The BBC have published a challenging insight into events in Egypt and the way Mubarak has played his cards. It concludes:

Mr Mubarak is effectively ‘kettling’ an entire country. Over a fifth of the country lives below the poverty line. They cannot protest indefinitely and, unlike the president, they must return to work.

In the meantime – with two out of three constituencies secure – Mr Mubarak can play a waiting game.

This forces the protesters to endure a harsh status quo or escalate by targeting the bastions of the state, the latter bringing upon them the wrath of an already petrified international community, who may feel it has done its job by putting a limit on Mr Mubarak’s term.

Those agitating for escalation ought to recall the anti-Saddam uprisings of 1991 by Kurds and others, in which the US first encouraged and then shied away from supporting resistance.

The result was massacres under the eyes of the international community.