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Under the 1980 amendments of the Egyptian Constitution, the President is elected for six years. As of 2005, President Mohamed Hosni Mubarak has been the President of the Republic since 14 October 1981 and is currently serving his last year of his fourth term. President Mubarak was re-elected in 1987, 1993, and 1999, making him the longest serving Egyptian President in the history of the Republic.

Egypt also hosts two major religious institutions. Al-Azhar University, the oldest Islamic institution for higher studies (founded around 970 CE) with its corresponding mosque Al-Azhar. The head of Al-Azhar is traditionally regarded as the supreme leader of Sunni Muslims all over the world. Egypt also has a strong Christian heritage as evidenced by the existence of the Coptic Orthodox Church headed by the Patriarch of Alexandria, which claims a following of 50 million Christians worldwide (one of the famous Coptic Orthodox Churches is Saint Takla Haimanot Church in Alexandria

Geography, population, history, military strength, and diplomatic expertise give Egypt extensive political influence in the Middle East. Cairo has been a crossroads of Arab commerce and culture for millennia, and its intellectual and Islamic institutions are at the center of the region's social and cultural development.

The Egyptians are a fairly homogeneous people. Mediterranean and Arab influences appear in the north, and there is some mixing in the south with the Nubians of northern Sudan. Many theories has been proposed on the origins of the Egyptians, however non are conclusive, and the most widely accepted theory is that Egyptian society was the result of a mix of east african and asiatic people who moved to the Nile Valley after the ice age. The bulk of Modern Egyptian society still maintains a homogenous genetic tie to the ancient Egyptian society which has always been regarded as rural and most populous compared to the neighboring demographics. The Egyptian people spoke only languages from the Afro-Asiatic family (previously known as Hamito-semitic) throughout their history starting with Old Egyptian, to modern Arabic.

The Egyptian judicial system is based on European, primarily French, legal concepts and methods. Under the several governments during the presidency of Mubarak, the courts have demonstrated increasing independence, and the principles of due process and judicial review have gained greater respect. The legal code is derived largely from the Napoleonic Code. Marriage and personal status are primarily based on the religious law of the individual concerned. Thus, there are three forms of Family Law in Egypt, Islamic, Christian, and secular (based on the French Family Laws).

In the Coptic Church only men may be ordained, and they must be married before they are ordained, if they wish to be married. In this respect they follow the same practices as does the Eastern Orthodox Church.

The word "mummy" is thought to be derived from the Arabic word mumiyah, which maens bitumen. Because of the the blackened skin of unwrapped mummies, bitumen was once thought to be used extensively in ancient Egyptian embalming procedures. Another possible source for the name is the Egyptian Coptic word mum, for wax of which the use in Egyptian embalming was in fact documented.

The vast majority of Egypt's population inhabit the banks of the Nile river (about 40,000 km²).Large areas of land are part of the Sahara Desert and are sparsely inhabited.

Disruptive social changes and Sadat's relative tolerance toward political parties contributed to the rapid growth of Islamic groups in the 1970s. On university campuses, for example, Sadat initially viewed the rise of Islamic associations (Gama'at Islamiya) as a counterbalance to leftist influence among students. The Gama'at Islamiya spread quite rapidly on campuses and won up to one-third of all student union elections. These victories provided a platform from which the associations campaigned for Islamic dress, the veiling of women, and the segregation of classes by gender. Secular university administrators opposed these goals. In 1979 Sadat sought to diminish the influence of the associations through a law that transferred most of the authority of the student unions to professors and administrators. During the 1980s, however, Islamists gradually penetrated college faculties. At Asyut University, which was the scene of some of the most intense clashes between Islamists and their opponents (including security forces, secularists, and Copts), the president and other top administrators--who were Islamists--supported Gama'at Islamiya demands to end mixed-sex classes and to reduce total female enrollment.

Under comprehensive economic reforms initiated in 1991, Egypt has relaxed many price controls, reduced subsidies, and partially liberalized trade and investment. Manufacturing is still dominated by the public sector, which controls virtually all heavy industry. A process of public sector reform and privatization has begun, however, which could enhance opportunities for the private sector. Agriculture, mainly in private hands, has been largely deregulated, with the exception of cotton and sugar production. Construction, non-financial services, and domestic marketing are largely private. This has promoted a steady increase of GNP and the annual growth rate. Among Arab countries, Egypt's GDP is second only to Saudi Arabia's. However, the Egyptian economy relies heavily on tourist revenues. The tourism sector suffered tremendously following a terrorist attack on tourists in Luxor in October 1997, and the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks against the United States, affecting the economy as a whole.