At least 24 were killed in Yemen’s capital Sanaa as security forces opened fire on protesters calling for the ouster of longtime president Ali Abdullah Saleh. The Pentagon is meanwhile stepping up drone strikes on al-Qaeda insurgents in the country’s south.
Clashes between police and Shi’ite protesters continue in Bahrain, fueled by the killing of a 14-year-old boy by riot police. The new protests erupted on the first day of the Eid al-Fitr festival.
Syrian government forces cracking down on the opposition may be committing crimes against humanity, according to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, which is urging an investigation by the International Criminal Court.
The Egyptian authorities must immediately drop charges against Asmaa Mahfouz, a woman blogger and activist accused of defaming the military on Twitter, Amnesty International said in a statement.
Some 5,000 Palestinian refugees have been forced to flee a camp in the Syrian port of Latakia amid shelling by government forces, according to the United Nations Relief and Works agency (UNRWA).
Lebanese singer Zeid Hamdan of the band Zeid and the Wings was briefly jailed on charges of defaming President Michel Suleiman in his single “General Suleiman.” He was released following a Facebook campaign.
Tens of thousands of Syrians returned to the streets in towns and cities across the country for the first Friday protests of Ramadan, declaring their support for residents of Hama, where some 200 have been killed in a military crackdown over the past week.
US drones struck for the first time in 19 days in Pakistan’s tribal agencies, killing four “militants” in an attack on a compound in South Waziristan. That same day, US drones killed 15 presumed al-Qaeda militants in south Yemen.
As promised, Egypt’s self-declared “Salafists” marched en masse on Tahrir Square, where secular opposition groups were holding a thousands-strong rally. No violence was reported, but the Salafists were clearly vying with the secularists for control of the square.
Egypt’s Gama’a Islamia has re-emerged with a threat to clear Cario’s Tahrir Square of “liberals and traitors” ahead of tomorrow’s planned Friday protest mobilization. The threat comes on the heels of violent clashes between protesters and regime elements.
Was Dennis Kucinich misquoted when he said Bashir al-Assad “is highly loved and appreciated by the Syrians”? And is the dictator’s uncle Rifaat al-Assad being groomed by the West as Syria’s new boss?
The Syrian government approved a law to allow formation of opposition political parties—but protestors seek an end to Article 8 of the Syrian constitution, which declares the Baath Party leader of the state and society.
