This
article in the Asia Times is one of the better commentaries I have seen on recent events in the middle east.
The key part:
"No less important for Tehran were the local Palestinian elections last week in West Bank cities. According to the preliminary results, the Islamic militant group Hamas won resounding victories. Coming as it does barely six weeks ahead of crucial parliamentary elections (scheduled for January 25), this development significantly impacts on the Palestinian problem and also alters the scope and dimensions of Middle East politics as a whole.
Hamas remains committed to the destruction of Israel, and is considered a terrorist group by Israel, the US and the European Union. The implications for the tepid peace process with Israel are bound to be serious. An existential dilemma forthwith arises for the "international community": can it any longer remain myopic and exclude Hamas from the the Middle East's political landscape?
But, more importantly, along with the significant showing by the Muslim Brotherhood in last month's elections in Egypt and the incremental "Islamization" of Iraq that is unmistakably under way (and that will get a fillip from the Iraqi elections), Hamas' emergence at the forefront of Palestinian politics signifies a huge eruption of popular disenchantment with the prevailing governance systems. Simply put, Islamism has placed itself in the vanguard of the Middle East's democratization - like "liberation theology" did at one time in Latin America."
The Bush administration is right that the Middle East is full of people yearning to be free of the yoke of petty tyrants. But they are dead wrong to believe that majorities ultimately want secular liberal governments instead. The whole neo-con security vision for the 21st century was based on the fanciful idea that liberal democracies wouldn't produce terrorists. What about radical Islamist "democracies?"