Libya unrest: Scores killed in Benghazi 'massacre'

[Pete]

Libya unrest: Scores killed in Benghazi 'massacre'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12517327

"Doctor 'Braikah' in Benghazi describes 'a massacre' (Amateur video with this interview purportedly shows recent unrest in several parts of Libya)

Details have emerged of huge casualty figures in the Libyan city of Benghazi, where troops have launched a brutal crackdown on protesters............."

With little "real" news on the ground it's hard to tell whats true or not. Government appears to be taking a harder line in Libya.

With little "real" news on the ground it's hard to tell whats true or not. Government appears to be taking a harder line in Libya.

The difficulty of reporting from inside Libya

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditor...rom_libya.html

"Reporting from Libya is tricky at the best of times - clearly, the situation there right now is anything but.

For 41 years, Muammar Gaddafi - the self-proclaimed "Brotherly Leader and Guide of the Revolution" - has made life difficult for the Western media. While British nationals can enter many of the world's 192 countries without visas, or collect them on arrival, Libya is one of the exceptions. There, the door is firmly shut to international journalists, local reporters face intimidation and the threat of worse. It explains why, in contrast to recent events in Tunisia, Egypt and Bahrain, we're unable to report from inside Libya on the protests taking place there, and the authorities violent response................+

[incarcerated]

Courtesy of Bryan Suits :
http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/1...amid-crackdown

Unprecedented challenge to Gaddafi amid crackdown

21 February 2011 | 09:29:41 AM
Source: SBS Staff and agencies
Libya's prime minister has said there is a plot to turn his country into a terrorist base, as anti-regime protests reached the capital and world powers denounced an iron-fisted crackdown said to have cost hundreds of lives.

Amid rumours of his departure, the challenge to Libyan leader Gaddafi was mounting with reports on Twitter, which Al Jazeera said in a live bloghad been backed up by witnesses, that anti-government protesters were effectively in control of the city of Benghazi.

Reports said that pro-Gaddafi militia in the city were 'being butchered.'

The news came amid unconfirmed reports on the network that troops were joining in the protests in the city.

And in another significant crack in the regime's public face, Libya's envoy to the Arab League announced he was "joining the revolution", AFP reported.

"I have submitted my resignation in protest against the acts of repression and violence against demonstrators (in Libya) and I am joining the ranks of the revolution," Abdel Moneim al-Honi said.

Ironically, Libya currently holds the rotating presidency of the 22-member Arab League.

The network also reported that the Libyan ambassador to China had resigned live on air....

And another official told AFP that Islamist gunmen had stormed a military depot and the nearby port of Derna on Wednesday and Friday and seized weapons and vehicles after killing four soldiers.

They also took hostages, both soldiers and civilians, and were "threatening to execute them unless a siege by security forces is lifted" in nearby Al-Baida.

With most of this week's violence concentrated in the east of the country, unrest hit the capital itself on Sunday night, one resident told AFP....

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http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/new...-1226009267520

Libyan PM Gaddafi may have fled country, says Al Jazeera, citing unconfirmed reports

By staff writers From: news.com.au
February 21, 2011 9:51AM
LIBYA'S ambassador to China, Hussein Sadiq al Musrati, says Muammar Gaddafi may have left Libya.

Al Jazeera says Libya's ambassador to China, Hussein Sadiq al Musrati, resigned on air with Al Jazeera Arabic.

He reportedly called on the army to intervene, and has called all diplomatic staff to resign, the site said.

He said a gunfight between Mr Gaddafi's sons occurred and also claimed that Mr Gaddafi may have left Libya.

Al Jazeera has no confirmation of these claims.

[Pete]

Reports: Benghazi now in the hands of Libyan protesters

http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/africa...pt=T1&iref=BN1

"(CNN) -- Multiple eyewitnesses have reported that Benghazi, Libya's second-largest city, was in the hands of protesters and their military allies after several days of unrest in the nation.

Some of the military dropped allegiances to longtime Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, according to the report.............."

May take a while to sort things out.

[dadof18x'er]

is this photo shopped?

[PSM]

Originally Posted by dadof18x'er

is this photo shopped?

Time wounds all heels.

Pat

[Paslode]

Originally Posted by dadof18x'er

is this photo shopped?

That is damn scary.......I pity the poor sole that wakes up next to that in the morning.

[incarcerated]

Originally Posted by Paslode

That is damn scary.......I pity the poor sole that wakes up next to that in the morning.

I had a boss who looked like that. Worst of all, she had a disposition to match.

[Red Flag 1]

Originally Posted by dadof18x'er

is this photo shopped?

Wonder what he looks like without the makeup and black hair dye.?

RF 1

[Pete]

The identity cards of Qaddafi’s Foreign militia mercenaries after the mercenaries were captured:

A link to a7fadhomar's flicker page. Page 4 claims to have pictures of the ID's of one of the captured "mercenaries" working security for Qaddafi.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/a7fadhomar/

[Pete]

Gaddafi flees Tripoli as protesters set the Libyan parliament building alight

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz1EbjbqcGU

"Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi is believed to have fled the capital Tripoli after anti-government demonstrators breached the state television building and set government property alight.

Protesters appear to have gained a foothold in Tripoli as banks and government buildings were looted while demonstrators have claimed they have taken control of the second city Benghazi..............."

[mark46th]

In all this chaos in Libya, I would be sending someone in to take care of Megrahi...

[incarcerated]

http://www.nationalreview.com/blogs/print/260280

Libya without Gaddafi: What to Expect, What to Watch For

By Victor Davis Hanson
Posted on February 21, 2011 2:53 PM
One of the most surreal experiences of my life — even apart from having a ruptured appendix and emergency surgery in a Gaddafi-government clinic — was a spring assignment in Libya to lecture on the Roman ruins there (which are quite impressive, since the neglect and ensuing 40 years of sand have, in counterintuitive fashion, been a protective cocoon from Gaddafi’s far greater ravages).

It was like no other country I have ever visited: wet garbage and sewage in the streets; an oil-exporter with massive pot-holes and no asphalt to fix them; almost every room, office, or hallway in Tripoli with peeling paint, exposed wiring, and something broken; the airport a disaster; almost every human action a possible violation of some government statute.

And, of course, Gaddafi’s picture was everywhere — sometimes as the protector of Islam, sometimes a sort of new-age Stalin, sometimes as the spiritual leader of black Africa, always presented with a nauseating green backdrop. In fact, books, shirts, even simple packaging was green. Citizens were terrified and talked in whispers, often relating some of the strangest rumors imaginable: past calls to burn all violins, past calls for every citizen to raise chickens, past calls for bonuses for marrying black African nationals. I arrived the day Lionel Ritchie was playing a 20th-anniversary anti-American concert commemorating Gaddafi’s heroic resistance to the Reagan bombing.

In sum, Gaddafi seems to have managed to destroy almost everything he touched: infrastructure, normal human interaction, the energy industry, the media — every aspect of life bore his destructive handprint.

So what does his apparent departure portend? Some random thoughts:

1) This is the first totalitarian, collectivist terror state to topple in this period of Middle Eastern unrest, which raises the question of whether others (e.g., Syria, Iran) might also face the same fate as Tunisia and Egypt, despite their willingness to shoot and kill indiscriminately and ban the international press.

2) Gaddafi hated the United States. Anti-American propaganda was spoon-fed to the population hourly (I remember watching the evenings newsreels’ ad nauseam depictions of U.S. “crimes” in Iraq). We are disliked by some countries’ protesters for cozying up to Saudi, Tunisian, Egyptian, and Pakistani authoritarians; does it necessarily follow that we will be liked by the opponents of anti-American authoritarians? Does anti-anti-Americanism translate into pro-Americanism?

I doubt it. In 2006, I heard constantly from my minders and others that Gaddafi was installed through some sort of U.S./Zionist plot to impoverish Libya. In general, if the Middle East becomes more ‘democratic’ (as in plebiscites without constitutions), we should brace, at least in the beginning, for a grassroots outpouring of anti-Western, anti-American, and anti-Semitic venom, given what we have seen in various polls of popular opinion.

3) We were far less culpable than the Europeans in dealing with this monster — especially the British and Italians, who simply overlooked Libyans’ virtual imprisonment and looked for profits wherever possible.

4) The country has great natural beauty, a stunning coastline, a central location, untapped gas and oil reserves (Gaddafi’s incompetence often meant that oil was not so easy to extract and squander), incredible antiquities — and unlimited tourist and commercial potential should it ever embrace constitutional government.

5) Libyans seemed to me terrified of Egyptians, including the tens of thousands of illegal-alien Egyptians in their country. The oil fields in their lightly populated country are a little too near for their comfort to the border of the oil-needy, overpopulated Egyptian powerhouse. The oil-rich border regions between the two countries will be of interest in the days ahead.

6) What is the U.S. official policy in all this? Is there a consistent one? When it came to encouraging anti-theocratic protesters in Iran, our policy was not to meddle; then we meddled quite a lot in anti-authoritarian protests in Egypt. Cannot the administration at last state that it supports non-violent, gradual transitions to consensual government, institutionalized secular human rights, and an independent judiciary — regardless of whether the overthrown government was hard-right authoritarian or hard-left totalitarian or theocratic Islamist? Since all governments and figures in the Middle East seem transitory, it would be far better to establish a policy that is principled and constant, no matter the ideologies and authoritarians involved.

In other words, I think the Obama administration’s “reset” outreach to countries like Iran and Syria is moribund — as it should be. Oppressed peoples in nightmarish states do not care to hear of our efforts to reach out to their oppressors, multiculturalism or no multiculturalism.

[Dusty]

Buzz is there's already a movie in the works re: the whole adventure. Danny Trejo's already been signed to play Gaddafi himself, and they're floating "Scimitar" as the title.

[Pete]

Libya: Who is propping up Gaddafi?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12558066

"Unlike in Egypt or Tunisia, it is not the conventional military that holds the balance of power in Libya.

Instead, it is a murky network of paramilitary brigades, "revolutionary committees" of trusted followers, tribal leaders and imported foreign mercenaries.

The actual Libyan Army is almost symbolic, a weakened and emaciated force of little more than 40,000, poorly armed and poorly trained. It is part of Col Muammar Gaddafi's long-term strategy to eliminate the risk of a military coup, which is how he himself came to power in 1969............"

Interesting article.