NY Times:
Libya appeared to slip further into chaos on Tuesday, as clashes intensified between rebels and forces loyal to Col. Muammar el Qaddafi in Tripoli. Opposition forces in eastern Libya moved to consolidate their control.
Witnesses described the streets of Tripoli, the capital, as a war zone. In several neighborhoods of the city, including one called Fashloum, protesters tried to seal off the streets with makeshift barricades of scrap steel and other debris. Forces loyal to Colonel Qaddafi so far failed to surmount the barricades and young protesters appeared to be gathering rocks to throw in their defense in anticipation of a renewed attack.
Outside the barricades, militiamen and Bedouin tribesmen defending the strongman and his 40-year rule were stationed at intersections around the city. Many carried Kalashnikov assault rifles and an anti-aircraft gun was deployed in front of the state television headquarters.
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A growing number of Libyan embassies around the world, including in neighboring Tunisia, have raised the country’s pre-Qaddafi flag — now considered the banner of the revolt — and many diplomats, including Libya’s ambassador to the United States, said they had resigned to protest the bloody crackdown.
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An exodus from Tripoli had begun, a witness said, and the freeways were crowded with cars and pedestrians attempting to flee. Inside the capital, people waited for hours to buy fuel and bread.
Security forces and militiamen backed by helicopters and warplanes besieged parts of Tripoli overnight, according to witnesses and news reports. Fighting was heavy at times, and the streets were thick with special forces loyal to Colonel Qaddafi fighting alongside mercenaries. Roving the streets in trucks, they shot freely as planes dropped what witnesses described as “small bombs” and helicopters fired on protesters.
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Reports from small towns in the mountains outside of Tripoli indicated that uprisings have driven out forces loyal to Colonel Qaddafi. But security forces blocked roads leading into Tripoli, preventing people from outside the city from joining the insurrection there.
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In Benghazi, Libya’s second-largest city, pro-government security forces appeared to have either fled or defected to the opposition. Citizens armed with guns organized into informal security committees, a resident reached by telephone said. Supermarkets and warehouses were open, as were local hospitals, caring for hundreds of people wounded during the government crackdown of the weekend, before defections from the military brought a lull in the violence.
“There is collaboration between people like never before,” said Mohammed Abdul Rahman el Mahrek, 42, who has been living in the city for 15 years and said he supported the rebellion. The warehouses of security forces loyal to the government had been looted by the people with the help of the army, he said. “It is quiet,” he said, “but it is like the quiet before the storm.”
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Qaddafi appears to be isolated in an ever smaller groups of mercenaries and loyalist. How much longer he can depend on them may depend on whether he can continue to pay them as sources of revenue begin to dry up. His forces don't even control all of the capitol, much less the country. He probably should have gone to Venezuela when he had the chance.
Image by chavezcandanga via Flickr
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