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Within hours of Mubarak’s resignation on Friday, Medhi Karroubi, one of Iran’s most prominent opposition leaders and clerics, was placed under house-arrest for trying to organize a protest on Monday. The government has not officially banned the demonstration, but Iran’s Revolutionary Guard has threatened to brutally crush any rallies. Two of Karroubi’s allies, Taghi Rahmani and Mir Hossein Mousavi, have also been arrested in anticipation of today’s protest. President Ahmedinejad’s regime experienced its strongest, Egypt-like popular challenge in 2009 when the country’s largely young population rose up under the banner of the “Green Revolution.” The Iranian government, despite showing support for the Egyptian and Tunisian uprisings as it celebrates the anniversary of its own 1979 revolution, has been jamming the BBC’s Persian service signal since Thursday in an effort to block coverage of Mubarak’s fall from power. Reports are coming in from today’s demonstrations that security forces have been heavy handed.

Meanwhile in Algeria, anti-government protests have increased in steam even as the Algerian government rushed to announce today that it would lift the emergency rule that has been in place since 1992, meeting a key demand of protesters. Yesterday hundreds of demonstrators clashed with government protesters in the Eastern city of Annaba and on Saturday, defying a police ban, thousands of Algerians marched on the capital, Algiers. They plan to hold weekly demonstrations in Algiers until their demands for reform are met.

GUESTS: Reese Erlich, author of “The Iran Agenda: The Real Story of U.S. Policy and the Middle East Crisis” and “Conversations with Terrorists: Middle East Leaders on Politics, Violence, and Empire,” David Porter professor emeritus of political science at SUNY/Empire State College, just wrote the piece “The Triumph of Leaderless Revolutions”

Find out more about Reese Erlich at www.reeseerlich.com. Read David Porter’s article here: http://counterpunch.org/porter02112011.html