It's Begun.

Yesterday, February 2nd almost medieval violence returned to the streets of Egypt as gangs of men armed with sticks, whips and machetes started to attack anti-government demonstrations. In Cairo, where the violence has been at it's worst, this first day has killed a minimum of five and injured at least 836 more.

Officially the violence has been caused by honest, hard working Egyptians who have been so outraged by the protests that they've spontaneously decided to take action to support their much loved President. In reality the protesters have been able to capture and search some of the attackers revealing them to be a mix of plain clothed police officers, members of Mubarak's political party and simply paid thugs. In Alexandria where the protests are at their strongest these armed gangs have been force to rely on uniformed police escorts in order to move around the city. The only good news is that because these pro-Mubarak supporters are just men for hire they will lack the stamina of legitimate protesters.

The purpose of the Mubarak regime getting thugs to attack the protesters is twofold. Firstly it reduces the number of people able to take part in protests by either killing them, seriously injuring them or making them too scared to take part. Secondly the violence creates the illusion that the anti-government protests are causing chaos in Egypt so Egypt and the world needs Mubarak to stay on so he can restore security and stability.

Having lived with Mubarak for thirty years the protesters know that if they back down now the violence will only get worse so they have called for another day of mass demonstrations on Friday February 4th. The worry here is that they will again focus their protests of Tahrir square. In the spring of 2010 people in Thailand staged mass protests against their government. These demonstrations focused on occupying and setting up a protest camp in the Ratchaprasong district of the capital. After probing attacks by the Thai security forces the protesters started setting up barricades and ended up trapped inside their own fortified camp. The Thai security forces then simply used snipers to kill the protest leaders before finally setting fire to the camp. Therefore it would be a better idea if the Egyptian protesters also used mobile demonstrations that focused on multiple locations.

Also there is no longer any point on relying on the BBC for news on the situation in Egypt. They've started producing special programming that means they are now acting as a 24hr a day pro-Mubarak propaganda service. They're failing to report that what they call pro-Mubarak protesters are being moved under police escort and they're refusing to show photographs where captured thugs are having their police ID cards taken off them. Also all presenters and guests are under strict orders to promote the official line that Mubarak has already made great concessions and most Egyptians fully support him and want the protests to stop. I knew it was a mistake to explain the situation to the Brits.