Here's what happened on Feb. 19, according to accounts provided separately by a Western diplomat and a Syrian official: A policeman insulted a driver in downtown Damascus; when the man protested, he was beaten by the cop, who was joined by two others. It was the sort of harsh encounter with authority that Arabs swallowed, bitterly but passively, until the surge of anger in Tunisia and Egypt.

A crowd of hundreds quickly gathered in the Damascus street and began chanting. According to a diplomat who has reviewed tape recordings of the incident, the chants roughly translated: "We are the people. The people don't want to be humiliated." People in the crowd videotaped the action with their cellphones and posted the drama on the Internet.

It was a volatile situation. Then something interesting happened, which shows how closely the authorities are monitoring events: The minister of the interior arrived on the scene about 30 minutes after the protest started, apologized to the beaten man and took him away in his car. The police officers were reprimanded. The crowd eventually dispersed, and some (perhaps with official encouragement) began chanting in favor of Assad.

The government did another sensible thing: Rather than try to suppress information about the event (which would have been futile, in any event), the government allowed the videos to circulate widely on the Internet. People shared their anger about police abuses, but the rage doesn't seem to have focused on the leader, as has been the case in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen.

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