Cairo: Heavy gunfire rang out on Friday throughout Cairo as tens of thousands of Muslim Brotherhood supporters clashed with armed vigilantes in the fiercest street battles since the country's Arab Spring uprising.
At least 95 people were killed and hundreds injured in Cairo's Ramses Square as anti-coup protesters were fired on by government forces. A correspondent for Al Jazeera described lines of bodies in a makeshift morgue in the nearby Al-Fath mosque.
Unlike in past clashes between protesters and police, Friday's clashes took an even darker turn when residents and possibly police in civilian clothing engaged in the violence. There were few police in uniform to be seen as residents fired at one another on a bridge that crosses over Cairo's Zamalek district, an upscale island neighbourhood where many foreigners and ambassadors reside.
Tawfik Dessouki, a Brotherhood supporter, said he was ready to fight for "democracy" and against the military's ouster of Mursi. "I am here for the blood of the people who died. We didn't have a revolution to go back to a police and military state again and to be killed by the state," he said.
A protester, Said Mohammed, told Al Jazeera that the crowds were shot at by snipers and by men in helicopters.
"Helicopters started to shoot us as we were walking. Not bombs this time, it was bullets. My friend took a shot in the neck and he died," he said. "This was the first time we saw helicopters shooting. There were people shooting from the windows."
Earlier on October 6 bridge near Ramses Square, a protester called Ahmed Tohami told Al Jazeera that police were firing at marchers.
"Men, young ladies, old women, under attack. The kids here on the bridge - we are under attack... there is no way down. They are attacking us from the front, they are attacking us from behind. We have nowhere to go," he said live on Al Jazeera.
Also in Cairo, residents blocked roads and clashed with anti-coup protesters as they tried to move through their areas. Ambulances carrying injured from the Ramses Square clash were also forced back.
Later in the evening, witnesses inside the Al-Fath mosque told Al Jazeera that police, soldiers and "thugs" were attempting to storm the building and that there were hundreds of people inside, including women and children. Live footage appeared to show tear gas being fired into the building.
"They are entering with guns. They are threatening to burn the mosque with the people in it," Umayma, a protester inside the mosque, told Al Jazeera in a telephone interview.
In Alexandria, 21 people were reported dead in clashes between pro- and anti-coup supporters. Al Jazeera's Jane Ferguson reported bands of men armed with batons and machetes on the streets as night fell.
Elsewhere, eight protesters were killed in the city of Damietta, while four died in Ismailia, northeast of Cairo.
Bader Abdel Atty, a spokesman for the Egyptian foreign ministry, defended the actions of the security forces in an interview with Al Jazeera, saying that protesters were armed with machine guns.
"They are raising al-Qaeda flags in the heart of Cairo. They are using machine guns against civilians. And this cannot be described as far as I know as a peaceful demonstration," he said.
He dismissed international condemnation of the violence and said it was not based on the facts.
The Muslim Brotherhood and other groups, under the banner of the Anti-Coup Alliance, had called for the protests on Friday in defiance of a military crackdown on sit-in demonstrations that left hundreds dead on August 14.
A curfew came into effect at 5pm GMT, with authorities warning "firm action" against breakers.
In a statement, the interim Cabinet asserted that the government, the police and the "great Egyptian forces" stood together in the face of a "brutal terrorist plot" by the "Brotherhood organisation".
The Brotherhood in turn said the coup leaders had "lost their minds" and were devoid of ethics and values. It said the coup had failed, and called for a week of daily marches in defiance of the crackdowns.
Meanwhile, state-run and private television stations have been broadcasting footage from Wednesday's violence they say shows armed men firing toward security forces. Graphic videos have emerged online portraying the violence from the protesters' side.
One video, authenticated by The Associated Press based on landmarks and reporting from Wednesday's crackdown, shows armored personnel carriers driving protesters back from an area near the main sit-in as continuous volleys of automatic gunfire rang out.
In the footage, the crowd was shown retreating after throwing stones at the approaching vehicles, leaving several bloodied men motionless on the ground. After a loudspeaker announcement instructed the crowd to evacuate, promising safe passage, a vehicle approached and the barrel of a weapon emerged from one of its gun ports.
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