Biden put this sentiment into action by working with Netanyahu despite serious moral and political failures in Gaza, with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on NATO expansion, and with Gulf potentates on the region’s security architecture.
Even as long-reigning autocrats such as Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei are removed from power, the outlook for the global state of democracy remains highly uncertain.
—
Yana Gorokhovskaia,
Washington Post,
19 Mar. 2026
Trump’s attacks may have raised some doubts in China that Xi’s backing of autocrats is wise.
Not your grandma’s authoritarians Today’s authoritarian rulers realize that civil society has the potential to support democracy and pry loose their grip on power.
—
Christopher Justin Einolf,
The Conversation,
26 Sep. 2025
During the confrontation, Hussein and his followers were massacred, but the imam’s quest for justice became a defining value of Shiite identity, fostering a sense of revolutionary duty to fight oppressors at any cost.
—
Sudarsan Raghavan,
New Yorker,
7 Apr. 2026
For Iran, what counts is resistance, against arrogant and wicked oppressors, chiefly the United States and Israel.
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