Syrian appeals, sympathy for Chapecoense Real, and a rant inspires a good deed

Thousands are fleeing the besieged sections of Aleppo as government troops advance

Syrians in east Aleppo continue to appeal for help, there's sympathy for Brazilian football club Chapecoense Real, after most of its team are killed in an air crash, an American woman raises thousands for a store employee, and a nine-year-old school dropout in Egypt catches the eye of a fine artist.

"Very sad but happy to be alive" - tweeting from east Aleppo

Syrians in east Aleppo are continuing to document their circumstances in English on social media, as government troops advance into the area.

The latest post from seven-year-old Bana Alabed is a picture of what the says is her bombed-out home.

The seven-year-old's tweets, which her mother helps her with, have found a wider audience since last week, when Harry Potter author JK Rowling struck up a correspondence, sending her her books electronically and retweeting her posts.

Ms Rowling, who has more than eight million followers on Twitter, has also started highlighting charities campaigning for Syria.

Other accounts in east Aleppo are continuing to appeal for help and solidarity, and to report on the circumstances there.

One tweet from the opposition Army of Conquest group, for example, featured an image of an injured man, his face bloodied, being loaded onto a trolley for transporting goods, and read: "Ambulances in besieged Aleppo... God you are aware of our situation.. Oh God".

Football mourns Chapecoense Real

"The last image of our warriors" - Chapecoense Real remembers its team in high spirits

Football clubs across Brazil are turning their social media profile pictures to black and adopting the logo of Chapecoense Real, as they express their sympathies for the club.

A plane carrying 81 people, including the team, crashed in Colombia earlier today, killing most of those on board.

Chapecoense was on its way to what many regarded as its most important match in history - the final of the Copa Sudamericana, South America's second most important club competition.

"Today, all the clubs in Brazil are one," tweeted Corinthians, another club in Brazil's top division. The rallying cry, #ForcaChape, and the hashtag #luto, "mourning", have been tweeted almost a million times since news of the crash broke.

One popular image being shared was a cartoon by Omar Momani. "You don't need a caption," tweeted Atletico Mineiro.

Clubs from elsewhere around the world, not least those that have suffered similar tragedies with flights, also offered their condolences.

US woman raises thousands for "inspiring" store employee

A woman who set out to raise some holiday cheer for a store manager in Chicago, after witnessing her being subjected to an unpleasant rant by a customer, has attracted more than $16,000 (£12,800) in donations, far exceeding her original goal of $400 (£320).

Jessie Grady's video of what she saw at the shop has been viewed more than three million times on YouTube and Facebook.

As it starts, a woman can be heard shouting "I voted for Trump, so there." She then goes on to complain that she is being discriminated against by two black store employees.

"I started recording because I'd seen her in the store and... when I was about to leave she started lying and yelling at the employees and going on a horrible racist rant," Ms Grady said.

"The last part of the video is shaky because my hands were shaking - not because of what she was saying to me or that she was screaming and filming my two-year-old, but because I stopped in the middle of this to hug the manager who showed me a picture of her baby and she said, 'this happens all the time'."

Ms Grady later set up a Go Fund Me page, explaining she wanted to do something to try to make it up to the employee who was the main target of the attack.

"I'd like to show her that many people are horrified by how this woman treated her, and that we stand with her and appreciate her hard work. She inspired me because despite the hateful words that were being hurled in her direction, she stood in that entranceway calm and unmoving to protect her staff and customers.

"In the current climate I believe it's very important that we go out of our way to treat each other with dignity, kindness and politeness, and that we stand up for each other when we see people being mistreated."

Art academy for school dropout thanks to Egyptian social media

A nine-year-old Egyptian boy who dropped out of school has come to the attention of a fine artist who is promising to teach him how to draw, thanks to students at Cairo University circulating his drawings on social media.

The boy, who has only been identified as Moaz, featured on a TV talk show in Egypt last week, where he said he had to accompany his grandmother selling tissues at a subway since his parents separated.

He told the host, Mona Elshazly:"I was sitting beside my grandmother and started to draw. This is when I figured out that my drawings were cool."

He said university students also started to buy him notebooks and other things. "There are many of them and all of them were nice," he said.

The university students' posts eventually attracted the attention of a fine artist, Ali al-Rawi.

Mr Al-Rawi said he saw promise in the pictures and decided to find the child and teach him how to draw in his own academy. He said he eventually plans to hold an exhibition of Moaz's work as well. Mona Elshazly has pledged to get him back into school.

Additional reporting by BBC Monitoring