2112 GMT: James is taking a break, but he wanted to note that we've receieved dozens of protest videos from Syria, some of which we will put into a separate feature.
2106 GMT: This video claims to show protesters in the Alqarya area of Sitra, Bahrain, tonight, before the protesters are attacked by police:
2051 GMT: Syrian expatriates have founded a 140 member transitional council in Turkey. The goal of the national council is to establish a vision for a post-Assad Syria, and to continue to organize peaceful pro-democracy protests:
At the meeting, 70 names were read out from a list of 140, as at least some of the rest cannot be named, possibly because they are inside Syria, says the BBC's Jonathan Head in Istanbul.
Others are in exile.
The opposition groups seem to have finally agreed to what is effectively an embryonic Syrian national assembly, says our correspondent.
For the first time, it has the full backing of all opposition groups inside and outside the country, and will now represent the opposition, he (opposition spokesman) adds.
Claimed footage of a mass funeral procession for Ezzat al-Baidee, the teenager whose death in the Damascus suburb of Douma on Monday was captured on video
2045 GMT: Another clip of the mass rally, organised by the opposition party Al Wefaq (see 1629 GMT), in Bahrain today:
2012 GMT: Protesters have removed most of the wall around the Israeli embassy in Cairo and a protester has once again scaled the 15-story building in order to remove the Israeli flag.
1954 GMT: NATO has conducted 120 sorties today, 42 of them hitting ground targets near Sirte, Bani Walid, and Hun, the last remaining areas with a heavy pro-Qaddafi presence.
1800 GMT: The World Food Programme [WFP] is tendering for 250,000 tonnes of gasoline on behalf of Libya's ruling interim council. The official statement reads:
At the request of Libya's National Transitional Council (NTC), WFP is looking to procure 250,000 metric tons of gasoline that would cover immediate life-saving humanitarian needs for one month. Fuel supplies have been disrupted by the fighting, and water and electricity supplies depend on fuel-run generators. Fuel is also required for hospitals, ambulances and vehicles to distribute critically needed medicines, food, water, and other supplies.
1730 GMT: Following the Eid prayers, Muslim Brotherhood called on Egyptians to protect the "freedoms" against "any manipulation of the people’s will or choice" and reemphisezed the importance of handing over power to a civil government as soon as possible.
1710 GMT: Asset freezes and bans on business interactions were imposed on Foreign Minister Walid Muallem, top presidential advisor Bouthaina Shaaban, and Syrian ambassador to Lebanon Ali Abdul Karim Ali, the US Treasury Department announced.
1645 GMT: Four video footages showing demonstrations in Damascus, Homs, Hama and Aleppo respectively.
2118 GMT: The LCCS is reporting that live ammunition and tear gas has been fired at protests in Douma, Damascus, in front of the Al Watani hospital. Also, a reliable activist in Syria who uses the pseudonym "Alexander Page" has an unconfirmed report that security forces are using ambulances to drive into protests in Qatana, Damascus, and they are shooting at the protesters from the back of the vehicles. Many activists are reporting that protesters are being arrested and harassed in and around Damascus tonight.
2110 GMT: Protests after Taraweeh prayers tonight, Zabadani, Damascus, Syria:
2103 GMT: Activists are reporting the presence of 30,000 protesters on the streets of Homs. We can't verify that number, but what we do know is that the amount of video coming from the city, like this one, from different sources and from different areas, suggests that in Homs, and around Damascus, the crowds tonight are very large:
2050 GMT: A very large anti-government demonstration in an important suburb of Damascus, Harasta, earlier today:
2017 GMT: This video, allegedly taken in Hama, shows men in a tank firing into the city. Though we never see the targets they shoot at, the note on the video is that none of the soldiers appear to be taking cover, and the soldiers outside the tank appear to be relaxed, suggesting that their target was unarmed.
Heavy gunfire in an attempt to disperse a massive demonstration that set off a short time ago from the Sa'ad Mosque
Foru people have also reportedly been injured when security opened fire on protesters in the Damascus suburb of Madaya, as a march was leaving the Shamali Mosque.
1954 GMT: Protests are also reported in the Douma District of Damascus. This video shows the scene after Taraweeh prayers:
In a separate entry, we had posted 2 exclusive videos. One video showed what may be the remains of the now infamous bodies that were dumped in a Hama river.
But the video at the top of the entry shows something very interesting, soldiers beating protesters while they are detained in a bus, forcing them to shout pro-Assad chants. Al Jazeera now has an interesting piece of analysis, that the soldiers in the video have beards, and beards are not allowed in the regular army.
This Friday was one of the most important during the course of the protest movement in Syria. For weeks, the security forces and the military, through their operations, have prevented mass demonstrations. However, in a remarkable step and due to increasing international support for the protest movement and the subsequent morale boost, many protesters have managed to overcome the security and military barriers and begin taking the steps necessary to de-legitimize the government. Despite the Syrian president’s promises to withdraw his troops and end military operations across the country, armored vehicles and tanks have continued to be stationed in city centers. In fact, security backups have been called to quell protests such as the one that occurred in Hirak and Ankhal in the Daraa Governorate, where they have resumed gunfire using both light and heavy machine guns. Today alone, security forces killed at least 22 protesters, including children who were not part of the demonstrations.
In the besieged city of Homs, all neighborhoods, including Khaldieh, Bab Sbaa, and Baba Amr demonstrated in thousands, despite gunfire yesterday and today, and despite the violent military operations in the city for the past week, which take lives on a daily basis. Deir Ezzor is in the same condition, but demonstrations approached large numbers before the military invasion.
The statement also said that there were renewed protests in the embattled regions of Idlib, its suburbs, and Hama, where security once again fired on demonstrators. In Lattakia and in Jableh, the most recent scenes of the military crackdown, protesters also began retaking the streets.
2104 GMT: James Miller is wrapping up the liveblog (but only because he has to start it again in 5-8 hours).
Our closing thought, the AP has compiled some video of Lattakia, taken today:
2038 GMT: The Local Coordinating Committees of Syria are reporting protests, heavy security, and the use of live ammunition against crowds in Homs, Deir Ez Zor, Aleppo, and the Qadam district of Damascus. Large protests are reported, once again, in almost every corner of Syria.
2025 GMT: Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmed Davutoglu expressed his frustration at the situatio today in Syria:
“We are asking Assad to actualize the steps we agreed on in our talks with him,” he went on to say, referring to his meeting with Assad last Tuesday. “He had taken some positive steps in the first few days. Such as the withdrawal of tanks from Hama and providing the transportation of our press members to Hama, but operations have continued in various cities since Friday. It is not possible to condone these operations, which have claimed the lives of many civilians,” he said.
“We have requested an immediate halt of these operations, and we will continue to do so. We are calling on the Syrian administration to be more sensitive to its own people and not to further increase the tension. The necessary steps must be taken immediately. The operations causing civilian losses should be stopped, particularly in this holy month of Ramadan. We will keep on with our contacts in the coming days. The Syrian issue is a matter we have been following very closely; it is a matter we are directly concerned with in every aspect.”
Davutoglu went on to deliver his strongest words yet to Syria's Bahsar al Assad:
“This is our final word to the Syrian authorities: Our first expectation is that these operations stop immediately and unconditionally,” Mr. Davutoglu told a news conference in Ankara, Turkey. “If the operations do not end, there would be nothing more to discuss about steps that would be taken,” he said, without saying what that action might include.
Saturday, September 17, 2011 at 13:46 | 