Now we have seen Iran's human face, a military attack is unthinkable

This is well bloody said, my pieces never make it very far but hopefully some people will read this. I have been rather shocked by all the staunch conservatives who find the slaughter of palestinians acceptable loss rallying behind the Iranian protesters. Shocked, unbelieving, and slightly hopeful (that it's something more than just another ploy to rip on obama) because it means that, by their own argument, the option of a general attack on iran is now unacceptable. We have empathized with them, we have seen them and read their comments about the elections and i think that has touched many on both sides. So, possibly, Iran just saved itself from a "eminent threat" attack by doing this. ...suck it zionists.
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But the deeper point relates to public sentiment, especially in the US. Seven years ago, Bush cast Iran as part of the "axis of evil", a faraway, abstract place clothed in black and bent on destruction. Now the world's people have read Iranians tweeting, minute by minute, on their aching desire for freedom. They have heard that Tehranis climb each night on to their rooftops to shout "God is great" – a subversive reminder to Khamenei that he is outranked by another supreme leader. They have seen, at last, that Iranians have a human face.

In this, an unexpected but eloquent source has been, of all things, Comedy Central's satirical Daily Show. Incredibly, the programme had its own correspondent in Iran. Brilliantly sending up the grammar of flak-jacketed TV reporters, he has been ushering real Iranians into American living rooms – listening in mock frustration as they refuse to conform to the stereotype, telling him: "We don't hate Jews, we don't hate Americans, we don't hate anybody." Even the goatherd in a remote village shows a stunning knowledge of US geography; a market trader correctly identifies the US speaker of the House. As anchor Jon Stewart put it on the eve of the election: "The evil, despotic, apocalyptic death cult we know as Iran appears to be one of the more vibrant democracies in the Middle East."

Of course, educated folk will insist they have long been familiar with Iran's human face. They will point to art exhibitions such as Made in Iran, now in London, or Iran Inside Out in New York, movies including the new Shirin and the much-admired Persepolis, or memoirs such as Reading Lolita in Tehran. What's different about the last few weeks, however, is that this exposure to the complexity, variety and sheer humanness of Iran's people has become mainstream.

This could cut both ways. Some Europeans and Americans might feel such empathy for the green revolutionaries that they join the neocon call and demand their governments act to rescue the Iranians from tyranny. But it's more likely that many would recoil from a shock and awe bombardment that would kill thousands of the very people for whom they now have a strong affinity. There was, alas, too little feeling for the peoples of Iraq and Afghanistan: they were always faceless, even in death.

All of which leaves Obama engaged in delicate diplomatic footwork. He must stand up for democracy, condemning the suppression in Iran as "outrageous", even as he gives the ayatollahs no excuse to crack down on the protesters as foreign agents, and all the while ensuring the western offer to Iran of rapprochement in return for compromise remains on the table. It is subtle work. But now that the world's people have seen the human face of Iran, nothing less will do. The street protesters of Tehran may have failed to topple their rulers. But in this – in showing the world that the people of Iran are human beings, not collateral damage in waiting – they have been a glorious success.