The Economist notes: 

Egyptians may be renowned for being politically passive, but the rising generation is very different from previous ones. It is better educated, highly urbanised, far more exposed to the outside world and much less patient. Increasingly, the whole structure of Egypt’s state, with its cumbersome constitution designed to disguise one-man rule, its creaky centralised administration, its venal, brutal and unaccountable security forces and its failure to deliver such social goods as decent schools, health care or civic rights, looks out of kilter with what its people want.

But also cautions that this momentum for change is often slowed by Egyptians proclivity for going along to get along:

By and large, though, poor Egyptians grumble surprisingly little. There are some positive reasons for their forbearance. Strong bonds among extended families, neighbourly solidarity and the Muslim tradition of charity support many of the needy. Egypt has very low crime rates, and it is the poorest who feel most secure in their homes. With their street life and intimacy under year-round sunshine, Egypt’s slums are often less grim than those in other countries. Sociologists have long noted the knack of Egypt’s poor to appropriate things they lack, such as space and freedom, by nimbly skirting the rules. Egypt may be chaotic, but it is often joyfully so.

And comments on the mixed state of public services like education:

Egypt has, in effect, accepted that it runs a two-tier education system. It is skewed towards those who can afford to pay for the best private tutors or, better still, private schools, which are flourishing. Even in public universities, a startling 48% of students come from the richest fifth of society. Yet although the promise of a decent free education for all has clearly not been met, at least Egypt’s better university faculties are again producing top-notch graduates, and publishers and bookshops have seen a surge in sales in recent years.

A lot of questions remain after Israel attacked an aid flotilla headed for Gaza early this morning: Why launch an operation against protesters in darkness at 4:00 am, a time that would maximize chaos? Why not wait until the ships entered territorial waters? Why launch an attack at all, when there were less risky ways to divert the ships? [update: Israel attacked at night to avoid media coverage. That worked out well]

The only thing that is clear is that Israel walked, with hubris, right into a giant trap. And Binyamin Netanyahu is leading one of the most diplomatically incompetent governments in history.

As the world waits to see how Turkey responds, another country to watch is Egypt. Many people (especially outside of the Arab world and Iran) often forget this fact—but the Gaza blockade is a two country affair. Egypt also has a border with Gaza, and by opening the Refah crossing, it could end the blockade any minute that it wants to. Egyptian President Mubarak's support for the blockade is extremely unpopular at home, and it makes him a frequent target of invectives from al-Jazeera, Hezbullah TV (al-Manar), and Iranian government mouthpieces. 

But Mubarak also loathes Hamas, which is an offshoot of Mubarak’s main domestic opposition, the Muslim Brotherhood. Let’s see if he can withstand pressure this time. And if Turkey wants to use its opportunity in the spotlight to make the blockade untenable, it should not only condemn Israel but also put heavy pressure on Egypt, which is more likely to crack.

P.S. For those who aren’t familiar with the history of the region, Gaza was actually part of Egypt until Israel conquered the territory in the 1967 Six-Day War. Many Israelis undoubtedly wish that it was still part of Egypt.

- Jon

Mubarak’s Egypt is often compared to Iran in the last days of the Shah: a middle class squeezed by inflation; anger at the regime’s alliances with the US and Israel; a profound sense of humiliation that is increasingly expressed in Islamic fervour; near universal contempt for the country’s ruling class; a state whose legitimacy has almost entirely eroded. 

In 2005, the Egyptian Movement for Change – a coalition of leftists, Nasserists and Islamists better known as Kifaya (‘Enough’) – staged a series of demonstrations in downtown Cairo, where, for the first time, Egyptians dared to criticise Mubarak in public, and to call for him to step down. Since then, hundreds of thousands of Egyptians have demonstrated: leftists and Islamists calling for an end to the Emergency Law; judges denouncing constitutional amendments that strip them of their right to supervise elections; workers striking for better wages and independent trade unions; poor farmers on land redistributed under Nasser defending themselves against attempts by large landowners – often with the backing of the state, sometimes with the help of armed thugs – to ‘reclaim’ their property.

The spread of these protests, on a scale not seen since the 1970s, when left-wing students mobilised against Sadat’s infitah and his alliance with the West, has led some observers to see this as Egypt’s ‘moment of change’, the subtitle of an informative new anthology on Egyptian social movements.

Read the full article here.

The Battle for the Nile (LA Times)
After the recent failure of Nile River nations to agree on water sharing, Egypt has announced it will take whatever steps are necessary to protect its historical rights to billions of gallons of water it needs each year to survive.   "Nile water is a matter of national security to Egypt. We won't under any circumstances allow our water rights to be jeopardized," Mohamed Nasreddin Allam, Minister of Water Resources and Irrigation, told Parliament this week.

Shocking News Out of Europe: Ashton Fails (Der Spiegel)
Four and a half months after Catherine Ashton took office as the European Union's high representative for foreign affairs, doubts are increasing about her suitability for the post.    Ashton has no ideas and no plan, criticizes Inge Grässle, a member of the European Parliament for Germany's center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU). Ashton is "simply out of her depth" when it comes to setting up the EU's new diplomatic service, the European External Action Service (EEAS), Grässle told SPIEGEL. Things are "totally on the wrong track," she added.

Apparently outgoing International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) head Mohamed ElBaradei is a glutton for pain. After 12 tumultuous years at the IAEA, the Nobel Prize winner announced that he is considering a run for the Egyptian presidency in 2011.

While its unlikely that ElBaradei will win (his recent support for Iran has been extremely unpopular in Egypt and he was only popular with a limited set of the elite in the first place) or even become an official candidate, his potential candidacy does shake up the race in a couple of interesting ways.

First, it almost ensures that Hosni Mubarek will run for reelection once again. The age and experience gap between the ElBaradei and Mubarek's son and potential successor Gamal Mubarek would allow the challenger to gain a significant advantage.  Second, ElBaradei's candidacy would bring a great deal of publicity to an election that otherwise would have been largely ignored.   

For more details, check out the discussion over at the Boursa Exchange.