• Muslim Brotherhood's offices targeted
• Defiant Morsi dismisses call for his removal
Graffiti depicting Egypt' President Mohamed Morsi on a outer wall of the presidential palace in Cairo. Hundreds of thousands thronged the streets of Cairo and cities around the country Sunday and marched on the presidential palace, filling a broad avenue for blocks, in an attempt to force out the Islamist president. Photograph: Hassan Ammar/AP 8.27am BST Middle East Live is now primarily a forum for readers to share links and offer commentary on developments in the Middle East and North Africa. Please post your comments below.
Here's a roundup of the latest news:
• Egypt is locked in a tense standoff after millions of protesters took to the streets across the country demanding the resignation of Mohamed Morsi with some militants set the ruling Muslim Brotherhood's headquarters on fire. After dawn on Monday, young men were still preventing traffic entering Tahrir Square but only hundreds of people remained, some resting under makeshift awnings, Reuters reports.
• Up to 500,000 protesters filled Cairo's Tahrir Square on Sunday. Security sources said that at least seven people were killed and more than 600 wounded in clashes between Morsi's supporters and opponents. Follow how the day unfolded in Sunday's Middle East Live.
• In an interview with the Guardian over the weekend, Morsi dismissed calls for his removal. He said:
If we changed someone in office who [was elected] according to constitutional legitimacy – well, there will people or opponents opposing the new president too, and a week or a month later, they will ask him to step down.
There is no room for any talk against this constitutional legitimacy.
• Trying to topple a democratically elected president amid widespread civil unrest invites the intervention of the army, argues a Guardian editorial.
If the army came to power it would stay for a long time. For many Islamists, having taken the democratic route but been denied the chance to see their leaders govern, opposition would not be a question of ideology but a matter of personal survival. What would prevent them from concluding that a future of arrest, torture and imprisonment awaits, a return to what they experienced under Mubarak? What would stop the ranks of extremists on both sides swelling?
Anti-Morsi protesters attack the Muslim Brotherhood headquarters in Al-Moqattam, Cairo. Photograph: Amru Salahuddien/Rex Features • Government forces have pounded Sunni Muslim rebels in the central city of Homs with artillery and from the air on Sunday, the second day of an offensive to expand loyalist control over Syria's strategic centre, activists said. They said rebels defending the old centre of Homs and five adjacent Sunni districts had largely repelled a ground attack on Saturday but reported fresh clashes and deaths within the city on Sunday.
• Saudi Arabia has sentenced seven activists from its restive Eastern province to prison terms ranging from five to 10 years for posting messages on Facebook calling for anti-government protests, according to Human Rights Watch. The New York-based rights group urged the EU foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, and other European officials who were meeting with Gulf counterparts in Manama on Sunday to condemn the convictions.
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