Rebels approach Tripoli and trigger uprising in suburbs as Gaddafi calls on 'all patriots' to help defend capital
Luke Harding in Maya
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 21 August 2011 20.32 BST
Article history
Libya: rebel fighters speed to join frontline fighting in the village of Maya, from where Tripoli could be seen in the distance. Photograph: Sergey Ponomarev/AP
He has ruled Libya for 42 tumultuous years. But Muammar Gaddafi's defiant regime was on Sunday entering its final hours, as an insurrection engulfed the capital Tripoli and rebels entered its outer suburbs.
In another day of dramatic advances, opposition fighters pushed forward from the western town of Zawiya along the coastal highway to Tripoli. They are now a short car ride away from the capital. From the frontline in the village of Maya, the chimneys of Tripoli's power station could be seen shimmering in the distance.
The regime's last moments are being played out in an attractive green landscape of orange groves, olive trees and seaside restaurants.
Gaddafi's troops are still fighting, directing mortars and sniper fire at the rebels, sometimes with deadly accuracy and on Sunday night the embattled dictator called for "all the patriots of Libya" to help defend the capital. But the fall of Tripoli is now very close.
"They are becoming weak. They are very frightened," Ahmad Gaid said of the government troops, who on Sunday retreated to and then further beyond the "27 bridge" – 27 kilometres from the centre of Tripoli. Gaid, a 25-year-old fighter, had taken temporary shelter together with a medical staff in a roadside house.
Up ahead was an enemy sniper. Bullets whined past. A rebel pickup truck responded with 12.5 anti-aircraft artillery: an unmistakable, thunderous boom-boom-boom-boom. The fighters had sent in their one tank, which promptly broke down. "There was something wrong with its chamber," Mohamad, a 25-year-old Libyan-American volunteer, said calmly.
Rebel vehicles streamed to and from the battle. Some fighters were in a hypnotic daze. One staggered in and recounted how his vehicle veered off the road after its tyre was shot at. A bullet hit one of his comrades in the face. "What happened to him?" he inquired. "He died," Mohamad replied.
Mohamad said he was hoping to rescue his US-educated father and brother, both rounded up by the regime and now in jail in Tripoli.
The rebels may lack heavy weaponry, but they have one supreme advantage: allied airpower. On the road from Zawiya to Maya an air strike had flattened a Turkish restaurant used by Gaddafi's troops as a command point. The building was a skeletal ruin, the restaurant's sandbagged entrance blown out. Nearby, opposition militiamen were combing through a dense forest of cypresses. Behind them was the town of Zawiya, definitively seized by the rebels on Saturday following a week-long battle, and now a ruined mess.
Two plastic mannequins lay surreally in one street; most of the buildings in the central square have been destroyed. The city was peaceful on Sunday.
The drama of Libya's six-month revolution has now shifted to further along the coast; the final act awaits. The anti-Gaddafi fighters are pushing towards the capital from three directions – west, south, and east. On the southern road to Tripoli volunteers from the Tripoli brigade were on Monday massing near the government-held town of Aziziya, 40 kilometres south of Tripoli. They were camped out at a primary school awaiting orders. Up ahead, Nato jets were pounding the sites from where Gaddafi's troops had been imprudently launching Grad missiles. "We will win this war," Mohamad, a 24-year-old law student, declared. Why? "Because we believe in God. God and then Nato," he replied. His faith wasn't misplaced: every few minutes there was a loud percussive, earth-shaking rumble, as Nato jets pulverised the way ahead. After each strike the fighters resting up in the shade broke into chants of "Allu Akhbar".
"Morale is very high. The rebels are controlling most of Tripoli," he added.
On Saturday evening a Libyan opposition TV channel claimed that Gaddafi and two of his sons had fled the country. It offered no proof, and the regime flatly denied that the Libyan leader had fled. But the claim triggered a pre-planned and well-coordinated uprising in several parts of the capital, as well as celebrations in rebel-held Benghazi, Misrata, and Zintan, the opposition stronghold in Libya's western mountains.
According to Issam Mohmed Shebani, there is now fierce fighting raging inside the capital between Gaddafi's soldiers and locals. The eastern suburbs of Tajura, Fashlum, and Souk al-Jouma had risen up against Gaddafi, he said. The pro-government west of the city was "pretty quiet". Fighting was also taking place in the central Mansura district. Shebani, the son of a prominent Libyan exile, said at least 133 civilians had been killed so far, citing opposition sources.
Other fighters preparing to launch the final assault on Tripoli said Gaddafi's desperate soldiers were now firing mortars into residential areas. Nabil Nassar said he had spoken to his family bunkered down in Tripoli. "There is non-stop fighting since dawn. Most families have got some weapons. They are also managing to get ammunition. But government troops are firing on them from the top of the mobile network tower," he said. Nassar added that he lived in Britain and had an MA in diplomatic relations. He left London two months ago to join the anti-Gaddafi war, he said, having tired of political tactics. "I got bored of taking part in protests," he said.
According to his relatives, opposition areas inside Tripoli had set up committees to protect residential areas, and were also manning their own checkpoints. Behind the frontline, there was mood of triumph and certainty that victory and the overthrow of Libya's hated dictator was close. Families driving past checkpoints hooted and waved V-signs; rebels responded by cracking off celebratory shots.
On a roadside skip someone had hung a stuffed effigy of Gaddafi. They had used a lot of white wool to improvise the leader's unruly hairdo. A petrol station had reopened, prompting long queues; a stall had set up business selling seasonal coriander and fennel. And what of Gaddafi himself? The fighters made clear on Sunday what would happen to him when – and if – they got hold of him. "We will kill him very slowly," one said.
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