The Next Step for the Middle East

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JAMES Fenton is right to lament the Obama administration's incoherent response to regime change in Egypt, but wrong about the rest of the US. Neoconservative intellectuals have robustly criticised the President for having abandoned his predecessor's freedom agenda. Had autocratic allies been pressed harder on internal reforms and liberalisation, they argue, the US may not risk losing the Middle East today.

Fenton's assault on America's response is also unfair as it implies other Western countries have done better. In fact, some senior European officials, past and present, were regular guests of the Egyptian and Tunisian regimes, taking all expensespaid holidays on the …