Antigovernment demonstrators showed up as scheduled on Iran's streets Thursday, commemorating in their own defiant way the 31st anniversary of the country's Islamic revolution. Government forces, meanwhile, worked overtime, and apparently with some success, to clamp down on the protesters.
Important as the day's efforts by the dissidents may be, though, their significance transcends one day, or one anniversary. It is simply this:
The Iranian revolution in 1979 was the biggest event of the last generation in the Middle East, spawning wars and radicalization that have reshaped the region and, to some extent, the world. If we're now watching the slow unwinding of that revolution, the consequences will be equally momentous.
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