This is probably your best piece this year.

There is no single Arab idea about what has happened, but there is a unified narrative of change.

Interpreted literally, this makes no sense. The more creative interpretation makes a distinction between what Arabs in communication with Arab experts in the West think has been happening on the one hand, and what they want to believe has been happening. Arabs disagree vigorously among themselves as to what has been happening in their disparate societies -- as the Libyan civil war and the Cairo demonstrations show. Among those Arabs in communication with Arab experts in the West, though, there is consensus as to what they want to believe has been happening. Western Arab experts, not entirely to their credit, have adopted that consensus as their own.

We're not dealing with a narrative of change here, but rather with The Narrative: a story required to be uplifting, flattering to the Arabs involved on the right side, insistent on the Arab Spring being solely the work of the Arabs and the oppressive regimes opposing it being the responsibility of the West, proud rejection of accommodation with the hated Jewish state and abashed silence as to the desired alternative, silence as well -- out of deference to Arab Islamists -- on the matter of religious toleration in Arab countries. The Narrative is a story of inevitable triumph, a story with the happy ending assumed.

The Narrative is a dubious guide to American policy, something the Obama administration should have learned by now, but which I fear it has not. Most obviously, of course, The Narrative diverges too far from reality. The most oppressive Arab regimes, the ones that reacted against street demonstrations with the greatest violence, were Syria and Libya, two governments with long records of hostility to America and the West. Qadhafi's fall was the work of American and European military action (in the case of the Americans, involving a sustained and unprovoked attack on another government with scant consultation of Congress. American Arab experts have gone sufficiently native that this detail does not appear in any part of The Narrative). The foundation of oppressive Arab states -- military establishments created to enable the sanguinary effort to destroy Israel and enable the monopolization of power by the state in Egypt, Syria, Jordan -- remains as popular with the public in two of these countries as it ever was. The doubtful prospects of Arab economies without access to oil revenues is a dark shadow looming over most of the Arab Spring countries.

From the standpoint of American policy, though, an even bigger weakness of The Narrative is its assumption of inevitable triumph over oppression. Oppression in Arab political culture has a very long history. It was not, in fact, imposed from the outside; in fact, the most significant outside influence on the development of power-monopolizing Arab states in the last century was probably the example and assistance of the Soviet Union -- in Egypt during the Nasser period, and in Syria, Algeria and Iraq for decades. Oppression and violence were the tools of choice of Arab regimes as they first established themselves, and they retain powerful constituencies in most Arab countries, al Jazeera and the Twitterverse notwithstanding.

The Obama administration assumed the Arab Spring's triumph in Egypt, the most important Arab country, as soon as Mubarak fell. It immediately turned its attention to the vastly less important nation of Libya, and later to Syria; it fretted ineffectually over Saudi intervention in Bahrain and the failing Yemeni state. The administration did not foresee that SCAF and the bulk of the Egyptian public would be perfectly comfortable with Mubarakism without Mubarak. Liberalization -- the reduction in the relative power of the Egyptian state, establishment of the rule of law, the abandonment of the worst abuses of arbitrary authority, and the supremacy of elected civil over military authority -- was assumed in Washington, and the events of this November caught the Obama administration flat-footed. America's ability to influence events there, badly attenuated in any event, was sacrificed to the wishful thinking inherent in The Narrative.

There is every likelihood that the same thing will happen again, with respect to Egypt and other Arab countries as well, if Americans do not start to cultivate some intellectual and emotional distance from developments in Arab societies. Political change beneficial to Arab countries and useful to American interests is possible, but is less likely if American officials continue to think of the Arab Spring as analogous to the Eastern European revolutions of 1989, the analogy implicit in The Narrative. American influence and advocacy on behalf of the values of civilization -- including values such as religious toleration unpopular with many of the people who have made the Arab Spring -- cannot be exercised effectively if the Obama administration just goes along with the flow, supporting every Arab illusion (as in Libya) and assuming that every victory over some Arab oppressor is irreversible.

The Narrative so ascendant now is ultimately just a propaganda device. American policy must rest on the firmer ground of realism about what is possible -- both good and bad -- in Arab politics, and on an understanding of how what is possible comports with important American interests. As is the case everywhere else, we are foolish to base our policy on the things we want to believe.

An important and thought-provoking piece. One question, though: You meant to refer to relations between the government of the United States, based in its capital Washington, and the government of Israel, based in Jerusalem? If you didn't I am hard-pressed to think what you could have meant with your reference to Tel Aviv.

Doubtful prospects of Arab economies without access to oil revenues is a dark shadow looming over most of the Arab Spring countries.Miniclip, Starfall, Funbrain, Miniclip, Armor Games. Arabs disagree vigorously among themselves as to what has been happening in their disparate societies -- as the Libyan civil war and the Cairo demonstrations show. Among those Arabs in communication with Arab experts in the West, though, there is consensus as to what they want to believe has been happening. Western Arab experts, not entirely to their credit, have adopted that consensus as their own.