$re = '/(xyz(?:(?!abc).)*?)123/ms';
$str = 'abc----1
pqr----2
123----3
xyz----4
lll----5
pqr----6
123----7
qqq----8
xyz----5
abc----3
123----9';
$subst = "$1456";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$result;
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php