Loyalist offensive in Benghazi
November 3, 2014
At least 13 people were killed during intense fighting with war planes and tanks between the army and Islamist militants in Benghazi on Monday, residents of the second largest Libyan city said. Local media reported forces loyal to the government advanced towards the center of the city.
"I saw families running for their lives out of the neighborhood. I even saw women going out of the area without their shoes," a resident of the city told the Associated Press news agency on the condition of anonymity. "A state of panic has taken over the neighborhood."
Dozens of residents were leaving Benghazi, heeding a call by the army to evacuate the port area and main commercial district where military officials said Islamists were holed up, while the army moved more tanks and artillery into the city.
A ship on fire
The pro-government forces had surrounded members of the Islamist-leaning Libya Shield force in areas near the city's Mediterranean port, Libyan news site Al-Wasat reported.
A large ship in the port was also set ablaze, with witnesses and the country's military spokesman disagreeing whether it was an oil tanker or a naval warship.
Mohammed Hegazi, the army spokesman, told the Associated Press that Islamist troops hit an oil tanker with rocket propelled grenades from buildings overlooking the port: "I saw it with my own eyes and it is a small oil tanker," he said, declining to divulge any more details about the shuo.
However, other eyewitnesses said the vessel caught in the crossfire was a naval warship.
Two governments, countless armies
Army special forces, backed by troops of ex-General Khalifa Haftar, launched the offensive two weeks ago against the militants, blamed by Washington for a 2012 assault which claimed several lives, including that of the American ambassador Christopher Stevens.
The government has struggled to maintain control over the country amid persistent attacks by rival tribes and militant factions. In August, Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thinni was forced to the leave the capital when an armed group from the western city of Misrata took control of the city and set up its own government.
At least 243 people have been killed since the beginning of the offensive, 13 of them on Monday, according to Red Crescent medics.
dj/kms (Reuters, dpa, AP, AFP)