A few minutes into Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's speech to the nation Thursday evening, as it became clear that he was not immediately stepping down, rapt pro-democracy demonstrators in Tahrir Square began to move restively. As interpreted live by Al Jazeera, the president said he was speaking to the youth in the square as a father to his children. I am, he said, "dreaming of a bright future and shaping such a future. All those who fell martyrs and injured, their blood will not go down the drain."

"I have been a youth, just like you," he assured protesters. "I have exhausted my life defending the homeland and its security" - a statement that prompted the beginning of loud chanting. Shown by Al Jazeera on a split screen, the president seemed strangely isolated from the effect his stance was having on the hundreds of people who had gathered in anticipation of his leaving office.

Mubarak said he would hold accountable all those whose crimes led to deaths of innocent victims. "I felt pain as the parents did," he declared. He said he was "totally determined to fulfill all the promises...and implementing all these promises with no turn backwards."

He paid tribute to the "genuineness and truth and your movement...It is important to admit to mistakes in my capacity as the president of the state." But the demonstrators were in no mood to accept more words.

"I cannot and will not accept to be dictated orders from outside," the president said, implying that the pressure for his departure was inspired from outside the country. By the end of the speech, protesters were beginning to wave shoes in the air, a harsh insult in local culture.

The national dialogue has yielded a preliminary agreement, Mubarak said. "Day by day, there will be a process of peaceful transition." Few in the square, chanting, "He must leave," believed peace, with Mubarak in office, is likely.