Welcome to Middle East Live. On the surface the capital cities of Libya and Syria are staying loyal to their respective governments. But the Guardian correspondents in both Tripoli and Damascus have uncovered simmering discontent.
First, David Smith in Tripoli:
Numerous witnesses tell the same story: that when night falls, out come the police checkpoints aimed at locking down restive districts, but so too do rebel militas opposed to Muammar Gaddafi. Under cover of darkness, it is said, they emerge from hiding to ambush his security forces. In some neighbourhoods the gun battles rage every night, but the bodies of those killed and all other traces are swiftly removed.
With security tight and little sign of a major uprising in Tripoli, these audacious guerrilla tactics appear to be the rebels' best hope of chipping away at the Libyan leader's defences.
Now Nidaa Hassan, a pseudonym of a journalist in Damascus, describes life in Syrian capital:
Normality belies a city that may not yet have been rocked by the protest movement, but has been torn apart under the surface. The protests and the regime's violent response – which it has blamed on armed gangs of foreigners and extremists – triggered an emotional reaction in the capital that has shifted from denial and confusion to anger and, finally, polarisation...
Everyone knows the calm in the centre may not last. Stories of detention and torture circulate widely, opening eyes to the brutality of the regime, which under Assad's rule has positioned itself as reformist, with some success, far from the dark days of his father's time in power.
A cafe customer tells her:
This country does not belong to Assad and we need to make that clear. Damascus's day will come because the whole country, including here, has already witnessed a revolution in horizons and aspirations.
In Hama, 130 miles north of Damascus, the city is open revolt in a standoff with security forces who have encircled the city.
One resident told the Guardian:
We are protecting the central square area. We have checkpoints and roadblocks of burning tyres.
If the boys manning the checkpoints see security forces coming, they shout, everyone picks up that shout, and people go inside. So far they haven't broken through into the city centre being protected.
"The Syrian people's fight for freedom promises to be long, uncertain, and violent," warns Syria watcher Gary Gambill in Foreign Policy magazine.
The crux of the problem is Syria's unique minority-dominated power structure, which is most closely comparable to Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Alawites, a heterodox Islamic sect comprising roughly 12 percent of Syria's population, may not be the privileged minority suggested by some Western media reports, but they provide both the brains and the muscle for a secular authoritarian political order that would otherwise be untenable.
Alawite solidarity renders the loyalty of the internal military-security apparatus nearly inviolable, enabling Assad to mete out a level of repression far beyond the capacity of most autocrats.
But US officials are describing events in Hama as a possible turning point in the uprising, according to the Washington Post. One said:
The support base is eroding, and particularly among the business elite.These guys carry a lot of weight, and until now they have benefited from the regime. Now they're looking for an alternative, and Assad is not part of the solution.
Here are some of the other main developments in the region:
Libya
• Senior Chinese diplomat, Chen Xiaodong, has called for talks to end the conflict in Libya. He made the plea after a meeting with members of the opposition National Transition Council in Benghazi.
• Libyan rebels have launched an apparently co-ordinated two-pronged offensive against pro-Gaddafi forces, striking from bases in the western mountains south-west of Tripoli and from the besieged city of Misrata, 130 miles to the east.
• Analysts are concerned about the possibility of "catastrophic success" in Libya. The Guardian's Simon Tisdall explains:
In this scenario, the negotiated settlement between regime and rebels and the orderly departure from power of Muammar Gaddafi that is the UN and Nato's stated aim does not happen. Instead, Gaddafi is killed or flees, his government implodes, the rebels' national transitional council splinters into rival power bases, and unpaid army units and police, renegade mercenaries and tribal militias (armed in some cases by France) commence battle for the nation's oil wealth.
Egypt
• The Minister of the Interior Mansour al-Essawy has promised a shake up of the police force ahead of planned rally in Cairo's Tahrir Square tomorrow.
• Hundreds of protesters pelted the security headquarters in the Egyptian city of Suez with rocks on Wednesday, angered by a court's decision to uphold the release of seven policemen facing trials for allegedly killing protesters during the country's uprising.
A new Guardian video explores how Egypt's political divisions are played out in the rivalry between Cairo's biggest football teams Al Ahly and Zamalek.
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"Gaddafi is crumbling and I predict he will fall," US Senator John McCain told the BBC Radio 4's Today programme.
He claimed there was a humanitarian imperative to fight Gaddafi but it was also important for national security of European countries because of Gaddafi's threat to attack Europe.
Libyan rebels claim they are clearing Gaddafi's forces from the western town of al-Qawalish, al-Jazeera reports from Zintan.
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Libya has accused Nato of backing the rebels advance on Tripoli, in breach of the its UN mandate, the Global Post reports.
Deputy foreign ninister Khaled Kaim told AP Nato targeted police checkpoints in the Nafusa mountains southwest of Tripoli ahead of a rebel advance on al-Qawalish.
He claimed rebels were later pushed back from Qawalish. Kaim said: "The aim of these attacks is to help the rebels to advance. But I assure you, it will be another failure for them."
A list of the latest targets hit by Nato appears to show that airstrike are backing the rebels advance.
The Guardian's interactive on the Nato bombing campaign has been updated to include Nato's latest "key hits".
Nato lists them as:
In the vicinity of Brega: 1 Military Refuelling Equipment, 8 Armed Vehicles, 2 Armoured Fighting Vehicles, 1 Truck. In the vicinity of Gharyan: 1 Anti-Aircraft Gun.
In the vicinity of Misratah: 3 Armed Vehicles. In the vicinity of Waddan: 1 Military Storage Facility. In the vicinity of Yafran: 1 Artillery Piece, 1 Armed Vehicle. In the vicinity of Zlitan: 8 Armed Vehicles. In the vicinity of Zintan: 1 Armed Vehicle.
The Middle East analyst Juan Cole, argues that Nato's action falls within the UN resolution.
Gaddafi made his an outlaw state and under these circumstances the UN resolution authorizes Nato action to prevent him from committing further atrocities. The only practical way to do so, given his defiance and aggression with heavy weapons, is to hit them where they are committing aggression and to strengthen the Free Libya forces.
A general strike in the rebellious Syrian city of Hama has turned the city into a "ghost town", activists and resident Omar told me in telephone interview.
Omar said electricity had been been switch back on after activists threatened to switch off a power line that would have cut power to large swaths of Syria, Omar claimed. He confirmed that 28 people have been killed in the city since the army began a crackdown on the city. Activist had published their names on a Facebook page he said.
He also claimed that the army tanks had withdrawn from the edge of the city.
Activists say 20 people were injured after shooting on the Hama's Mazreb Bridge.
General strike in #Hama after shooting in Mazreb Bridge which caused 20 injured most of them in Horani hospital #Syria
Omar said this was only a minor incident and that the city was largely calm. "I'm not afraid the city is protecting us," he said.
Video from Hama dated today appears to back Omar's claim that the city is deserted as a result of the strike.
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Graffiti has popped all over Cairo announcing tomorrow's demonstration in Tahrir Square, Cairo-based photographer Themba Lewis says.
She says the bystanders in this photograph are watching a protest march in solidarity with Suez demonstrators, who yesterday attacked police in pitched battles over the release of police officers charged with killing protesters. The photo was taken in Midan Talaat Harb, just a few minutes from Tahrir Square, she says.
Graffiti publicising a planned rally in Cairo's Tahrir Square on 8 July Credit: Themba Lewis
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MEPs have called for humanitarian corridors to be set up help those fleeing the violence in Syria, according to a report by the European Parliament.
Besides calling on the UN security council to pass a resolution condemning Syria, MEPs urged the other EU institutions to press the UN to help the Turkish and Lebanese authorities to set up a humanitarian corridor at their borders with this country.
Activists in the Egyptian capital Cairo took part in the fourth TweetNadwa last night to discuss the Economy and Social Justice. The initiative is kind of highbrow tweetup in speakers are limited to 140-second contributions to discuss Egypt's future.
American blogger Michael Kremer described the "inspiring" atmosphere.
It was impossible not to be inspired by several hundred people voluntarily coming together to talk about the future of their country. The level of energy and passion in the room – fed by the feeling that there is a real window of opportunity right now to shape Egypt's political and economic future – was infectious.
But he seemed slightly unnerved when the discussion took a leftist turn.
Tonight's topic was social justice, and the conversation mainly focused on economics. The microphone swiftly changed hands in the beginning of the meeting, with most of the attendees striking idealistic notes about the necessity of improving healthcare and education, raising the minimum wage, etc. Nothing revolutionary, but nevertheless a good way to start the program. After a brief digression in which the attendees argued amongst themselves about how the stock market functioned and whether it was or wasn't necessary for the country's future, the discussion heated up when a proud Communist stood up and admonished the crowd for not focusing on the real issues.
"You all are forgetting the critical problem here," he declared, "we need to stop talking about the minimum wage and the stock market and start talking about how to end the capitalist plague that is destroying our country! We must return to the basics and realize that capitalism is inherently unfair!"
The crowd's attention instantly turned to broad, ideological issues. Instead of clapping, the moderator told the audience members to raise their arms and wave their hands when they agreed with a certain point, and judging by the amount of raised hands and smiles after that mini-Communist manifesto, the man had many allies in the room.
Citizen journalist Lilian Wagdy published this Flickr gallery of the event.
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Another crack in the Nato alliance over Libya?
The Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said he had opposed the decision to go to war but was forced into it by the Italian parliament, Reuters reports.
"I was against this measure as everyone knows," Berlusconi told a book presentation."I had my hands tied by the vote of the parliament of my country."
Italian support for the campaign has always been weak. Italian jets joined the campaign in late April after Italy initially said it would take no part in air strikes citing Italy's colonial rule.
Last month foreign minister Franco Frattini said civilian deaths from the airstrikes threatened Nato's credibility.
CNN has a compelling undercover report on a clandestine group of Damascus doctors treating those injured in the protests in Syria in make shift field hospital. The report, which was spotted by reader oivejoivej, was put together with graphic YouTube footage of injured protesters.
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More than 700 people have been arrested in the Syrian Hama in the last 24 hours, according to the citizen journalist network Avaaz. It also names 24 people who have been killed in the crackdown.
Avaaz claimed that water and electricity had been cut off in the city. But a resident told the Guardian that electricity had been switched back on after activists threatened to attack a power station that supplies other parts of Syria.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that about 1,000 people had fled the city, according to Al-Jazeera.
Nato has denied helping the rebel advance in Libya, as Gaddafi's regime claimed (10.31am), AP reports.
Wing Cmdr Mike Bracken, an alliance spokesman in Naples, Italy, said Nato is "not involved in the ground battles," although he acknowledged the alliance is tracking the fighting between rebels and forces loyal to Moammar Gadhafi.He said Nato's mandate remains to protect civilians.
Hama will be too preoccupied with defending the city from the army to take part in a demonstration tomorrow, Omar a resident and activist in the city predicted.
"People are guarding the city 24 hours a day," he said. "Today from one side six [army] buses to got in... but they ran away," he said.
He foresaw only small protests taking place tomorrow, and nothing on the scale of last week's rally - the biggest in the Syrian uprising so far.
"People will keep guarding the city. We will not go on a big demonstration and leave the sides of the city open for them," Omar said.
We are safe, we are quiet, [there is] no attack because all the world is watching what they [the regime] are doing. I don't think they will do something silly. Once anyone comes hundreds and thousands get down to the street[s] with stones and wood. Without any weapons just fighting defending their city with stones and wood.
He said it been relatively quiet today after a general strike. People had stopped fleeing the city and tanks had moved away. He insisted that electricity and water in the city were turned back on in the city after activists threatened to blow up an electricity towers that supplies other parts of Syria. "After this threat, within half an hour water and electricity came back," Omar said.
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You can hear earlier audio from Omar here (apologies for not embedding this earlier).
Remember those camels in Tahrir Square ridden by pro-Mubarak supporters during the revolution? Prosecutors in Egypt have charged 25 people with instigating a camel charge in February, Reuters reports.
Supporters of President Hosni Mubarak, including some riding horses and camels and wielding whips, march towards anti-Mubarak protesters in Cairo, Egypt. Photograph: Amr Nabil/AP
This sounds like another attempt to head off anger ahead of tomorrow's planned demonstration in Tahrir Square.
British MPs are wrong to welcome the son of Rifaat al-Assad, a man thought to be responsible for the deaths of thousands of Syrians, argues Chris Doyle, director of the council for Arab-British understanding.
Although he will be speaking out against the Bashar al-Assad regime, the young man also happens to be a first cousin of Syria's president. His name is Ribal al-Assad and the genuine Syrian opposition regard him warily since he represents one side of a decades-old squabble within the ruling family.
It is widely believed that Ribal's father, Rifaat, tried to stage a coup against his brother Hafiz, who was president from 1971 to 2000. Hafiz expelled Rifaat from Syria and he has been obsessed with returning ever since. His sons, including Ribal, are his cheerleaders.
But instead of throwing Rifaat out of Syria, Hafiz should have put him on trial. He is possibly the most hated of all Syrians, including those who are still part of the regime. Few in the region have more innocent blood on their hands.
Earlier this week we reported that graphic video footage had emerge of the body of activist Ibrahim Kashush with his throat cut. Doyle provides some important context:
Only days ago thousands were watching the compelling video of a man singing to a huge crowd in Assi square in Hama, chanting for freedom, singing "Irhal ya Bashar" ("Get out Bashar!"). The crowd goes into rapture as he sings, "Tuzz fiik yaa Bashar" (roughly, "Fuck off, Bashar") and after appearing on YouTube it is being sung at demonstrations across Europe.
But the man who wrote the lyrics, Ibrahim Kashush, will hear it no more. It seems his body was found, washed up in the Orontes, his throat slashed. In Arabic, the Orontes is called Nahr al-Assi ("the rebellious river") and two of its riverbank cities, Hama and Homs, have perhaps been the most rebellious in Syria. Historically they have been rivals but today they are united in one struggle. Homsis have gone into the streets chanting Ibrahim's name.
Tomorrow's protests in Syria have been labelled the "Friday of No Dialogue", activist Edward Dark tweeted. The opposition is refusing to enter talks with the government until it stops the violent crackdown.
The Local Co-ordination Committees of Syria said thousands of people attended the funeral today of Ahmad Qutaish, a soldier who it says was killed in Idlib by the the security forces.
(That's it for today. There will be on the Friday protests in Cairo and Syria tomorrow).