The internal and external pressures for democratic reform in the Middle East have never been greater. The strength of President Bush’s commitment to the transformation of the region is no longer doubted, either by his domestic critics or by Arab intellectuals and hitherto entrenched political and military elites. The logic behind the strategy, a deliberate reversal of the decades of US tolerance of unpalatable regional governments for the sake of “stability”, is that pressing for wider political debate, economic modernisation and women’s rights is essential for the region’s long-term success.

In Iraq, the Palestinian Authority and Lebanon, and more cautiously in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, political relaxation has been producing electoral outcomes that, while not always ideal, have underlined the strength of popular demand for a say in government. The next proving ground, and the one that may have the most profound impact on the Middle East, is Egypt.

Under persistent US prompting to take “a democratic lead” in the Arab world, Hosni Mubarak, whose hold on the presidency has endured, unchallenged, for 24 years, has changed the constitution to allow opponents to run against him in September. Parliamentary elections will follow in November.

These polls will be Egyptians’ first taste of multiparty democracy since Nasser’s coup in 1952 ushered in decades of quasi-military rule. Voters’ tastes are, admittedly, being carefully “educated”. The Government has unapologetically maintained its political ban on the Muslim Brotherhood, Islamists whose proclaimed conversion to democracy ministers dismiss as an opportunistic ruse. The ruling National Democratic Party retains power to vet candidates.

Opposition supporters boycotted last month’s constitutional referendum in protest, and some were brutally beaten up on the streets of Cairo. Egypt’s first reaction to the announcement by Ayman Nour, a liberal, that he intended to challenge Mr Mubarak, was to lock him up. The US had to insist on his release, but his arrest said much about the nervousness about opening the door to democracy, even by this careful chink.

The risk is that Islamist groups, whether moderate or radical, could be the big gainers. Liberal and secular politicians are at a huge disadvantage; discriminated against in official media, for years they have had no platform, whereas Islamists had their mosques. There is no guarantee that “political Islam” would respect democracy’s rules, or that Egyptian Islamists would hold back from supporting Palestinian terrorism — a particular worry in the context of Israel’s pullout from Gaza.

As we report today, Egyptian reformers who have already done much to free up the economy are genuinely anxious for change. Egyptians live in a sometimes tolerant state whose relative calm they value. An internationally monitored, reasonably fair election in this vast, populous, unnecessarily impoverished country would give fresh impetus to the entire region. And Mr Mubarak could be an un-expected role model.