Epstein Secrets

he public space, there was now the cult of the rulers, the unbounded power of Saddam Hussein and Muammar el-Qaddafi and Hafez al-Assad in Syria and Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia. The traditional restraints on power had been swept away, and no new social contract between ruler and ruled had emerged. Fear

udi Arabia last week after three months of convalescence in the United States and Morocco, one of the first meetings he took was with his ally King Hamad bin Isa al- Khalifa of Bahrain to discuss the turmoil in his tiny nation. Sunni- ruled Bahrain, less than 20 miles from Saudi Arabia's oil- and Shiite- rich

of the first meetings he took was with his ally King Hamad bin Isa al- Khalifa of Bahrain to discuss the tur

s. The government was authoritarian but also determinedly secular and pro- Western. The cracks, however, were larger than anyone thought: President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali had carefully hidden the extent to which illness had weakened his control of the government; his ties with other centers of power, such as

nited. The Sunni Khalifa dynasty, headed by King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa, is fighting an uprising, stoked by th

smoldered, Bahrain -- facing many of the same social and economic problems of the other two -- ignited. The Sunni Khalifa dynasty, headed by King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa, is fighting an uprising, stoked by the island nation's Shia majority, which is demanding that a true constitutional monarchy replace the current g

he public space, there was now the cult of the rulers, the unbounded power of Saddam Hussein and Muammar el-Qaddafi and Hafez al-Assad in Syria and Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia. The traditional restraints on power had been swept away, and no new social contract between ruler and ruled had emerged. Fear

udi Arabia last week after three months of convalescence in the United States and Morocco, one of the first meetings he took was with his ally King Hamad bin Isa al- Khalifa of Bahrain to discuss the turmoil in his tiny nation. Sunni- ruled Bahrain, less than 20 miles from Saudi Arabia's oil- and Shiite- rich

of the first meetings he took was with his ally King Hamad bin Isa al- Khalifa of Bahrain to discuss the tur