The Anti-Coup alliance has urged supporters of the ousted president Mohamed Morsi to take to the streets after Friday prayers as it continues to ignore the government’s threat to disperse sit-ins by the Muslim Brotherhood by force. It said in a statement: We call upon the masses of the great Egyptian people to continue to take their families to liberty squares to celebrate ‘Victory Day’ together on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, so the world should witness the civilised nature of Egyptians defending democracy and electoral legitimacy.  Morsi’s wife made her first appearance since her husband was ousted on 3 July on Thursday as Muslims celebrated the Eid al-Fitr holiday which marks the end of Ramadan. Naglaa Mahmoud promised her husband “is coming back, God willing”. The Muslim Brotherhood claimed “tens of millions” of people rallied in support of the deposed president on Thursday, while Reuters put the figure in the capital at thousands. There was also a demonstration in Cairo in support of the military, in Tahrir Square. Syria • Extremist groups are carving out pockets of territory that are becoming havens for Islamist militants, posing what United States and western intelligence officials say may be developing into one of the biggest terrorist threats in the world today, the New York Times reports. It writes: Many of the militants are part of the Nusra Front, an extremist group whose fighters have gained a reputation over the past several months as some of the most effective in the opposition. But others are assembling under a new, even more extreme umbrella group, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, that is merging some Syrians with fighters from around the world – Chechnya, Pakistan, Egypt and the west, as well as al-Qaida in Iraq, the Sunni insurgent group that rose to prominence in the fight against the American occupation in the years after the 2003 invasion. The concern is that a new affiliate of al-Qaida could be emerging from those groups. • The UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, has discussed the escalating humanitarian crisis and increasing sectarian violence in Syria with the Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov. The UN spokesman Martin Nesirky said the UN chief underscored the need to find a political solution to the two-and-a-half-year Syria conflict and to urgently renew momentum for a new Geneva conference to try to get the government and opposition to agree on a transitional government. • Syrian rebels launched a mortar attack on a convoy carrying Bashar al-Assad early on Thursday, which left the embattled leader unharmed but underscored how close the country’s crippling civil war is edging to its seat of power. Assad was travelling to a mosque in the Damascus suburb of Malki, where he has an office and a residence, when the attack took place in the early morning. Residents confirmed to the Guardian that at least three mortars, or small rockets, landed as his convoy arrived at the Enas bin Malik mosque for prayers to mark the beginning of the three-day Islamic festival of Eid al-Fitr.
Aug92013