CAIRO: Just south of Cairo’s Tahrir Square, down a pockmarked and rock-strewn street, a military crane builds a concrete wall to staunch the flood of deaths on the frontline of a renewed battle for democracy.
More than 30 people were killed on Mohamed Mahmoud Street over five days in clashes marking the bloodiest challenge to the country’s military rulers since they took charge after an uprising ousted Hosni Mubarak in February.
The riot police guns, which sent thousands of rubber and birdshot bullets down the street, fell silent on Thursday as did the wailing of sirens from ambulances that careered up the street to evacuate the dead and wounded.
The police, who set off the clashes on Saturday when they dispersed a sit-in by protesters wounded during the uprising that ousted Mubarak, have withdrawn to the nearby interior ministry headquarters.
Thursday’s ceasefire has given the weary protesters in the square, the epicenter of the revolt that ousted Mubarak, time to bring in fresh medical supplies and to ponder the course of their revolt.
Some of the wounded wander around the square, determined to see the protest to its end.
"I don’t know if this is my country anymore," said Ehab Mohammed, 16, whose arm was broken by riot police. "I just want to have a happy life. I want to feel like a human."
The clashes started a day after tens of thousands poured into the square to demand a clear timetable for the transfer of power to a civilian government.
The protesters had initially demanded a handover by April or May, but they now want the military to step down immediately, they say, or their comrades would have died in vain.
"I wanted them to leave power by the end of April, but a massacre took place in the past few days over there," said one protester, Ahmed Al-Qinawy, pointing down Mohamed Mahmoud Street.
"Now there is one demand, that cannot be negotiated: the military has to go," said the law student.
Others have set up their own roadblocks to prevent protesters from renewing the clashes, but they have trouble mollifying their furious comrades.
"What right do they have to call a ceasefire? Who’s going to get the rights of the martyrs?" yelled one woman.
"No one was intending for this outcome," said the woman, who gave her "revolutionary" name as Um Muaz. "But people were outraged after they dispersed the sit-in, and god willing millions will come out tomorrow."
Protesters have called for mass demonstrations on Friday to press for their demands.
Tens of thousands of protesters filled up the square on Tuesday to demand the military transfer power to a civilian council, scorning a promise by military ruler Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, Mubarak’s former defense minister, to step down by July.
But, unlike the January revolt in which millions of Egyptians protested for 18-days to overthrow Mubarak, many are choosing to sit out the current protests.
"I’m very confused. Everyone is confused. If the military just steps down, there will be chaos. I mean, there is chaos now, so imagine what would happen if the military steps down," said Essam Al-Arabi, whose shop sells leather handbags near the square.
The military has warned of the economic fallout from the protests, a very real threat in a country which has lost billions since the January uprising.
"We need stability," said Mohamed Abdel Salam, who works in a travel agency close to the downtown square. "We don’t need chaos. But at the same time I want my rights. I’m torn between these two things."
Most of the influential political parties, which have been preparing for Monday’s parliamentary elections, have also distanced themselves from the protests.
But analysts say that, just like the January revolt, the relatively small number of protesters in the iconic square may decide the country’s future.
"It’s very difficult to say that Tahrir is representative of the entire country," said Issandr ElAmrani, an analyst and blogger at www.arabist.net.
"There are a lot of people in Tahrir, but obviously a lot more people are not," he said. "The military faces the same problem Mubarak did. They can’t crush Tahrir, for domestic reasons and for international reasons. And the result would be a bloodbath."
