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Mideast hanging on every text and tweet from Iran
From the LA Times, a story that focuses on the use of Twitter as a tool for the protesters.
Reporting from Cairo -- Footage of burning cars, masked boys and bloodied protestors in Iran is playing across the Middle East, captivating Arab countries where repressive regimes have for years been arresting political bloggers and cyberspace dissidents.

Egypt, Saudi Arabia and other Sunni nations have tense relations with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the Shiite-led theocracy ruling Iran. But they don't want protests in Tehran to inspire similar democratic fervor in their countries -- especially the merging of Facebook and Twitter with a potent opposition leader like Iran's presidential challenger, Mir-Hossein Mousavi.

So far, that has yet to happen. Egyptian activists, for example, have over the last year called for rallies and strikes on the Internet's social networks, but they have no galvanizing personality and are not organized enough to pose a threat to a police state controlled by President Hosni Mubarak.
Posted by: Steve White 2009-06-17
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=272138