The outcome of this summer’s war between Israel and Hizballah was confused and confusing. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert declared a military success, and then appointed a commission to determine what had gone wrong. Hassan Nasrallah, the head of Hizballah, proclaimed a glorious victory, and then explained that he would never have ordered the kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers if he had thought there was “even a one-percent chance” it would lead to war.

Mr. Nour pried a small opening in Egyptian politics late in 2004 when he succeeded in securing legal status for his al-Ghad (Tomorrow) Party. One of the hallmarks of Egypt's authoritarianism has been its peculiar party system.

Elections to the Egyptian People's Assembly had promised to be another step toward democratization in a country that Mr. Bush has looked to as a pathbreaker for the region.

The most shocking outcome of last week's U.N. summit was the failure, once again, of the world organization to take a definitive stand against terrorism.

It was the challenge of Islamist terrorism that impelled George W. Bush to jettison, as he put it, 60 years of American policy emphasizing stability as our key goal in the Middle East in favor of a policy emphasizing freedom and democracy.

Why is the U.N. so insusceptible to effective reform? One reason is that its 18,000-strong bureaucracy is run on the basis of a baroque system of affirmative action: Staff is hired according to region and nationality, not merit.

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