Maha Yahya is right to worry about the "violence unleashed in Arab countries" in recent years. She predicts there would "be further conflict and a new wave of uprisings", even worse than what we have seen, if there is no "change of course".

Indeed the popular unrest in 2011 in many parts of the Arab world did take us by surprise. It seems politicians, policymakers, analysts etc. had failed to see it coming. No doubt collective mobilisation was made possible with help of social media, allowing protests be staged simultaneously across the region. At the beginning of Arab Spring protesters showed that they could rise up against oppressive dictatorships without resorting to terrorism. The removal of four autocrats in Egpyt, Libya, Tunisia and Yemen through peaceful demonstrations was possible without al-Qaeda.

Initially, Osama bin Laden seemed to many frustrated Muslims to be the answer to years of humiliation at the hands of despotic and corrupt regimes, which were empowered by the US, in an effort to secure peace with Israel and to guarantee stability in the region. However the 9/11 attacks hadn't weakened the US. On the contrary the neocons in the Bush administration used 9/11 as a pretext to wage war on terrorism. The fall of autocrats, like Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and Ali Abdullah Saleh in Yemen had dealt a heavy blow to Washington, as they were strategic allies in the region.

The Iraq invasion in 2003 stirred up a hornet's nest, triggering new Shia-Sunni tensions. Iraq, like Syria and Yemen had soon become a venue of a proxy war fought between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Taking advantage of the mayhem in Syria, al-Qaeda affiliates, and since the last year emergence of ISIS, they had established their strongholds in areas they captured.

However eager the West is to combat ISIS, it sees oppressive regimes in the Middle East as the lesser of two evils. As long as dictators like Bashar al-Assad and Abdel Fattah al-Sisi rule with an iron fist in Syria and Egypt, violence in the region will spiral out of control. The tragedy with leaders in the Middle East is that any efforts to "introduce inclusive political processes, end state-sanctioned violence, ensure due process" will be seen as a sign of weakness. As long as "socioeconomic injustices" remain unaddressed, youth bulge and high unemployment will hang like a Sword of Damocles over the leaders' heads.