Syria (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Critical Mass?

Claimed video of military cadets marching for the opposition in Aleppo in Syria on Friday

1925 GMT: The AP is now carrying a story we've been reporting this afternoon, the clashes in Cairo, Egypt:

A crowd estimated at around 10,000 people set out from downtown Cairo's Tahrir Square but was stopped from reaching the military headquarters in the eastern Abbasiyah neighborhood by a line of army barricades. Along the way, they chanted slogans against the military council's delay in implementing their demands.

Bands of men armed with knives and sticks set upon them from side roads, setting off pitched street battles in which both sides threw punches and hurled rocks. Gunfire was heard, but it was unclear who was shooting.

1919 GMT: Bahraini police harass protesters with tear gas in Maameer:

1911 GMT: The situation might be winding down in Egypt:

RT @Sandmonkey: The #abassia battle seems to be over. People are getting out now.

1901 GMT: There are reports of an escalating situation in Egypt. According to Rasha Abdulla:

AlJazeera: More than 70 protesters injured in #Abbasiya clashes #massira

An activist is also sharing this picture, reportedly showing smoke in the air after a car was lit on fire and molotov cocktails were thrown (there appears to be fire in the background as well).

1856 GMT: Al Jazeera reports on events in Homs, where a general strike has been called and thousands protested today alongside the funerals of three people killed yetsreday:

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Syria (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Can the Regime "Lose" Homs?

2100 GMT: Night-time protest in Daraa in southern Syria tonight, "Oh Homs, Daraa is with you until death":

And a demonstration in the Tayba Al-Imam section in Hama also expresses solidarity:

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Yemen 1st-Hand: "They Want to Turn the Revolution into a Tribal War" (Worth)

Freedom Square, Taiz, YemenThe events in Taiz took on a tragic dimension that went beyond the numbers of dead and wounded. Taiz is Yemen’s least tribal city, home to the highest number of educated people, professionals and traders. The city was “the heart of the revolution,” in one popular refrain, and its protesters were less politicized and more rigorously nonviolent than elsewhere in Yemen. The attack on May 29, with its deliberate cruelty and excess, confirmed what many Yemenis feared: that Saleh sees the democratic uprising as a greater threat to his power than Al Qaeda. The burning of the Taiz square, after all, coincided with the collapse of all government authority in large areas of south Yemen, where heavily armed jihadist groups have captured two towns and several villages. In the northwestern province of Saada, too, a militia movement now reigns supreme; they recently elected Yemen’s biggest arms dealer as their new governor. All this has implications that go well beyond Yemen’s remote mountains and deserts — the chaos in the north, for instance, threatens to set off a proxy conflict between the region’s two great nemeses, Saudi Arabia and Iran — and the Yemeni military has done little to oppose any of it.

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Syria, Libya (and Beyond) LiveBlog: "Death Squads"?

1920 GMT: (James accidentally killed this update by Scott, so it is reposted) Video of a protest tonight in the Kafar Souseh section of Damascus:

And women in Keswah chant, "Where are the detainees?"

1915 GMT: There are multiple reports of protests and clashes in Douma, Harasta, Zabadani, Qaboun, and other areas near Damascus, Syria. This is perhaps the most concerning, though unconfirmed, report:

"Security thugs attacked the about 100 protesters in #Qimaryee in #Damascus very aggressively using knifes"

1845 GMT: Along with video from today's protests (below) come reports (from multiple sources, including the LCCS) of an ongoing security crackdown in Zabadani (Zabadany), in the Damascus governate (northwest of center of city):

Damascus Suburbs: yesterday 19 July, Zabadany is still besieged suffering from several security barriers on all entrances and on branch roads leading to farms some tanks are also there. Moving barriers on roads leading to Serghaia and on other roads from and to Zabadany. The arresting campaigns continued by raiding houses, work places, at barriers and even for some people walking in streets. Some motorcycles were confiscated. Even though with the very difficult conditions people went out to streets to demonstrate yelling for freedom and to topple the regime

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Syria (and Beyond) LiveBlog: The Competition of Rallies

Claimed video of Syrian troops joining demonstrators in Al-Bukamal on Saturday (see 0440 GMT)

1929 GMT: Activists are reporting that security forces have used live gunfire against protesters in Daraa, Barza (southwest of Jisr al-Shughour), and in the LCCS is reporting that armed cars, driven by secret police (Shabiha) have opened fire in Homs:

"Cars belonging to armed shabiha roam the besieged neighborhoods and open arbitrary gunfire especially in Bayada & Khaldieh districts, gunfire from checkpoint present at Zenoubia School in Khaldieh"

1922 GMT: An activist has posted these graphic pictures, claiming to show casualties in Sana'a today.

1913 GMT: An in Sana'a, violence has broken out. There are reports of deaths, including a family of five. According to Reuters:

Fighting between government forces and opposition supporters erupted in Yemen's capital Sanaa on Monday, killing six people, opposition sources said. The fighting was the first to break out in Sanaa since President Ali Abdullah Saleh flew to Saudi Arabia for treatment after sustaining severe burn wounds when an attempt to assassinate him was made in June....

One clash began when demonstrators seeking to increase pressure on Saleh to quit marched outside a square where they have been camped for months, said the sources, who declined to be identified.

'Hundreds of youths marched out of the sit-in area, but were confronted by security forces and gunmen in civilian clothes who fired on them. They killed one protester and wounded eight others,' said one source.

In northern Sanaa, a family of five was killed by shelling during clashes between Republican Guard forces and pro-opposition tribesmen, opposition and tribal sources said.

1905 GMT: We've often spoken of the 3 fronts in Yemen, protesters v. Saleh, tribes v. Saleh, and the Yemeni government v. radical muslim insurgents, including members of Al Qaeda. As if the situation there could get any more complicated...

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Syria (and Beyond) LiveBlog: A Regime Losing Control?

2025 GMT: Syria state news agency SANA is highlighting pro-regime rallies throughout the country today, including marches in Damascus, Baniyas, "stressing rejection of all forms of foreign interference in Syria's affairs".

The demonstrators unfurled large Syrian flags, sang the national anthem, and chanted in support of President Assad's reform programme.

2010 GMT: Footage from Morocco's largest city Casablanca of today's pro-reform demonstration:

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Syria (and Beyond) LiveBlog: When "Many Thousands" Becomes Routine....

Claimed footage of protest today in Idlib Province in northwest Syria

1715 GMT: Libyan insurgents carried out a late-night reconnaissance raid on Friday on the oil port of Brega in north-central Libya.

An opposition military spokesman said a light mobile force of about 50 troops had breached regime positions before pulling back for a hoped-for offensive early on Saturday.

The insurgents held Brega for weeks in the spring before it was retaken by Muammar Qaddafi's forces.

The opposition troops had reportedly tried to dispose of more than 150 landmines found outside the town, to make way for heavy artillery, but the assault left at least 10 dead and 172 wounded, according to medics.

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Egypt (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Marching Again in Cairo

1645 GMT: Thanks to James Miller for taking the LiveBlog through the afternoon.

Video testifies to a series of protests across Yemen today, calling for a transitional government. Claimed footage of a march in Taiz attacked by security forces:

A march of women and children in Taiz:

A demonstration in Hodeidah:

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Syria, Yemen (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Postures of "National Dialogue"

1155 GMT: Thanks to James Miller for stepping in for a bit.

A couple of quotes, from those opposition figures who did attend, to flesh out the sketch of Syria's "national dialogue" talks that we offered in our first entry (see 0310 GMT)....

Mohammad Habash, an independent MP, said, "The way out is by putting an end to the security stateand to work for a civil and democratic country where there is political pluralism and media freedom and to end the one-party rule. Confronting protests with bullets is not acceptable at all."

And dissident writer Tayyeb Tizini asserted, "The bullets are still being fired in Homs and Hama. I would have hoped that that would have stopped before the meeting. That's what's necessary."

1130 GMT: Yemen's President Ali Abdullah Saleh has met with US envoy John Brennan in Saudi Arabia. Yemeni State Television has released this video, where Saleh can be seen with his hands still bandaged. According to the State Department, Brennan pushed Saleh to sign the GCC transition plan.

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Yemen Snapshot: Two Brothers Fighting on Opposite Sides (Boone)

Opposition Tribesmen in Sanaa, YemenIn the eyes of Hashim, an antigovernment activist and writer fond of quoting Islamic philosophers, Yemen's peaceful struggle for democracy is divinely ordained.

But his brother, a member of Yemen's elite Republican Guard, sees it differently. Ghazi says Yemen's uprising is driven not by democratic aspirations but by bandits trying to incite chaos. "They have attacked power stations, cut off supply lines to major cities," he points out.

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