20111121
Reuters
(Reuters) - Hardened and emboldened by their success in toppling Hosni Mubarak nine months ago, experienced protesters in Cairo's Tahrir Square encouraged each other on Sunday to hold their ground as the police fired canister after canister of teargas.

"Don't run, that just provokes them to fire more," shouted one protester to others fleeing a hail of metal cans.

"Field Marshal, go! Egypt needs to see the light," a group chanted as choking smoke engulfed them, directing their anger at Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, Mubarak's defense minister for two decades who now leads the ruling army council.

It looked like a reprise of the uprising that ended Mubarak's 30-year rule, as protesters erected barricades around the square. When the police advanced, activists banged on metal as a warning to send forward parties to defend the perimeter.

But this time, the once revered army and its generals who now run Egypt are in the firing line. Praised when they took over after police lost control of the streets under Mubarak, many activists now fear the army wants to hold onto power.

"The military is brutal. I'm scared, I'm terrified. I've never been this scared since the beginning of this (uprising). But it's too late to give up. It's too late to let go. I'm going down again," said Amira Khalil, heading back to Tahrir.

The protest began on Friday, led by Islamists angered by a move by the army-backed cabinet to set ground rules for drawing up a new constitution that would have shielded the military from scrutiny and given it a broad national security remit.

Politicians saw it as a veiled attempt to keep hold of the reins of power even after a transition to civilian rule. They said it would undermine the parliament to be elected in a vote starting on November 28. Islamists expect to do well in the vote.

"Since Mubarak stepped down, we have been fooled. We gave legitimacy to an illegitimate people and they have clung on to power," said Mahmoud Yassin, a driver in Tahrir.

Yet, as the protest extended through Saturday and Sunday, the protesters changed too. Islamists receded, giving way to the kind of youthful activists who launched demonstrations on January 25 against Mubarak, putting national pride above religion.

"It is the same atmosphere. There is no political affiliation. The difference is that the army joined police in beating us. Even the cabinet statements and the military council's ignorance are the same as Mubarak's," said Mohamed Gamal, 24, a teaching assistant at Cairo University.

CAT-AND-MOUSE

The tactics by security forces were similar too. Police made the first bid to retake the square on Saturday, but their success was short-lived. Street battles raged through the night. The Interior Ministry nearby was again a protester target.

By Sunday morning, relative calm had returned to the square. Vendors sold tea to exhausted protesters, bleary eyed and yawning in the chill air. Fires smouldered in the middle of Tahrir's usually traffic-clogged roads, now empty of cars.

The game of cat-and-mouse picked up again, as police tried to drive the protesters away from the Interior Ministry.

But nearby some Egyptians grumbled about the protests. Many are fed up with the turmoil that has hammered the economy.

"I don't know who is right and who is wrong, I want things to return to normal ... The police left the square. Why are they heading to the ministry? They are starting trouble," said Alaa Mostafa, working at an electronics shop near the square.

Then at dusk on Sunday, army armoured personnel carriers moved around the ministry and, at the same time, police backed by the army fired salvoes of teargas into the square.

Film-maker Samir Eshra, filming in a makeshift clinic in Tahrir, said the army and police threw teargas inside. Doctors and the wounded struggled to get out to escape the fumes.

"What I saw today can only be described as a war crime," he said. "I do not believe an army, attacking even an enemy, can intentionally target a medical facility or hospital, like they did today."

The death toll since the violence erupted on Saturday reached at least five, according to the Health Ministry, cited by the state news agency. Other medical sources said it was more than 11 on Sunday alone.

A YouTube video, which could not be verified, showed police dragging what appeared like a corpse on the ground and dumping it in a pile of rubbish on a Tahrir street.

The independent newspaper Al-Masry Al-Youm issued a video, that also could not be verified, of protesters being dragged by the hair and beaten with batons by security personnel.

But by Sunday night, Tahrir was again back in control of protesters. The chants of "Down with military rule" had resumed.