Egypt has been hit by another wave of major violence ahead of parliamentary elections after security forces opened fire on thousands of protesters demonstrating against the military junta. 
 
 Two people were reported dead and more than 600 injured in central Cairo after riot police sent volleys of tear gas, rubber bullets and "birdshot" pellet cartridges into the crowds. The clashes put further pressure on the ruling generals and cast doubt on the ability of police to secure the poll, scheduled to begin on 28 November. 
 
 "All options are on the table, but right now – given the state Egypt is in – nobody can see how the military council can pull off these elections," said Mahmoud Salem, a prominent blogger who is running for parliament but who has now frozen his campaign. "I'm at the international eye hospital at the moment with my friend Malek Mustafa, who has been shot in the head by police with a pellet cartridge and looks likely to lose his eye. How can I continue?" 
 
 Mustafa was one of dozens of demonstrators left with serious head wounds during the police assault on Tahrir Square. Trouble began after riot police moved to disperse tents set up after a large rally calling on Egypt's Supreme Council of Armed Forces (Scaf) to return the country to civilian rule. 
 
 Protesters succeeded in driving the security forces from the square and captured one of their trucks. Crowds jumped up and down on the vehicle, chanting "The interior ministry are thugs" and calling for the downfall of Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, the country's de facto leader since the toppling of Hosni Mubarak in February. It was later set ablaze. 
 
 By mid-afternoon police had returned to Tahrir in far larger numbers and began firing from armoured vehicles. Pro-change activists sent out calls for solidarity and as darkness fell police and the protesters saw their ranks swell. As the night wore on and control of Tahrir shifted back and forth between the security forces and demonstrators, running battles spilled down side streets and along several of downtown Cairo's most important thoroughfares. 
 
 The Observer saw heavy fighting along Talaat Harb street, a key shopping district and one of the main roads running into Tahrir Square. Street lighting was cut and amid the gloom hundreds of protesters tore up paving stones to throw at police lines, sporadically falling back as clouds of tear gas filled the air. 
 
 "The scenes are reminiscent of the Friday of Anger," said journalist and pro-change activist Hossam el-Hamalawy, referring to 28 January, the day protesters beat Mubarak's security forces off the streets during the uprising against his regime. "We are being hit with showers of US-made tear gas canisters, and I've watched with my own eyes at least five people being struck by rubber bullets." 
 
 A military police car which at one point approached the centre of the unrest was chased away by protesters, another sign of public support for the junta apparently waning. "Ordinary people are making a stronger link than ever between Scaf and the hated troops of the interior ministry," added el-Hamalawy. "The police and Scaf are revealing their true colours with this brutal attack on Egyptians. They have succeeded in only one thing today, and that is mobilising even more of Egyptian society against them." 
 
 By late evening the number of demonstrators had grown to several thousand with the arrival of the ultras – hardcore fans of Cairo's main football teams, some of whom played a significant role in the anti-regime uprising earlier this year – and some Islamist political groups, forcing police units to fall back from Tahrir where protesters quickly built barricades and fires continued to burn. 
 
 The retreat marked a significant blow to the security forces, which over the past few months have generally avoided attacking large protests, preferring to wait instead until numbers dwindle and the remaining activists can be isolated and labelled as hardcore troublemakers. On Saturday that tactic appeared to have backfired, with the police assault provoking a strong public response. 
 
 "Considering the small numbers that we had this morning, it's amazing," said Hady Kamar, a 26 year old artist who was hit twice by rubber bullets, once in the foot and once in the head. "When things looked darkest and the police had pushed us out of Tahrir, we returned in huge numbers. To see this many on the street and feel this much energy, is special. Today it feels like the revolution is back up and running, but we'll see what tomorrow brings. It's always been a day by day struggle." 
 
 Reprising many of the slogans used during mass protests against Mubarak, demonstrators vented their anger at Scaf and chanted 'Here is the revolution, nothing else'. 
 
 Many expressed scepticism about the elections, saying they were designed to entrench military control over the country, but most insisted they still wanted the vote to go ahead. "The generals want to rule Egypt, but this is our revolution," said Ahmed Mohamed, a 24-year-old accountant. "Look around you – you don't see different political parties or rival candidates, you just see the Egyptian people. People have come down from their homes to join the fight; we are battling the remnants of Mubarak's regime who remain in power at the moment, and both this and the elections are all part of that same process." 
 
 Solidarity rallies also erupted in the large cities of Alexandria and Suez. Egypt's interior ministry claimed its forces had acted with restraint, and blamed protesters for escalating tensions so close the parliamentary vote. 
 
 On Friday a group of prominent intellectuals, including former UN nuclear weapons chief Mohamed ElBaradei, unveiled an alternative transition plan which would involve postponing the parliamentary ballot and wresting executive control of Egypt away from the armed forces whilst a new constitution is drawn up. 
 
 The ruling generals have yet to respond to the proposal. ||||| Protesters accused soldiers clearing the square of using excessive force [EPA] 
 
 The Egyptian army has forcefully removed protesters from Cairo's Tahrir Square, after dozens of men armed with rocks attacked several hundred pro-reform campaigners. 
 
 Officers fired warning shots in the air to break up the two sides on Wednesday and scores were arrested. The flow of traffic through the square was cut off but has since been restored. 
 
 "We were attacked by the army and plainclothes thugs destroying the tents and beating up everyone," Salma Said, one of the pro-reform campaigners, said. 
 
 "I was very shocked seeing the army coming with sticks, beating everyone and destroying tents over people's heads." 
 
 Activists said they had caught one man who said he had been paid to attack the protesters. 
 
 "I saw two people injured in the head, carried away by people," Ahmed Fathy, a witness, said. 
 
 Amnesty International, a London-based human rights group, condemned the army's "heavy-handed actions" in clearing the square of protesters. 
 
 "It is absolutely unacceptable that the army should participate in violently breaking up the peaceful protests", Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Amnesty International's deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa, said. 
 
 "The Supreme Military Council has the duty to uphold the right to peaceful protest. 
 
 "We have spoken to eyewitnesses who have told us that the army allowed thugs to attack protesters with sticks and swords, the same practice that was used under former president [Hosni] Mubarak. 
 
 "It appears that the Armed Forces are simply continuing the same old tactics of repression." 
 
 Tense situation 
 
 Small groups of activists had continued to gather in Tahrir Square after Hosni Mubarak, the former president, was toppled on February 11. 
 
 Numbers have climbed on Fridays when activists have called for bigger participation to keep up pressure on the country's leaders for political reform. 
 
 In another development, clashes that broke out late on Tuesday night when a Muslim mob attacked thousands of Coptic Christians protesting against the burning of a Cairo church have left at least 13 people dead and about 140 wounded, officials said. 
 
 The Muslims torched the church amid an escalation of tensions over a love affair between a Muslim and a Copt that set off a violent feud between the couple's families. 
 
 The officials said all 13 fatalities, at least six of them Coptic Christians, died of bullet wounds. 
 
 There is a long history of animosity between Copts and Muslims in Egypt, though there have been recent signs of a rapprochement following a deadly New Year's Day bombing of a church in Alexandria.
– So much for peaceful transitions of power in Syria and Egypt, where regime forces brutally cracked down on protesters today. In Syria, the day after officials agreed "in principle" to let the Arab League oversee a peace process, troops invaded a region near the Turkish border and a town in search of government opponents. One civilian was reported killed. Troops also gunned down two army defectors near the Lebanese border, the AP reports. In Egypt, just 9 days before national elections, troops opened fire on thousands of demonstrators in Tahrir Square. Some 500 were wounded with rubber bullets, Reuters reports (see their compelling video here.) The fighting erupted when troops moved in to remove tents set up by protesters, after last night's 50,000-strong rally opposing military rule, the Guardian reports. "We are being hit with showers of US-made tear gas canisters, and I've watched with my own eyes at least five people being struck by rubber bullets," says one protester.