By Khaled Yacoub Oweis

AMMAN (Reuters) - Syria's fractious opposition coalition meets on Thursday under pressure to name a new leader and prove to its Western and Arab backers it can be trusted with advanced weapons to beat back a concerted offensive by President Bashar al-Assad.

The opposition's inability to unite has made Western countries reluctant to send weapons, even as Assad's forces have seized initiative in recent months and Washington and its European allies have vowed to aid his enemies.

Rebels are under siege in the strategic city of Homs and trying to hold on to swathes of territory across the country, while the opposition in exile has been unable to exert authority on the ground and halt strides toward radical Islamism.

The Syrian National Coalition has been without a leader for months after its head quit over disagreement about potential talks with Assad's government. It aims to agree on a new unified leadership at its talks in Istanbul.

Coalition insiders say its international backers want to avoid a repeat of a near debacle a month ago when last-minute intervention by senior officials from Turkey and Western and Arab countries was needed to keep it from disintegrating.

A new leadership for the body of mainly exiled politicians will also need to show that it can forge stronger links with the activists and rebel fighters insider Syria, the sources said.

"The best solution is to create a civilian-military council and move into Syria, with the coalition remaining as an assembly," said Kamal al-Labwani, a senior member of a liberal bloc of the coalition.

More than two years into a war that has killed more than 90,000 people, momentum has shifted in recent months in favor of Assad, especially since he gained the support of fighters from the seasoned Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.

Western countries opposed to Assad were predicting at the end of last year that the Syrian leader's days were numbered. But they now fear for the survival of the rebellion after Hezbollah fighters helped capture the rebel-held town of Qusair.

The West has had to balance its desire to aid the rebels with its worry that the rebellion has become dominated by militant Sunni Islamists, including groups allied to al Qaeda.

Saudi Arabia has assumed a central role in backing the opposition and has begun limited delivery of sophisticated weapons to the rebels, with the United States playing a bigger role than before in supervising such shipments to keep weapons out of Islamist hands, diplomats in the region say.

"The Americans will have the final say on Saudi support. On the surface, U.S. military pledges are minimal, but indirectly, Washington's role is big," a Western diplomat said.

A senior opposition source in contact with U.S. officials said Washington, as well as French security operatives, were concentrating on supporting rebel units in the province of Aleppo on the border with Turkey, where new anti-tank missiles are helping reverse the military tide.

"I think we will be hearing good news from Aleppo soon. No one wants to repeat the weakness in logistics that allowed Hezbollah to take over Qusair and paved the way for the offensive on Homs," the source said.

BOOSTING REBEL COMMAND

At the core of Western and Saudi strategy is boosting the Supreme Military Council, a centralized rebel command structure led by defectors from the Syrian army, to claw back Assad's advances and create a counterbalance to militant Islamists.

Labwani said that the opposition has started to build up its military capability through the Supreme Military Council but Islamists still dominate the battlefield. He said he expected an increase in weapons shipments to rebels, dismissing U.S. and Russian plans for a peace conference, known as Geneva 2.

Washington and Moscow, Cold War foes supporting the opposing sides, announced plans for the peace conference in May but never agreed a date for it. Their relations have deteriorated rapidly as momentum on the battlefield swung in favor of Assad and Washington committed to aid the rebels.

"Geneva 2 is preparation for more war. Does anyone seriously think Assad would give up power to a transitional government that would order the army to take its tanks from the streets, release tens of thousands of prisoners and allow demonstrations?" Labwani said.

The rebels have been receiving light arms from Saudi Arabia and Qatar for many months, but say they need more sophisticated weapons to defeat Assad, including shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles to counter the government's big air power advantage.

The West is wary, because such missiles could be used by militants to threaten civil aviation. Diplomats said the United States is overseeing delivery of Saudi weapons after concern that shoulder-fired missiles sent by Qatar may have been delivered to jihadist fighters.

Abu Kassem, a senior member of the Local Revolutionary Council of the rebel-held city of Rastan north of Homs, said the priority of any opposition meeting should be to send arms.

"The coalition has been arguing about who will be leader while the regime is amassing forces for a zero-hour attack on Homs. All the roads to Homs have been blocked. The only way to get supplies there is by air," he said.

The coalition has been rudderless for months, but several names have surfaced as strong candidates for the presidency to be decided in Istanbul, including Ahmad Jarba, a tribal figure well connected with Saudi Arabia, and Mustafa Sabbagh, the Qatari-backed secretary general of the coalition.

(Additional reporting by Warren Strobel and Susan Cornwell in Washington; Editing by Peter Graff)

Mandla Mandela, grandson of Nelson Mandela, talks during a news conference in Mvezo, a day after a court order to exhume the remains of three of the anti-apartheid hero's children

MTHATHA, South Africa (Reuters) - A feud between factions of Nelson Mandela's family descended into soap opera farce on Thursday when his grandson and heir, Mandla, accused relatives of adultery and milking the fame of the revered anti-apartheid leader.

In a news conference broadcast live on TV that stunned South Africans, Mandla Mandela confirmed rumors that his young son, Zanethemba, was in fact the child of an illicit liaison between his brother Mbuso and Mandla's now ex-wife Anais Grimaud.

With Mandela on life-support in a Pretoria hospital, the escalating feud has transfixed and appalled South Africa in equal measure as it contemplates the reality that the father of the post-apartheid "Rainbow Nation" will not be around forever.

"Mbuso impregnated my wife," Mandla said in Mvezo, the Eastern Cape village 700 km (450 miles) south of Johannesburg where Mandela - now 94 years old and critically ill - was born and where Mandla serves as the formal chief of the clan.

Mandla, 39, first raised questions about his son's paternity last year when he split from French-speaking Grimaud, who has since moved back home to the Indian Ocean island of Reunion. He also revealed then that he was unable to have children.

His attempts to get the family to address the questions of Zanethemba's paternity had been rebuffed in the interests of preserving a semblance of unity in South Africa's most famous family, Mandla said.

"This matter has never been discussed by the so-called members of the family who say that they want to ensure there is harmony in this family," he said, challenging reporters to conduct DNA tests to confirm his allegations.

"The facts are there. You may go and find out, do the necessary tests that are needed," he said. His brother Mbuso has denied being the father of the child.

Newspapers have plastered "Mandela vs. Mandela" headlines across their front pages and editorials have bemoaned the cruel irony of bitter divisions inside the family of a man lauded the world over as the epitome of reconciliation between races.

The government said that Mandela remained "critical but stable" after nearly four weeks in hospital.

"THE MANDELA WAGON"

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Mandla Mandela (L), grandson of former South African President Nelson Mandela, talks to journalists …

The sleepy community of Mvezo, set amid the rolling hills of the Eastern Cape, has been at the center of a vicious dispute that may ultimately determine where South Africa's first black president will be laid to rest.

Two years ago, Mandla exhumed the bodies of three of Mandela's children from Qunu, where Mandela grew up, and moved them the 20 km to Mvezo, where Mandla has built a visitor center and a memorial center dedicated to his grandfather.

Mandla said he moved the bodies based on his right as chief to decide the final resting place of family members, especially his father Makgatho who died of an AIDS-related illness in 2005.

"I hold the right to determine where he is buried. I am the chief of Mvezo, as a traditional leader and the head of the royal house of Mandela," said Mandla, dressed in a black leather jacket and red shirt.

Despite his assertions, many of South Africa's 53 million people believe the exhumations were part of a deliberate plan to ensure Mandela was buried in Mvezo.

Last week, a rival faction of the family, led by Mandla's aunt Makaziwe and including Mbuso, won a court order for the bodies to be returned to Qunu - an edict carried out late on Wednesday after a last-minute legal bid by Mandla failed.

Speaking calmly and deliberately in front of a bank of cameras, Mandla lashed out at Makaziwe and members of the wider family, accusing them of trying to cash in on the legacy of one of the 20th century's most respected political figures.

"This is the very family that has taken their own father, their own grandfather, to court for his monies," he said, referring to a long-running legal bid by Makaziwe to remove the guardians of a Mandela charitable trust.

"It seems like anyone and everyone can come and say 'I am a Mandela' and demand to be part of the decision-making in this family," he said. "Individuals have abandoned their own families and heritage and decided to jump on the Mandela wagon."

Makaziwe has declined to comment on the graves dispute, telling reporters that it is a "private family matter".

The three Mandela children exhumed from Mvezo are an infant girl who died in 1948, a boy, Thembi, who died in a car crash in 1969, and Mandla's father, Makgatho. In all, Mandela fathered six children from his three marriages.

(Writing by Ed Cropley; Editing by Pascal Fletcher and Gareth Jones)

CAIRO (AP) — Egyptian authorities shut down four Islamist TV stations, banned the Muslim Brotherhood's newspaper and raided the office of Al-Jazeera's Egypt affiliate in crackdown on media considered sympathetic to ousted President Mohammed Morsi, bringing an outcry Thursday from rights groups.

Rights groups said the moves appeared to be an attempt to intimidate pro-Morsi media and shut off their viewpoints.

Among the shuttered stations was the Misr25 channel, run by the Brotherhood. It went off the air Wednesday night just as it was airing pro-Morsi protesters chanting "Down with military rule" after Egypt's military chief announced that Morsi had been removed.

The military's move came after four days of massive anti-Morsi protests demanding the country's first freely elected president step down.

In a statement, the Brotherhood said the shutdowns were a return to the "repressive" policies of Egypt's "dark ... ages."

The London-based Amnesty International called the shutdowns a "blow to freedom of expression."

A security official said the stations were shut down over suspicions of incitement, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the press. He did not elaborate.

Notably, no Egyptian stations are currently airing live footage from the main pro-Morsi rally in Cairo, where thousands have been holding a sit-in since Friday.

Also targeted was Al-Jazeera Live Egypt, or Mubasher Misr, an affiliate of the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera TV network. Late Wednesday night, police raided the station's offices, detaining 28 staffers, Al-Jazeera said in a statement Thursday. All have since been released, except the managing director and the broadcast engineer, it said.

The station broadcasts from Qatar, so its signals were not taken off the air, but it has stopped airing live events and its office in Cairo remained shut Thursday. Al-Jazeera said Associated Press Television News was ordered to deny Al-Jazeera channels access to their live services. A local media service company, Cairo News Company, has also been told to withhold access to broadcast equipment.

The Associated Press strongly protested the order to police and government officials. It said it followed the directive because it is bound by local law.

"Our longstanding position is that we cover the news for all of our clients. What is happening in Egypt is a fluid situation, and we are working to satisfy the needs of all of them," Erin Madigan, the news cooperative's senior media relations manager, said in a statement.

A video posted on YouTube recorded the moment security agents entered the studio as it was broadcasting live from Tahrir Square, where hundreds of thousands were celebrating Morsi's ouster. An agent can be heard in the background saying: "Please come with us" as the guests and staff asked what was going on.

The other stations shut down were Al-Nas, Al-Rahma and Al-Hafez, all connected to the ultraconservative Salafi movement. Over the past year, they have put on the air talk show guests, including hard-line clerics, who have made threats against opposition figures or depicted them as anti-Islam, including one cleric who called for their death. Other talk show hosts and guests have painted Morsi's opponents as dominated by Coptic Chrisitans, hiking sectarian tensions. Their shows were regularly taken to task by prominent satirist Bassem Youssef.

Al-Jazeera, owned by close Brotherhood ally Qatar, has been harassed by the state in the past. Al-Jazeera Egypt Live, set up in March 2011, was raided twice by security forces in September 2011, when the military ruled Egypt directly after the fall of Hosni Mubarak. Authorities said it was operating without permits.

Al-Jazeera's acting director Mostefa Souag on Thursday appealed for the immediate release of the staff.

"Media offices should not be subject to raids and intimidation," he said. "Regardless of political views, the Egyptian people expect media freedoms to be respected and upheld."

The New-York based Committee to Protect Journalists said the crackdown was part of "a worrying series of moves that seemed designed to cut off coverage of pro-Morsi events."

The Arab Network for Human Rights Information called the moves "a clear violation of the law and stifling freedom of expression." The group, based in Cairo, said while some programs aired on these stations carried at times "hate speech" and incited Morsi supporters to violence, that does not justify shutting the stations down.

Amnesty said Egypt's armed forces and the police have a well-documented record of human rights violations that must not be repeated.

"In this time of great tension and with the constitution suspended, it is more important than ever that the military comply with Egypt's obligations under international human rights law," said Salil Shetty, General Secretary of Amnesty International.

Munir Fakhri Abdel-Nur, a member of the National Salvation Front which led the opposition against Morsi, said his group objected to exceptional measures against such stations.

"We must respect due process of law," Abdel-Nur said.

The protesters and opposition parties have accused Morsi, Egypt's first democratically elected president, of mismanaging the country during his one year in office and seeking to monopolize power for his group.