My first encounter with the concept of “democratic transformation” was in South Africa in 2004, when I attended a seminar in Cape Town at the Center of Higher Education Transformation, and asked why the center was given that name.

Calls for the army to take over power, which come from “revolutionary” and “civil” forces, reveal the failures of those in power and the bankruptcy of the opposition, and thus require closer inspection.

As Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood government slides toward the financial cliff, what’s the right policy for the United States? That’s becoming an urgent question, as Egypt’s financial reserves decline and the country nears a new breaking point.

In his first visit to Egypt since taking office on 2 and 3 March, newly-appointed US Secretary of State John Kerry came to deliver the following message: that the protagonists in Egypt’s political crisis – regime and opposition – must agree on a political map aimed at breaking the deadlock and making the concessions needed to reach common ground to advance the current chaotic transitional period.

Looking for ways to improve my English when I first arrived in the US, I chanced upon a book about strong and weak words. It now strikes me how the reporting and writing about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is replete with weak words.

Nobody could have mistaken the horror this 6-year-old girl was experiencing. Nothing more tells of the fear that gripped her than the warm yellow fluid running down her short legs as her knees started to shake. Her heartbeat escalated as the quiver of her little lips began.

Successive events continue to show confusion among political forces on the relation between the state and religion. Shura Council discussions over the past few weeks were eye opening in this regard. The draft law on “Islamic bonds” — submitted by Islamists — was rejected by Al-Azhar (according to Article 4 of the constitution, senior Azhar scholars are consulted on Sharia issues), not because it contradicts Sharia but because it prevents appeals against decisions that are based on it. Also because it gives foreigners ownership rights, which seems more of a political rather than a religious argument. In reaction, civil groups, which fear the interference of religious institutions in governance, welcomed the move.

Successive events continue to show confusion among political forces on the relation between the state and religion. Shura Council discussions over the past few weeks were eye opening in this regard.

Egyptian politics are somewhat like a dining and dancing establishment. Egyptians attend to eat a filling meal, while being entertained by numerous programs that enable them to dance as they eat. Apparently, what really matters to the audience is the copiousness of the meal, not the entertainment program, overcrowded with musicians and singers.

An Egyptian army conscript walks up to 12-year-old Omar Salah Omran, who sells hot sweet potatoes on the street - outside the front gates of Cairo’s US Embassy, close to Tahrir Square - and requests two potatoes from the young street vendor.

From the outset of the revolution, we had dreamy romantic perceptions that it would move us forward. We perceived the rebels as being mature and consolidated, facing the dishonorable political power with bare chests. The situation was easy to describe and the fronts were clear; highly moral and brave rebels facing a tyrannical authority that was trying to eliminate them by arrest, injury and murder, using its security forces and hired thugs. Whenever a rebel was killed or injured by the treacherous authority, they became symbols that we celebrated.

From the outset of the revolution, we had dreamy romantic perceptions that it would move us forward. We perceived the rebels as being mature and consolidated, facing the dishonorable political power with bare chests. The situation was easy to describe and the fronts were clear; highly moral and brave rebels facing a tyrannical authority that was trying to eliminate them by arrest, injury and murder, using its security forces and hired thugs. Whenever a rebel was killed or injured by the treacherous authority, they became symbols that we celebrated.

At the beginning it was Ultras Ahlawy. On 27 January, a judge ordered the execution of 21 civilians in the Port Said football violence, in which at least 72 football fans were killed.

On a recent Friday, coppersmith Alaa Moussa parked himself in the same spot where two years earlier he had stood defiantly with a handwritten banner addressed to then president Hosni Mubarak

Mohamed Morsi is indeed full of surprises. Ever since Morsi took office, he has never ceased to present us Egyptians with surprising decisions that make us wonder how, why, and for what purpose these decisions were made in the first place.

The Arabic definition of feloul depends on the sentence, but basically covers an array of negative adjectives, including defeated, barren, broken or bankrupt.

The soundtracks of 007 movies 'Live and Let Die' and 'Skyfall' had been particularly useful in understanding the relations between Egypt's minister of defence General Abdel Fatah Al-Sisi and the Muslim Brothers’ President Morsi, which is significant to grasp the country’s deepening political and economic crisis.

Numbers can say a lot about the status achieved by Islamists on the second anniversary of the 25 January revolution.

The National Salvation Front (NSF) is the main entity encompassing opposition to the Islamists in Egypt. It often projects itself as a united and homogenous body

Some imagination is necessary to better deal with reality. So imagine Egypt without the Muslim Brotherhood; then imagine the political scene that would not only be void of the Brotherhood but of their critics as well.

Amidst the increasing violence on the Egyptian street and the uncertainty regarding the political transition process, the birth of the second Egyptian republic seems to be highly complicated.