Retired General Khalifa Haftar, once commander of Libyan ground forces in the 1980s, has escalated “Operation Dignity”, the campaign he recently launched against Islamist extremists in eastern Libya. His forces have struck locations in Benghazi said to be strongholds of the Ansar Al-Sharia organisation and other Islamist extremist groups. The interim Libyan government headed by caretaker Prime Minister Abdullah Al-Thinni, who is also minister of defence, appears at a loss in the face of the intensification of fighting between the forces loyal to Haftar and the brigades of former rebels against the Gaddafi regime. On Sunday and Monday, Haftar's forces targeted a number of sites in the neighbourhoods of Tablino, Qaryounes, Al-Warasha and Sidi Faraj in western Benghazi. No less than 19 have been confirmed killed, one an Egyptian citizen named Mohammed Abu Saada, and more than a hundred were wounded, mostly civilians, as the result of the continuous bombardment during the fiercest hostilities since 16 May when Haftar launched his campaign. What gives the Haftar forces an edge over their adversaries is the military aircraft that have been deployed to target the Ansar Al-Sharia strongholds, although other areas have been damaged by the aerial bombardment, such as Benghazi University, some government buildings as well as some private property. Popular anger in the city has mounted against Ansar Al-Sharia, especially after a statement issued by its commander, Mohammed Al-Zahawi, in which he threatened to engage foreigners to fight Haftar's forces. The threat added weight to long-held suspicions that Ansar Al-Sharia already has foreign fighters who have engaged in operations to sow unrest and instability. The spokesman for “Operation Dignity”, General Mohammed Al-Hijazi, has stressed that the drive against extremists will continue until it reaches its aim of flushing terrorists out of Benghazi, and Ansar Al-Sharia above all. Libyan activists have been circulating images on Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites depicting the destruction caused by the bombardment that was reported to have damaged some private homes in the neighbourhoods of Qaryounis and Sidi Faraj. According to the dean of the Faculty of Engineering at Benghazi University, three missiles struck the faculty building, wounding two persons. It was very fortunate that lectures had ended, he added. In a development that is certain to increase popular and media support for “Operation Dignity”, Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) has threatened to join the fight against Haftar's forces. In a statement entitled “Declaration of Support and Assistance for our People in Libya,” published on jihadist websites, AQIM called on Libyan tribes to oppose Haftar and his forces and it urged militias and other formations not to lay down their weapons under any pretext. The statement described “Operation Dignity” as “a crusader scheme to bury the project for the application of Sharia law in its cradle and to impose their heretic methods on the Muslims of Libya”. It also called on Libyans to reject the Haftar drive and “to prevent their fellow people from staining their hands with the blood of their brothers who remain vigilant over their security and who strive to apply the Law of their God in spite of the campaign of siege and distortion against them”. In an interview with the Dutch “Here's Your Voice” website, Haftar said that his campaign could take anywhere from three months to a year on the outside to complete. It was impossible to bring it to a conclusion quicker because “We face an enemy that is not systematic, that fights from different places and that receives support from its counterparts abroad.” As “Operation Dignity” heads toward a hazy future, while it leaves tangible results on the ground, Deputy Minister of Defence Khaled Al-Sherif, on his Facebook page, claimed to possess certain information that he had obtained from his communications with some of the military units in the east that had supported “Haftar's coup attempt” to the effect that they now realised that Haftar had deceived them and that his real aim was to undermine the revolution. Al-Sherif said that those sources now were preparing to apprehend Haftar and hand him over to the relevant authorities. He added that the same sources said that some of the officers who were involved with Haftar had sent their families to Egypt after having received information that the operation was not proceeding according to plan and that the situation on the ground was not in their favour. Supporters of “Operation Dignity” eye Al-Sherif's remarks with scepticism. However, sources in Tripoli with whom Al-Ahram Weekly spoke by phone report that the revolutionaries of Libya are on their way to join their militias that are under the command of the chief of general staffs, an office that falls under the General National Congress (GNC), Libya's highest sovereign authority. The sources, that spoke on condition of anonymity, said that the militias, foremost among are the seven Libya Shield brigades, will be merged into three military regiments beneath the office of the chiefs of general staffs. They stressed that the members of these militias will be signed up as individuals, with each given a military number as is done in professional armies. According to these sources, Libyan Shield Central Zone, or the “Central Shield” for short, will become the “central regiment”. This militia, which is affiliated with the city of Misrata, is the strongest of the seven Libyan shield brigades. With more than 25,000 members, it is also the best armed and equipped, and is regarded as the chief of general staffs and the GNC as the major strike force. In the east, the revolutionaries have begun to study merging a number of militias, such as Libya Shield 1, the 17 February Brigade and the Rafallah Al-Sihati Brigade into a new formation called the Eastern Zone Regiment. The caretaker government, under Defence Minister Al-Thinni, has condemned the bombardment operations initiated by Haftar's forces Sunday. In a statement appearing on the government's official website that evening, it said that the bombardment to which Benghazi had been subjected Sunday afternoon had not been ordered by the Libyan Ministry of Defence or by the chief of general staffs of the Libyan Army. The statement stressed that those who undertook the act would bear responsibility and it concluded: “At a time when the government deplores with all its might the terrorism, murder, kidnapping and intimidation of the people that certain groups are perpetuating in the name of religion, it does not approve the actions undertaken by parties that claim to speak in the name of the national army.” The statement signifies that the government does not recognise Haftar as a commander of Libyan armed forces and that he has not been authorised in any such capacity by the central authorities in Tripoli. In view of the general elections that have been scheduled for 25 June, the GNC has instructed its committees to prepare for the handover to a new parliament. However, some political forces object to the fact that the GNC has not been dissolved or has not gone into obligatory recess, as required by law, until the elections are held. Haftar, for his part, has announced his opposition to holding elections while his military drive is in progress in the east, a stance that could further complicate the political situation, especially in the west where the conflicts are more complex than in the east. One conflict surrounds Prime Minister Ahmed Maetig, who was recently appointed by the GNC to form a government and whose proposed cabinet was subsequently approved by that assembly. Nevertheless, both the fate of current caretaker government of Al-Thinni and that of the government of the controversially elected Maetig are still awaiting a ruling of the Supreme Constitutional Court. Meanwhile, in a development that may have come as a surprise to many, the Tripoli municipal assembly, which had just been elected in May, elected Milad Al-Harathi mayor of the capital. The source of surprise is that in Libya, contrary to other countries of the Arab Spring, liberals have been more successful than Islamists in elections in the post-Gaddafi period. Yet, the new mayor of Tripoli is a well-known Islamist. The former commander of the battle to liberate Tripoli, he was recently in charge of recruiting and dispatching fighters to Syria. His election, which was conducted as an internal election among council members, may herald the return of Islamists to Tripoli at a time when they are being defeated in Tunisia and Egypt. Othman Al-Qajiji, who chairs the central committee for municipal council elections, announced Monday that the municipal elections were proceeding smoothly. Thirty mayors have been elected so far. Libya has begun to reap the fruit of the successful municipal council elections, he said, adding that these councils will play a prominent role in the country's political process because they are pillars in progress towards the development of the institutionalised state, which is one of the most important aims of Libya's 17 February Revolution.
