2100 GMT: One Egyptian soldier beats a protester while another soldier wields a handgun:
2005 GMT: An EA source is reporting another death from the activities of the security forces in Bahrain. Abdali Al Mawaly, a 58-year-old man, suffered the effects of tear gas inhalation in Mugsha village on Friday and died this evening. People are now gathered around his house.
“People here are ready with rocks,” said Omar Habbal, an activist....
In past weeks, Hama, a city of 800,000 on the corridor between Damascus and Aleppo, has emerged as a symbolic center of the nearly four-month uprising against 41 years of rule by the Assad family. Protests have gathered momentum, with a remarkable demonstration of tens of thousands on Friday, and youths have turned out nightly to taunt the government in Aasi Square, which they have renamed Freedom Square.
Though some have ambitiously described the city as liberated, the city’s administration still functions, and the military remains in force on Hama’s outskirts.
Residents said about 20 military vehicles and several buses carrying armed men in plain clothes, arrived in the early morning. As they entered, some of the security forces chanted in support of President Bashar al-Assad; some residents in the streets responded with, “God is great,” a religious invocation meant as defiance.
“The whole city woke up to defend against the raid,” Mr. Habbal said.
Some activists said residents threw rocks, and others tried to build roadblocks and barricades with whatever was available — burning tires, stones and trash dumpsters.
The plainclothesmen carried out dozens of arrests, mainly on the outskirts. One activist said 43, another put the number at 65, though the estimates seemed more guesswork. Residents reported gunfire, but the forces soon retreated.
“The security forces entered, then they left quickly,” said a 24-year-old student who gave his name as Abdel-Rahman. Like many, he insisted on partial anonymity. “People are waiting. They can’t control Hama unless they wipe out the people here.”
1907 GMT: The US State Department Spokeswoman, Victoria Nuland, has defended a Syrian-government funded trip by a US ambassador to tour northern Syria. Nuland said that it was an opportunity for Ambassador Robert Ford to "see for himself the results of the Syrian government's brutality." According to Ford, the town of Jisr al-Shughour, a focus of the tour, was abandoned, and there were no civilians present to dispute the Syrian government's claims.
1844 GMT: An activist with sources in Libya is claiming that NATO has struck positions occupied by pro-Gaddafi forces near Nalut. Also, Gaddafi's forces in Ghazaya have also been hit by NATO aitstrikes five times in the last day, and his forces in Ruwais have also been struck:
1811 GMT: Journalists in Libya are reporting that Misurata is once again being shelled by Gaddafi forces, potentially by Grad rockets. Three or four large explosions have been heard in the last hour, and there were explosions on Benghazi street.
Britain's Tony Blair & Muammar Qaddafi, 2004You might think that the "Arab Spring" would bring hope to everyone, given calls for democracy, justice, civil society, political representation, freedom of expression and media.
Nope.
There is one group which is worried that all of these demonstrations and discussions might be aiding terrorism. "European and Israeli intelligence officers" are worried that friendly intelligence services --- you know, Mr Qaddafi's men in Libya, Mubarak's in Egypt, Ben Ali's in Tunisia --- are being disrupted by all this fuss on the streets.
Saturday, December 17, 2011 at 13:47 | 
