A fury is sweeping a nation with 7,000 years of political history. Egypt’s youth-led popular uprising for change, democracy and social justice is being watched on TV screens world-wide. It has jolted leaders in the Middle East, with Jordan and Yemen announcing changes.

Egypt, according to several analysts, is a bellwether state “as when it moved towards the Soviet bloc, many Arab states followed, when it turned towards the West, many Arab states followed; and when Islamism became a leading trend in Egypt, it also did in other parts of the Arab world.”