Benghazi, Libya: "If we lose, Huda Ben Amer will hang all of us"

[pinboy3niner]

Libya: Benghazi's rebels know it is now them or Gaddafi


Dream of freedom threatened by advancing government forces, the city's people recognise the price they could pay for revolution

Chris McGreal in Benghazi guardian.co.uk
Saturday 12 March 2011 18.51 GMT


Ask people in Benghazi what awaits them if Muammar Gaddafi's army fights its way back into the rebel capital and the chances are they will talk about Huda Ben Amer.

Today she is one of the Libyan dictator's most closely trusted lieutenants, but nearly three decades ago Ben Amer was a young woman in Benghazi keen to earn a name with the regime. Her moment came at the public hanging of one of Gaddafi's opponents in 1984. Ben Amer rushed forward as the unfortunate man dangled from the rope, wrapped her arms around his body and used her weight to pull down until he was dead.

That stomach-churning performance won her Gaddafi's attention, and Ben Amer rose to become powerful, rich and twice mayor of Benghazi. It also earned her the enduring hatred of many in a city long viewed by the regime as riddled with subversion, where she is spoken of with the same depth of loathing and fear as the dictator.

...


"If we lose, Huda Ben Amer will hang all of us," said Walid Malak, an engineer turned revolutionary who has armed himself with a Kalashnikov plundered from a military base abandoned by Gaddafi's forces. "Everyone in Benghazi knows it's them or us."


http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/mar/12/libya-benghazi-gaddafi-revolution

[pinboy3niner]

1. "If Ajdabiya is taken, Benghazi will be next"

--AJE correspondent Nick Clark, reporting from Tobruk.

[pinboy3niner]

2. AJE: "The frontline is moving eastwards in favour of Gaddafi"

10:17am < (3:17 am EST) >

Al Jazeera's Nick Clark reports from Tobruk that, "The frontline is moving eastwards in favour of Gaddafi.

"But there is huge amount of resilience still, they (rebel forces) still think they can see Gaddafi off without a doubt. They are all proclaiming that ultimately they will win.

"East of the country is hugely anti-Gaddafi, the reason for that is that they have been deprived by Gaddafi of the infrastructure and teh oil wealth that has been coming into Libya for years."

http://blogs.aljazeera.net/live/africa/libya-live-blog-march-13

[pinboy3niner]

3. Gaddafi's army will kill half a million, warn Libyan rebels

Gaddafi's army will kill half a million, warn Libyan rebels

Rebels flee Ras Lanuf and call on UN to impose no-fly zone as Gaddafi's forces recapture

strategically important towns

Chris McGreal in Benghazi
guardian.co.uk, Saturday 12 March 2011 18.14 GMT


Muammar Gaddafi's army won control of a strategic rebel-held Libyan town and laid siege to

another as the revolutionary administration in Benghazi again appealed for foreign military help

to prevent what it said would be the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people if the insurgents

were to lose.

...


The head of Libya's revolutionary council, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, claimed that if Gaddafi's forces

were to reach the country's second-largest city it would result in "the death of half a million"

people.

The Arab League, meeting in Cairo, called on the UN security council to impose a no fly-zone on

Libya as Gaddafi's forces also began to move against Misrata, a city of 300,000 people about

125 miles from Tripoli. Misrata is the only town in the west of the country still under the control

of the insurgents after their defeat in a vicious battle for Zawiya. The rebels said that Misrata

was now surrounded by Gaddafi's forces, which included tanks.

"We are bracing for a massacre," Mohamad Ahmed, a rebel fighter in the city, said. "We know

it will happen and Misrata will be like Zawiya, but we believe in God. We do not have the

capabilities to fight Gaddafi and his forces. They have tanks and heavy weapons and we have

our belief and trust in God.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/mar/12/gaddafi-army-kill-half-million

The rebel fighter quoted, Mohamad Ahmed, added:

"The fighters here and the people of Misrata hold the international community responsible for

the fall of Zawiya and for all the deaths that happened. Gaddafi is responsible, but they are

partners in crime."

[pinboy3niner]

4. GADDAFI'S BLOODBATH: "Yesterday the ambulance delivered just arms and legs"

As the rebels struggle to hold ground, the war creeps toward them. In the darkened halls of the Ajdabiya hospital, 45 miles east of Port Brega, Dr. Anis Bargty predicted more casualties.

"Yesterday the ambulance delivered just arms and legs," he said. "A terrible day, and there will be more."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-libya-rebels-20110313,0,1893818,full.story

[upi402]

5. Obama is closing yet another window of opportunity

He needs to stop this slaughter sugically. Do something good here for these people struggling for democracy.

[joshcryer]

6. Check Steve Clemons' arguments, they're effective, but come short.

The US doesn't want to get involved without international support for obvious reasons, the "imperialists are trying to take over everything" propaganda is effective, even people here on DU would refuse to see intervention from a humanitarian point of view. It's heartbreaking.

It'll be three days yet before a decision is even made.

[pinboy3niner]

8. And it wd take 2-3 days to implement NFZ enforcement, analysts say. nt

[WinkyDink]

9. Completely ineffectual...on purpose.

[pinboy3niner]

11. The Observer calls the West's response 'a panoply of irresolution'

Their editorial today:

Libya: The west can't let Gaddafi destroy his people
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/mar/13/observer-editorial-libya

[KG]

10. american gov'ts didn't mind ghaddafi as long as he didn't interrupt revenue streams

[upi402]

13. Revenue stream

trumps even energy supply vis-a-vis state security concerns.

We are pwned.

[joshcryer]

7. Just saw "Inside Job" and came back to this. :(

:cry:

[Turborama]

12. I was about to watch it

But might leave it for a bit after seeing your reaction.

:kick:

[pinboy3niner]

14. NYT: Qaddafi Forces Move on Town Near Rebel-Held Benghazi

Qaddafi Forces Move on Town Near Rebel-Held Benghazi

By ANTHONY SHADID
Published: March 13, 2011

AJDABIYA, Libya — Military forces loyal to Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi advanced Sunday on this anxious town, a strategic linchpin on the doorstep of the opposition capital Benghazi and within grasp of a highway crucial to recapturing the eastern border and encircling the rebellion with heavy armor and artillery.

After another day of headlong retreat, this time from the refinery and port at Brega, one town west of here, the rebels prepared for what some called a last stand at Ajdabiya, taking refuge in military barracks where they stacked ammunition boxes six deep, positioned a handful of tanks and tried to bring order to a jumble of small artillery and antiaircraft guns. Bulldozers built berms three feet high near a pair of green, metal arches that mark the town’s entrance.

The fate of Ajdabiya, an eastern town of 120,000 near the Mediterranean coast, may prove decisive in the most violent and chaotic of the uprisings that have upended the Arab world. Under a sky turned gray by a menacing sandstorm, the rebels valiantly vowed victory but acknowledged the deficit posed by their weapons and pleaded for a no-flight zone that seemed a metaphor for any kind of international help.

...


The United Nations Security Council this week may take up an Arab League call for a no-flight zone over Libya, a decision that Colonel Qaddafi’s government on Sunday deemed an “unexpected departure” from the league’s charter. The foreign ministers of major industrial nations are expected to consider the topic at a meeting in Paris on Monday. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is to fly on to Egypt and Tunisia afterward, and is expected to meet with Libyan opposition leaders.


http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/14/world/africa/14libya.html?_r=1&ref=world

[pinboy3niner]

15. Plan A and Plan B...

Al Jazeera's Tony Birtley reports from Benghazi, "The rebels here have two plans, Plan A is about what will happen if Gaddafi goes, how they can run their country according to their own rules and Plan B is run."

http://blogs.aljazeera.net/live/africa/libya-live-blog-march-14


At least the opposition fighters have a sense of humor--even if they're only half-joking. They know that if Gaddafi prevails, they're dead men walking...

[eShirl]

16. "We must, indeed, all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately."

quote often attributed to Benjamin Franklin on the signing of the Declaration of Independence