Current events in Egypt speak for themselves. The conscious will of the Egyptian masses refuses to be broken. In their hundreds of thousands the people are asserting their determination to break the power of a military caste which has grievously miscalculated the temper of a revolutionary movement that will not be denied. Historical parallels should never be used lightly, but nonetheless comparisons with Russia in 1917 are irresistable. The Egyptian people have had their February and are now approaching their October.

And just as with Russia in 1917, Egypt in 2011 stands at a crossroads. For the first time in decades, and perhaps longer, the masses are in control of their own destiny. The attempt by the military to appease the nation with piecemeal concessions to a new draft constitution that was and is designed to cement the power of the military at the apex of Egyptian society has been answered with an outpouring of people onto the streets to demonstrate their anger and defiance. Once again Cairo’s Tahrir Square is the epicentre of revolutionary struggle in a country whose importance to the region cannot be overstated. What happens in Egypt will have profound consequences for the region as a whole and by extension the entire world.

Unlike Libya or as is increasingly the case, with Syria, the West finds itself powerless to intervene when it comes to Egypt. Instead, reflecting its comparative impotence, Western governments are reduced to calling for ‘restraint’ on both sides.

The last thing the Egyptian people need now is restraint. In fact they should rip the word from their vocabulary as they enter the most important period in their history since the struggle over Suez in 1956. Now is the time to break the power of the generals and end decades of shame in which the largest and most important country in the Arab world was reduced to the status and role of Western satrap, its military bribed to turn the other way as the Palestinians suffered alone at the hands of Israel, and its allies in the West exerted dominion over the region’s vast resources.

In fact the only Western intervention since Mubarak was toppled back in February came in the shape of British Prime Minister David Cameron, when he arrived in Egypt trailing behind him a delegation of British arms dealers and visited Tahrir Square before the blood of those who’d given and risked their lives to topple the British backed Egyptian dictator had dried. His presence there was an insult to the memories of those men and women, though a timely reminder of the fact that where the likes of Cameron, Sarkozy and Obama are concerned, the only thing that matters is business as usual.

On the ground the Muslim Brotherhood, socialists, nationalists, trade unionists, democrats and forces of every political stripe have united to demand an end to military rule and free elections to create a national unity government with full powers. After an earlier attempt by the hated police to clear the protesters from Tahrir Square by violence was defeated at a cost of 30 people killed and dozens more injured, the generals find themselves ruling a nation that refuses to be ruled by military writ any longer. The perception of the Egyptian military as being on the side of the people is history. No longer politically infantilised, armed with confidence in their own strength and sense of history, the masses have lost their fear. In Cairo, Alexandria, Suez, all across the country, they have poured onto the streets as never before.

Now anything is possible – including victory.

The significance of Mubarak stepping down as President today cannot be overstated. It marks the arrival onto the stage of history the Arab masses as an actor rather than the passive and infantilised observers they had been for generations. The stranglehold of dictatorship has been broken from below.

The Arab world shall never be the same. The remaining dictatorships and kleptocracies throughout the region have just moved closer to their end. In Washington, London, Paris, and Tel Aviv frantic efforts to adapt to a new reality will be taking place. The day of Arab liberation moves closer. And all as a result of the Egyptian masses and their courageous and indomitable stand.

People make their own history but not in circumstances of their choosing.

In the words of Eduardo Galeano [for the Arab peoples] ‘the dictatorship of fear is over’.

Update: The Swiss government has just announced it has frozen all the assets held in Swiss banks belonging to Mubarak and members of his family. This invites the question as to whether the British government will do likewise. 

The announcement:
The people rejoice:

and from Al Jazeera

The top figure in Egypt’s new regime is now Mohammed Hussein Tantawi, the country’s defence minister. After the announcement, he drove past Mubarak’s former palace, where crowds cheered him. He stopped briefly to thank and hail the crowds before driving in.

The crowd in Tahrir chanted “We have brought down the regime”, while many were seen crying, cheering and embracing one another.

Mohamed ElBaradei, an opposition leader, hailed the moment as being “a dream come true” while speaking to Al Jazeera.

“I can’t tell you how every Egyptian feels today,” he said. “We have been able to restore our humanity … to be free and independent”.

In what history will record as one of the most chilling and wicked speeches ever made by a political leader, President Hosni Mubarak, thirty year dictator of Egypt, last night declared war against the people not only of his own country but the entire Arab world. Secluded in his palace surrounded by sycophants, drunk with opulence, this degenerate and delusional potentate appeared on state television and effectively announced that Egypt, a nation of 80 millions, belongs to him and not to its people.

The likelihood as a result is that a tsunami of rage will be unleashed throughout the country that will be talked about for generations to come. The key question now is what the army will do. If as Mubarak and Suleiman have clearly calculated the regime retains the support of the military high command, the stage is set for a massacre. As a consequence all of a sudden history hinges on the junior officers and soldiers of the Egyptian army. It calls on them to do their duty and refuse orders to fire on their own people. More, it calls on them to join the people and help sweep this rotten regime from power once and for all.

Seventeen days have now passed since the uprising began in Egypt. In that time the regime has tried everything from organising counter demonstrations and physical attacks on the protestors, resulting at time of writing in 300 deaths, to waiting the movement out in the hope and expectation it would dissipate as a result of lethargy, to then attempting to placate it by talking to various opposition figures and groups and assuring the country that Mubarak will go in September. It has even tried bribing 6 million government employees with 15 percent pay rise.

None of it has worked.

Instead, in a wonderful and beautiful example of a risen people, the Egyptians have come out into the streets in even greater numbers in the past couple of days, determined to maintain the pressure on the regime and the military high command. In this latest stage of the uprising the movement has been joined by thousands of workers who’ve gone on strike throughout the country, helping to exacerbate an already desperate economic situation for a regime which continues to try and do what it can to cling on to its power and privileges.

Failing to learn the lessons of history has been the currency of dictators since time began. Mubarak has not only plundered his nation’s wealth during his time in power, he is now attempting to plunder its future. This is one crime among the many he’s committed against his people that will never be forgiven.

Friend of the US government, friend of the Israeli government, friend of imperialists, colonialists and plutocrats – friend of everyone except the Arab people – Hosni Mubarak with the speech he delivered to the Egyptian people on the evening of 10 February 2011 declared himself an outlaw.

Mubarak is yesterday. The people are today. And today the ground benath Mubarak will shake.

A candid discussion of the current situation in Egypt

Today’s footage and reports of pitched battles between anti and pro-Mubarak forces in Cairo’s Tahrir Square marks a dangerous turn on this the ninth day of the uprising in Egypt. From afar it appears that the opposition may have run out of steam due to the lack of a coherent leadership able to take the movement forward. The resulting confusion and lack of momentum, evidenced in mass, static rallies in Cairo and elsewhere, combined with an inability or unwillingness to exert pressure on the army to choose sides, looks to have given Mubarak and his supporters in the police and military high command time to regroup and move onto the offensive.

The Egyptian dictator’s response to yesterday’s million man march now appears in hindsight not so much a sign of how out of touch he is but rather part of concerted strategy to sow division in the ranks of the opposition - between those determined that he go now and more moderate elements willing to take his word and accept that he will go in September. For a mass movement pitted against a brutal dictator such as Mubarak heterogenity can a fatal weakness. The mixed and lukewarm support we’ve seen for Baredei among many anti-Mubarak protesters is perhaps reflective of this weakness.

The subjective factor was always going to be all that mattered at this point in events, and as of now it sadly appears to be lacking.

Over the past week the army has been there to be won. But for that to happen the army, and more specifically the troops and commanders on the ground, have to feel confident that the mass movement against Mubarak is irresistable and unstoppable. The failure of the opposition to take those bold and audacious steps without which history tells us all revolutionary movements fail has thus far been responsible for the army continuing to remain uncommitted on the sidelines. Now, with the arrival in the streets of pro-Mubarak forces to influence proceedings, suddenly everything hangs in the balance.

Of course it isn’t over yet, not by a long chalk, so let’s hope the opposition response to this dangerous turn in events is strong, decisive and effective. Judging by today’s reports it will have to be if it is to have any chance of succeeding from this point on.

Elsewhere the Obama administration played its hand last night with a statement by the president calling for the process of transition to begin now. It came after Mubarak’s address to the country on Egyptian state television during which he refused to stand down until September and vowed to remain in Egypt come what may. It revealed that the military high command had decided to refuse to bow to pressure and force him out. No doubt this was a decision motivated as much by concerns over their own survival and fear of how they would fare in a post-Mubarak Egypt as any other factor involved.

British Prime Minister David Cameron’s statement today, delivered in a joint appearance with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, merely echoed the US President’s. Given the sustained material and political support which both the US and Britain have given Mubarak throughout his thirty years in power, both statements will sound hollow to those currently risking their lives in Cairo tonight, with the very real prospect of reprisals by the regime should it survive uppermost in their minds.

All of a sudden the chilling warning of Saint Just looms large over events in Egypt: “Those who make revolution halfway only dig their own graves.”

For the sake of the men and women who’ve taken to the streets and inspired us with their courage over the past week, let us hope the words of Saint Just do not come to pass. 

Solidarity with the Egyptian people.