[Rostov]

I'm not an expert, but I think what happened is that a ton Egyptians have always been opposed to Mubarak, and have wanted to do something about it. Then they saw what happened in Tunisia, where the president had to flee because of mass protests, and they were like, HEY WE SHOULD DO THAT TOO. So now they're protesting to get him out of there (and successfully it seems).

^This. The protests are spreading now to Yemen as well. With much of the world is slowly getting richer(as a whole) with the rise of global free trade, the non-oil middle East(except Israel) is stuck in poverty run by autocratic regimes. The middle class in Egypt are well educated but tired of being unemployed/underemployed. They're pressuring for change for more democracy and for more of the wealth to trickle down to the masses.