A hole is blown in the middle of the "status quo." And that nice little orderly status quo starts teetering. What some once called stability is really just a rickety old shack ready to crumble.
And it's instructive to see that sometimes "world powers" are powerless; reduced to watching events unfold, without any real influence. Or then again, their influence can actually work against them.
And all those years of supporting the status quo which was basically a dictatorship (and this story can be told over and over in countless countries), maybe doesn't sit all that well with those who were dictated to.
So people are in the streets. And no one knows what will emerge from the rumble of the old order. Might be good, might be bad, might be different, might be just a new status quo. No one knows, no one seems in charge. Change is hard and messy - that's change you can believe in.