Nightly News   |  February 11, 2011

Mubarak's ouster reverberates across Middle East

NBC's Martin Fletcher reports from Tel Aviv on what Mubarak's resignation means for the entire Arab region.

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>>> now to a big angle of this. imagine how other countries throughout the middle east are watching this. put it this way, the largest arab nation in the world just changed hands, so how does that now affect the balance of power ? we go to our veteran in the region, correspondent martin fletcher in tel aviv tonight. martin, good evening.

>> reporter: hi, brian. well, the balance of power is changing. for anybody who really wants democracy in the middle east , it's party time here tonight. throughout the region arabs were in the streets dancing, singing. they spoke of the winds of change bringing democracy, freedom, and it was almost as if they were there in cairo themselves. across the region people were saying the message, we've done it, we've done it, brought down a dictator through peaceful people power . of course there was a distant reaction among the leaders. their reaction mostly was who's next? there's almost complete silence from other governments in the region tonight, except for iran . iran , which put down its own revolt two years ago quite brutally, iran 's president tonight said the new middle east will break free, quote, of american interference and doom israel . of course israel is rattled tonight. on the one hand supporting democracy, on the other worried what kind of government will come to power in egypt now. will they continue to support the peace treaty with israel ? change in the region is already working against israel . turkey, which was a strong ally, is moving away from israel now towards iran , towards syria, and now the most powerful arab country in the region, egypt, is in place. very worried israeli leaders in jerusalem today looking with great concern at their southern neighbor, brian.

>> it will be interesting to see what monday morning brings. martin fletcher in tell aveen, martin, thanks.