the other countries because they had income and so many factors. of you know the worst possible indicators when it comes to development when it comes to unemployment when it comes to inflation comes through to you know all these considerations and one of the i want to jump in here i want to get i want to see everybody this particular team i want to be fair here when larry i'm going to give you the last word in ask you question is the united states finally on the right side of history and. well i think they're getting closer but you know you look at each case each case individually and you can't and this idea that you can have

a doctor in a one size fits all is simply not true there's a big difference between each of these countries what the people want the way you know the way the world was treat the people and everything so to say well because it happened in libya it should happen in syria now it's simply not true and if you take a look at egypt the real question in my mind is each of pecan turkey or simply com pakistan because as was pointed out earlier the military is going to have a big role to jump in here ok many thanks to my guests today in london and in washington and thanks to our viewers for watching us here darkie see you next time and remember of crosstalk.

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