Mustafa Abdul Jalil, leader of Libya's interim National Transitional Council, declared the end of the war and the liberation of Libya on Sunday following the controversial death of Moammar Qaddafi.  Judging by the tenor of discussion in the United States, you would think that this was an unmitigated disaster -- a humiliating end to an illegal war which prevented the UN from acting in Syria, massacred civilians, and opened the door to state failure, warlord violence, reprisals, and radical Islamist tyranny.  (Though at least we can be relieved that the rebels can now get their mack on.)  That's quite a catalog of failure dominating the public discourse at a time when the official war has come to an end, and most Libyans are celebrating Qaddafi's demise and planning a democratic transition towards a post-Qaddafi future. In fact, the intervention in Libya has been broadly successful and has helped to give Libyans the opportunity to build the country which they so deeply deserve. 

There's every reason to be cautious about Libya's future, of course.  There will be massive challenges facing the emerging new country, from independent militias to tribal and regional conflicts to the legacy of decades of the systematic destruction of independent civil society.  But nobody denies that.  Despite what Google tells me is 64,300,000 articles warning that "now comes the hard part in Libya," this is a straw man. I have heard almost nobody arguing the opposite -- certainly not the White House, which consistently has warned that "We’re under no illusions -- Libya will travel a long and winding road to full democracy. There will be difficult days ahead."

But for all those concerns, the intervention in Libya should be recognized as a success and real accomplishment for the international community.  The NATO intervention did save Libya's protestors from a near-certain bloodbath in Benghazi. It did help Libyans free themselves from what was an extremely nasty, violent, and repressive regime.  It did not lead to the widely predicted quagmire, the partition of Libya, the collapse of the NTC, or massive regional conflagration.  It was fought under a real, if contestable, international legal mandate which enjoyed widespread Arab support. It did help to build -- however imperfectly and selectively -- an emerging international norm rejecting impunity for regimes which massacre their people.  Libya's success did inspire Arab democracy protestors across the region. And it did not result in an unpopular, long-term American military occupation which it would have never seemed prudent to withdraw.

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Tunisians are voting today for a Constitutional Assembly, ten months after the fall of President Zine el-Abedine Ben Ali.  Despite considerable turbulence along the way, including growing political polarization and ongoing economic frustration, the early reports on election day are encouraging.  Turnout is high and voters enthusiastic, and thus far there are few signs of any official manipulation or fraud.  This is an exciting day for Tunisia and for the whole Arab world.  The election results will only set in motion new political struggles over the formation of a government and the contents of a new Constitution, and won't solve the deep economic problems of the country. But they are a promising and essential starting point for the creation of a legitimate, accountable and democratically elected civilian government.

We will have a lot of coverage of the elections results in the coming days.  While we wait for the returns, check out recent coverage of Tunisia on Foreign Policy's The Middle East Channel:

-Putting Tunisia's Democracy to the Test, by Erik Churchill

- Tunisia's Test, by Fadil Aliriza

- Tunisia's Surprising New Islamists, by Ellen Knickmeyer

-Divine Election, by Don Duncan

-Don't Tunisians want to vote?, by Erik Churchill

- Suspicion and Strategy in the New Tunisia, by Chris Alexander

- Tunisians agree on more than they realize, by Nathan Brown

- Tunisia's New al-Nahda, by Marc Lynch

- Tunisia's Forgotten Revolutionaries, by Lauren E. Bohn

And for more background, download POMEPS Briefing #1, Tunisia: Protests and Prospects for Change, from January 25, 2011 .

President Barack Obama's announcement today of a complete withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq by the end of 2011 should be cause for real celebration.  This is the right decision, at the right time.  It may have been forced upon the administration by Iraqi political realities. But the end result will be a mutually agreed upon and orderly American withdrawal from Iraq on the timetable which both Bush and Obama promised but which few believed would ever really happen. This should be seen as a positive moment for America and for Iraq. Indeed, removing the distraction of the polarizing and largely irrelevant debate over the presence of U.S. troops could actually improve the chances of building a positive, enduring relationship with Iraq -- though that opportunity could all too easily be lost.   

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Yemeni human rights activist Tawakkul Karman was announced last night as one of the winners of the Nobel Peace Prize.  For once, the Nobel committee really got it right.  Karman has been a tireless, creative and effective advocate for human rights, media freedoms, and democracy in Yemen for years.  And Yemen's struggle for change has been largely forgotten by the world in spite of its almost unbelievable resilience in the face of dim prospects for success.  She represents the very best of the new Arab public.  Now let us hope that the award sparks the international community to refocus on Yemen's forgotten revolution and push hard for the political transition which it so desperately needs and deserves.

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Egypt's Supreme Council for the Armed Forces (SCAF) hastily convened a meeting with a group of political parties on Saturday, September 30, in the face of an uproar over amendments to the election law announced earlier in the week. It emerged with a document that addressed a number of the major popular demands, and which initially seemed to get Egypt back on track for crucial parliamentary elections scheduled to begin in less than two months. But within hours opposition to the agreement exploded, threatening to throw Egypt's democratic transition back into crisis.  

The agreement did include a number of important concessions by the SCAF. It changed the most controversial parts of the new election law, laid out a clear timeline for a transition to civilian rule, and promised to study a more rapid lifting of the emergency law and an end to military trials. It seemed to secure Islamist agreement to a statement of supra-constitutional principles which they had previously rejected. But it introduced new problems -- above all, a timeline which delayed presidential elections until 2013, and vague, unclear promises on key issues which a skeptical public felt little reason to trust. 

I've just returned from a week in Cairo, my third visit in the last four months. It is impossible to miss the atmosphere of mistrust, frustration, anger, polarization, and skepticism consuming the political realm. A month ago I warned of the risk of an election boycott. By last week, such threats had erupted onto the front pages of the newspapers and had caught the SCAF's attention. But despite all this turbulence, I remain hopeful about Egypt's prospects. Any healthy democratic transition is going to involve contentioun and uncertainty and frustration. The SCAF's intentions remain unclear, but the continuing challenges posed by a dizzying array of political forces, movements and parties through a contentious Egyptian media are a good sign that they will not be able to go too far against a popular consensus. The most important thing, in my view, continues to be that Egypt move forward to holding the parliamentary elections on schedule, with a widely acceptable election law, a level playing field, and adequate international and domestic oversight. The SCAF-Parties agreement, for all its many flaws which should continue to be challenged, at least keeps hopes alive for such elections to produce a legitimate parliament which can finally begin to move Egypt toward the democracy it so desperately needs and deserves.

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The long stalemate in Yemen took a bloody turn yesterday which was as horrifying as it was utterly predictable. Regime forces opened fire on the tenacious, peaceful protestors in Change Square in Sana'a, killing dozens and flooding the hospitals with the wounded. The internet has been flooded with horrific videos which could easily have come from Libya or Syria. The violent crisis which many of us have been warning would result from neglecting Yemen and allowing its political stalemate to grind on has now arrived. The Sana'a massacre should be a crystal clear signal that the Yemeni status quo is neither stable nor sustainable, and that the failure to find a political resolution ensures escalating bloodshed and humanitarian crisis. It is time to push for an immediate political transition -- and one which does not include immunity for Saleh's men. 

It has been difficult to get anyone to pay attention to Yemen.  For months, ever since President Ali Abdullah Saleh had been rushed to Saudi Arabia for treatment of wounds from an apparent assassination attempt. Distracted by hot wars in Libya and Syria, the struggling transition in Egypt, and the diplomatic train wreck between Israel and the Palestinians, the U.S. and most of the region put Yemen on the back burner. Even though thousands of incredibly determined and resilient Yemenis continued to protest regularly, and analysts warned with increasing desperation that missing the opportunity to bring about a transition would be a disastrous mistake, the urgency faded away. Indeed, Saleh's regime counted on that fading external urgency as part of its strategy of delay and distraction, hoping to outlast, confuse, divide, and where possible crush the protest movement. Now, Yemenis are paying for that neglect in blood.  

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Friday's attack on the Israeli Embassy in Cairo by protestors marching from Tahrir Square and the subsequent harsh security crackdown could become an epic fail for the Egyptian revolution. That's not because Egyptians shouldn't protest against Israel if that's what angers them, and it's not because the incident is likely to escalate to war. It's because the incident could easily become an excuse for the Supreme Council for the Armed Forces (SCAF) to postpone elections, expand rather than surrender its Emergency Law powers, and avoid the transfer of power to a legitimate civilian government. What's more, these moves might now win applause rather than condemnation among key constituencies: revolutionaries who were already skeptical of elections, liberals worried that Islamists will win, and Americans and others abroad worried about the implications of Egyptian democracy for Israel. 

This would be a terrible mistake. The absence of any legitimate political institutions seven months after Mubarak's fall and the SCAF's arbitrary and unaccountable rule are what created the political vaccuum which has brought Egypt to this edge. Yesterday's chaos should not be taken as a reason to postpone a democratic transition. It should instead be a powerful reminder of the urgency of sticking to the timeline for elections and getting on with the business of building an Egyptian democracy. Those who care about Egypt completing its revolution should now be doubling down on the urgency of a real democratic transition -- not backing away from it. 

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Egyptian activist groups have called for another "million man march" on Friday, September 9 in an attempt to "correct the course" and to revive what they see as a flailing revolution.  Friday is shaping up as a significant test of the continuing power of the activist groups after a summer where they have struggled. The exuberantly successful mass demonstration of July 8 gave way to an unpopular Tahrir sit-in and a disastrous attempt to march on the Ministry of Defense.  Recent calls for protests have produced small turnouts. Friday is therefore being widely taken as a test of the continuing relevance and power of the activists. 

But in some ways the turnout on Friday is a sideshow compared to the decisions to be made about the upcoming Parliamentary elections now scheduled for November.  It's no secret that many activists are deeply disenchanted with the SCAF-led political process.  They see street protests as the source of their power, and understand their identity as the "soul of the revolution." They have done little to prepare for elections and don't look likely to win.  Some view the coming elections as themselves counter-revolutionary since they will likely produce a Parliament dominated by Islamists and ex-NDP fulul.  When I was in Egypt in July, I already began hearing whispers that activists might boycott the elections.  Those are now spilling out into public.

Will activists actually boycott?  What would happen if they did? I think that it is distressingly likely, and growing more so, and that it would be a disaster. An activist boycott probably would not be joined by the major political parties, and probably wouldn't affect the overall turnout or results. But it would have a disproportionate impact on the  perceptions of the legitimacy of the election, especially in the West, and would seriously  undermine hopes of achieving a democratic Egypt. I am putting this out here now mainly to draw attention to the risks, provoke some public discussion... and, hopefully, to be proven wrong. 

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