An aerial view of drying washing amidst rubble and dusty rooftops of houses in the village of Bairat, on the West Bank of Luxor, Nile Valley, Egypt. Egypt is the most populous country in the Middle East and the third-most populous on the African continent (after Nigeria and Ethiopia). About 95% of the country's 82.5 million (2012 est.) people live along the banks of the Nile throughout the Nile Delta, which fans out north of Cairo; and along the Suez Canal.