Yesterday I heard a young Saudi mockingly shout at a friend he had a minor disagreement with: “You’re an Arab.” I asked him what that was supposed to mean, and he told me that the shabab (youth) are now throwing that word about as though it were an insult. He left me with the feeling that it was meant to be taken only as half a joke.

Everyone has betrayed everyone. America led the way, abandoning its Jeffersonian democratic foundations in favor of crude economic exploitation and colonial expansion. The Arabs quickly followed suit, abandoning their brothers. Britain turned its back on Europe, while Europe chose lip-service over action when push came to shove. Saddam long ago betrayed his people and so the Iraqi people, in turn, predictably betrayed him. Less predictable, but equally devastating, was the passive betrayal of the Republican Guard. They betrayed their honor and dignity, which we are supposed to believe are the most important things to any Arab man, let alone an Arab fighter.

America has triumphed, and it would not be an overstatement to say that the whole world — formerly represented by the United Nations, the greatest betrayer of them all in this mess — feels betrayed by the ease with which America has managed to pull this off. The junta in the US were right: Don’t listen to all the talk about resistance and anger. The Iraqi Army is a joke, and the demonstrations will soon pass — just as they did over the boy martyr, Mohammed Al-Durra.

The message has been clearly sent: No country, certainly no country in the Middle East, can ever withstand even a half-baked military campaign against it led by the United States. America now rules the world, either directly or by proxy; and there is nothing anyone can do about it.

Nothing, that is, but wait for history to take its course, for Fortune’s wheel to turn as it inexorably does, crushing underneath those who once danced on top of it. But not in our lifetime. Yes, there will be more terrorism, and Osama Bin Laden — or at least his infamous voice — was heard once more yesterday, calling for suicide attacks and thus giving more easy justification, as he did on Sept. 11, to America’s imperial ambition. Thanks, Osama, you’ve done us all about as much good as George W. Bush. Both are two sides of the same coin.

So what of the immediate future? Some things can surely now be taken for granted. The hastily concocted “road map” for Middle East peace will be implemented, creating a still-born Palestinian state completely dependent politically and economically on Israel. A democracy of sorts will come to Iraq, and sooner or later to much of the Middle East — just enough to give the people a sense of freedom while allowing America to justify at home a continued “partnership” with the rulers of the region. As in the 1990s, when those on the Left suddenly found themselves disenfranchised after the Berlin Wall came down and Stalinism was replaced in Eastern Europe with that cruder system of exploitation, undiluted capitalism, so now those on the side of basic justice and human rights know that the international, independent judges have been bought off, and there is no longer any recourse to moral argument.