Charismatic young military rulers-turned-dictators like Egypt’s Gamal Abdel Nasser, Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, Libya’s Muammar el-Qaddafi, Yemen’s Ali Abdullah Saleh, and Syria’s Hafez al-Assad used these popular causes to win public support. But their failure to deliver better lives to their citizens, together with the discrediting of left-wing ideologies following the Soviet Union’s collapse, fueled the rise of a rival movement: political Islam.
天赋异禀的年轻军事执政者——比如埃及的纳赛尔、伊拉克的萨达姆·侯赛因、利比亚的卡扎菲、也门的萨利赫和叙利亚的哈菲兹·阿萨德——利用这一民意赢得公众支持，由执政者转身成为独裁者。但他们没能给人民带来更好的生活，加上左翼思想因为苏联解体而失去信誉，于是产生了敌对运动——政治伊斯兰教。