Also the Iranian Revolution (which wasn't entirely Islamist in nature, but they were the ones who won the power struggle in its immediate aftermath - the liberals were out of the picture by 1980, while the communist opposition got finished off in mass executions in 1988) happened due to the unpopularity of absolute monarch Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who was stubbornly supported by the US to his last days.

And this has roots in the western-supported coup against Mohammad Mosaddegh in 1953, who was a social democratic reformer.

It's a story that unfortunately repeats many times around the region, and globally too.