CAIRO/BEIRUT/UNITED NATIONS: The United States said it would return Ambassador Robert Ford to Damascus within “days to weeks,” as divisions within the Syrian opposition spilled out into the open when egg-throwing dissidents tried to prevent other opposition figures from entering the Arab League headquarters in Cairo.

Speaking after a hearing of a Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee, Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman said Ford would return to his post in “weeks – I mean, days to weeks.”The Cairo attack highlights the growing fault lines in the Syrian opposition, which is struggling to overcome infighting in the face of a brutal government crackdown that has persisted even after Damascus agreed last week to an Arab League plan to stop the violence. Security forces killed at least 13 protesters nationwide Wednesday, activists said.Syria’s two major opposition groups, the National Coordination Committee and the Syria National Council, are divided over issues at the core of the eight-month-old revolution, including whether to request foreign military assistance and accept dialogue with the regime. The divisions have prevented the opposition from gaining the traction it needs to present a credible alternative to the regime.

Around 100 protesters in Cairo threw eggs and tomatoes at a four-man delegation from the NCC – including prominent writer Michel Kilo and militant Haytham Manaa – as the group tried to enter the Arab League’s headquarters for a meeting. Critics say the NCC, which includes veteran activists and former political prisoners, is too lenient and willing to engage in dialogue with the government.

Kilo, 71, who lives in Syria, has opposed the ruling Baath party since it came to power in 1963, and was jailed from 1980-83 and from 2006-09.

He is a member of the National Committee for Democratic Change, which was formed on Sept. 17 and groups Arab nationalists, socialists, Marxists, members of the Kurdish minority and independents such as Kilo.

Haytham Manaa is a former political detainee and now lives in self-exile in France.

The NCC’s stance has prompted some anti-government protesters in Syria to carry banners reading: “The National Coordination Committee does not represent me.”

“What happened today in Cairo is a sign of the Syrian street’s disenchantment with the NCC and its direction, which goes against the people’s will,” said Ausama Monajed, a London-based member of the Syrian National Council. “There should be no dialogue with this regime. Not before, nor after it withdraws its tanks from the streets.”

The Syrian National Council – made up of opponents mostly outside Syria – has urged the Arab League “to take a strong and effective position against the Syrian regime commensurate with the dangerous development of the situation in Syria, especially in … Homs.”

It wants the League to freeze Syria’s membership, impose economic and diplomatic sanctions, and seek the referral of allegations of genocide and other human rights violations by the regime to the International Criminal Court.

Members of the NCC delegation, who also were shoved and taunted with shouts of “traitor!” were forced to turn back but the head of the delegation, Hasan Abdul-Azim, managed to enter the Arab League’s building from another entrance and met with Secretary-General Nabil Elaraby.

Abdul-Azim described the accusations that his group was cooperating with the Syrian regime as “nonsense.”

“We are a patriotic opposition … and we reject excluding any group, but others want to exclude us because we reject the foreign intervention in Syria,” he told reporters following the meeting with Elaraby.

Elaraby denounced the attack and said the Arab League is open for all Syrian opposition groups.

“What happened in Cairo is completely unacceptable behavior,” Sada Hamzeh, a Paris-based Syrian dissident who is a member of the NCC, told the Associated Press.

She suggested supporters of the Syrian National Council were behind the attack, adding: “It’s like everyone who is outside the Council is a traitor, it is another kind of dictatorship.”

As the opposition struggles to find a unified voice, the government crackdown has continued.

Syria agreed to a peace plan brokered by the Arab League last week, but officials say Damascus has since failed to abide by its commitments to pull tanks and other armor out of cities and stop the bloodshed that the U.N. estimates has killed 3,500 people.

The deal also includes a pledge to work on starting a dialogue with the Syrian opposition. The Arab League called an emergency meeting Saturday to discuss Damascus’ failure to abide by its commitments. It was not clear what action the league would take if bloodshed continues.

And, while the disagreement over foreign intervention and what role the Arab league could play bristled, France led other Western Nations condemnation of opponents of the U.N. action against Syria as a “failure.”

France’s U.N. envoy Gerard Araud said Wednesday the 15-member body had “abdicated their responsibilities” when China and Russia blocked a resolution condemning the violence in Syria.

“Some vetoed even limited action by the Security Council. Others chose abstention, that is indifference,” Araud told the meeting. “It is a serious failure of the Security Council, in humanitarian or political terms.”

Also Wednesday, the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Local Coordination Committees, key activist networks, said at least 13 people – and possibly more than 20 – were killed by security forces in Damascus, Homs and other cities. The unclear death tolls point to the confusion in the aftermath of attacks in a country that has prevented independent reporting.

Other activists said an armored Syrian force stormed a plain northwest of the city of Hama in pursuit of army defectors. They said tanks pounded villages near the town of Maharda and casualties were reported on both sides in fighting. Troops surrounded a farm in the village of Khuneizeer where deserters had taken refuge and at least one civilian was killed.

The latest reports of defections came as U.N. human rights chief Navi Pillay warned an increasing number of soldier defections could raise the risk of a Libyan-style civil war in Syria.

“More and more soldiers refuse to become complicit in international crimes and are changing sides. There is a serious risk of Syria descending into armed struggle,” she said during a debate on protecting civilians in armed conflict.

Echoing her sentiments, Feltman urged Syria’s opposition Wednesday to stick to peaceful methods.

“We urge the opposition, and our regional allies, to continue to reject violence. To do so otherwise would, frankly, make the regime’s job of brutal repression easier,” said Feltman.