(CNN) -- Three gone (Gadhafi, Mubarak, Ben Ali), two holding on in the face of daily protests (al-Assad, Saleh), two more (Kings Abdullah of Jordan and Mohammed of Morocco) trying to stay ahead of the curve of protest: After 10 months of the Arab Spring, the region is still in the throes of a heady and unpredictable transformation.





Moammar Gadhafi's demise, after the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia, means that three rulers in power collectively for 95 years are gone. Scholar and author Fouad Ajami, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, says that 2011 "is to the Arabs what 1989 was to the communist world. The Arabs are now coming into ownership of their own history and we have to celebrate."





Protesters in Yemen and Syria may be re-energized by the pictures from Sirte, Libya, showing the almost pathetic end of a ruler whose flowing robes and uniforms had long given him an aura of invincibility. Demonstrators in Syrian cities celebrated Gadhafi's death and warned President Bashar al-Assad that he would be next. As one Syrian activist told CNN: "The clear fate of all who kill his people is to end up under the feet of the nation."





Former Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri (no friend of the Syria regime) said: "Any Arab citizen, watching the course of events in Libya, cannot but think of the popular revolutionary movement that is taking place in Syria."





There has been one refrain common across the Arab world this year -- from the dusty streets of Sidi Bouzid in Tunisia, where it all began, to the barricades that litter Homs in Syria today: "The fear is gone, the people have put away their fear." Those words, spoken by Tunisian activist Sana Ben Achour in January, have echoed across the region ever since. It was quickly followed by a chant: "The people want the downfall of the regime."





Even so, it took U.N. resolutions and thousands of NATO sorties to degrade Gadhafi's forces. And that's unlikely elsewhere. The United States and Western Europe are applying economic sanctions against the Syrian regime but have persistently discounted military intervention. President Ali Abdullah Saleh of Yemen seems impervious to outside pressure and even his own injuries as he maneuvers back into the game. And in a majority of Arab countries, the power of the state remains formidable if not overwhelming.





In 1989, the people of Eastern Europe shared a continent with developed democracies; they had a model to copy -- and considerable help in shaking off the legacy of communism.





The Arab states, which did not even draw their own borders, each have different dynamics. Explosive sectarian and regional divides have enabled authoritarian rule in Syria, Yemen and Libya. Like the Gulf states, Jordan and Morocco are monarchies and their kings at least have the legitimacy of succession. Egypt and Tunisia have by Arab standards a large and capable middle class; Yemen does not. The Gulf states are enriched by massive oil and gas reserves; countries such as Jordan have little or none. The attitude toward women's rights varies widely; Islamists are stronger in some countries than others.





Perhaps most importantly, security forces are in some places loyal to the flag, in others bound to the regime, or split down the middle. The military in Tunisia and Egypt would not defend leaders who became liabilities; the military in Syria has remained cohesive and loyal to al-Assad.





But one of the few characteristics Arab states have long shared is the "freedom deficit," the product of decades of authoritarian rule. A landmark report on Arab societies by the U.N. Development Program in 2002 concluded: "This freedom deficit undermines human development and is one of the most painful manifestations of lagging political development."





The situation changed little in the following decade, but other forces were at work. The pan-Arab satellite television networks -- so different from the sclerotic state broadcasters -- gave Arabs a new window on the world. The educated young began to harness the power of the
The overthrow of how many leaders doesn't change the dilemmas that Arab world faces? How many leaders were overthrew? What power remains formidable in Arab countries? Scholar says 2011 "is to the Arabs what 1989 was to which other region?
Three Three of the state communist world.
question: The overthrow of how many leaders doesn't change the dilemmas that Arab world faces?, answer: Three | question: How many leaders were overthrew?, answer: Three | question: What power remains formidable in Arab countries?, answer: of the state | question: Scholar says 2011 "is to the Arabs what 1989 was to which other region?, answer: communist world.