It looks increasingly improbable that Egyptian leader Mohamed Morsi can navigate his way out of the crisis engulfing his presidency.
While a deadline from opposition campaigners for their demands to be addressed expired yesterday, most eyes were still on the army's separate ultimatum which runs out this afternoon.
Opposition demands were bolstered by the millions of Egyptians who turned out to demonstrate against Mr Morsi on Sunday. Their one key call is for Mr Morsi to stand down and offer fresh presidential elections.
Rival pro-Morsi protests held in Cairo's Tahrir Square yesterday were modest by comparison but Mr Morsi's defenders are surely right to point to his democratic mandate. They object that if he is forced out there is nothing to stop subsequent democratically elected candidates facing the same fate whenever they become unpopular. That is true, but when protests bring such vast numbers on to the streets, it is hard to equate that with the mid-term blues routinely seen in other democracies.
While a campaign of civil disobedience is now promised by opposition groups, the plans of armed forces chief General Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi are far from clear.
He called on Mr Morsi and the opposition to end the public unrest within 48 hours, pledging that the army would otherwise intervene and set out its own road map for change. This seems to include rule by an interim council ahead of a new constitution and presidential elections.
International anxiety over the situation has been growing and US President Barack Obama has called for Mr Morsi to acknowledge that democracy is about more than simply election results. The regime run by Mr Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood has been autocratic, opponents argue, and Egypt's current leadership has failed to recognise that democracy must go further than the ballot box. Other White House sources have appeared to suggest that Mr Morsi should tackle unrest by appointing a new prime minister and reshuffling his cabinet.
It is hard to know what to propose to prevent a gradual slide towards civil war in a region which is already highly unstable due to the crisis in Syria and large anti-government protests in Turkey.
While protesters hope fresh elections might see a new, more revolutionary leader elected, there are few obvious candidates, and the prospects for a peaceful resolution if the army steps in, perhaps putting Mr Morsi under house arrest and imposing new elections, are not good.
Facing ministerial resignations and little prospect of forming a working government, Mr Morsi's defiant insistence on seeing out his term is surely equally implausible.
In a country which was so key to the so-called Arab Spring, preserving democratic principles is vital. It may not be ideal, but the best chance of doing this is for Egypt's leader to forestall army intervention by calling new presidential elections, with the hope that this can renew rather than confound the achievements of the 2011 revolution which toppled Hosni Mubarak.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article