Al Qaeda is mainly driven by the Saudi Arabian Wahabi sect of Islam but al Qaeda's militant roots goes back to the Muslim Brotherhood. The Muslim Brotherhood is mainly an Egyptian phenomena. The Muslim Brotherhood was partially a reaction to Egypt's former president Gamal Abdel Nasser's attempt to turn Egypt into a socialist paradise (he was not successful).

There is a lot of tension in Egypt. The Egyptian government is democratic in name only. If the current Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak were to enable genuine democracy then probability the Muslim Brotherhood would plunge Egypt into civil war. The Copts are what's left of the original Egyptians. The Copts are one of the world's oldest Christian communities. Islam was imposed upon the Egyptians by Moslem invaders streaming out of the Arabian penninsula in 641 AD. The Copts are now a persecuted minority in their own country. If the Muslim Brotherhood gains political control of Egypt then the Coptic community will probably be wiped out. Arguably the only thing protecting the Copts from extinction is the non-democratic government of Hosni Mubarak.

Gary