Islam

The world does really end with a whimper, not a bang, as T.S. Eliot said. After 31 years in power, seventeen days of protests, more than 300 dead and a shouting match between the US administration and its one-time Egyptian ally, it looks as if Hosni Mubarak will be leaving office tonight. Twitter is atwitter with news that the Egyptian strongman will soon make a TV appearance during which he is expected to hand power to newly-anointed Vice-President Omar Suleiman. Expect Tahrir Square to erupt in a festival of freedom, as the heroic, web-enabled protesters savour their unlikely but amazing victory. But while Egypt’s revolution has been more successful than many in the US and British believed it could be, it is not yet the time to celebrate.

Alastair Beach is on the ground in Cairo. Here is his report for Coffee House: As the imam rounded off his midday Friday sermon, the ring of more than three hundred riot police encircled the worshippers. It was no ordinary congregation. A stellar assortment of Egyptian directors, actors and political bigwigs were assembled in an enormous crowd on the pavement outside the Mustafa Mahmoud mosque in Mohandiseen, Western Cairo. Over the loudspeaker, the imam drew polite applause from the listeners when he praised protestors who had turned out for the initial demonstration in Egypt’s uprising a week last Tuesday. But then he put his foot in it. “Democracy should involve free speech but without the trouble,” he intoned solemnly in Arabic.

A week ago, that would have seemed a foolish question. But after thousands of Egyptians have taken to the streets for two consecutive days of protest, even Hosni Mubarak is beginning to look vulnerable. It has placed the West in a dilemma, in a way that Ben Ali's fall did not. For years, the fear has been that President Mubarak is the lesser of two evils. Though authoritarian, Mubarak's Egypt is a pro-Western state willing to live with Israel and combat Islamist terrorism. On the hand, the Muslim Brotherhood opposition, which shares an ideological wellspring with Al Qaeda, is a grave threat to Western security.

A suicide bomber has killed more than thirty people at Moscow airport. This is the third major terrorist attack on Russian soil in the last year. Islamist groups were responsible for the previous two attacks and, I imagine, will claim proprietorship this one also. It is a telling reminder that the domestic threat faced by Russia and NATO are becoming more aligned, which should lead to greater co-operation between the two in the coming decade. Already, NATO Secretary General, Anders-Fogh Rasmussen (not a man to cower before the pernicious Islamist menace) has said that his organisation will stand together against terrorism.