Arab Spring Reckoning

THE ARAB SPRING PROTEST MOVEMENT TOOK the Middle East and North Africa by storm 10 years ago, sparked in part by the January 2011 death of Mohamed Bouazizi, a Tunisian street vendor. Bouazizi had set himself on fire two weeks earlier in a suicidal act of anti-establishment defiance that fanned the flames of revolutionary fervor across the region.

But while the early days of the Arab Spring were defined by hope, excitement and indignation, many countries where mass demonstrations occurred would see brutal crackdowns, an influx of foreign interests and fighters as well as civil war, muddling the legacy of the pan-Arab revolt for democracy.

A decade after Bouazizi’s iconic self-immolation, Newsweek looks back at some of the countries most affected by the Arab Spring and examines where they are today.

Tunisia

Then-Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was forced to resign and flee to Saudi Arabia just 10 days after Bouazizi’s death, which marked a turning point in a roughly month-long series of