Reply #34: Berber Rebellion & Gaddafi

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Sat May 07, 2011 at 10:02 AM PDT
Berber Rebellion & Gaddafi

by niccolo caldararo

In the forgotten mountains of western Libya a terrible struggle is going on. Berber rebels and their Arab allies are fighting a loosing war against better armed Gaddafi military and militia. No Nato aid has arrived and the Gaddafi forces are taking no quarter and firing on the old, the infirm and women and children. Ignored by the world the Berbers are fighting for their existence. Protected in part by the rugged territory of the Nafusa Mountains, they have been able to hold off Gaddafi forces until the last three weeks when a new offensive has broken rebel lines. The Berbers need no foreign troops to help, they need arms and ammunition. Nato air cover would be effective but even if Nato bombed roads and bridges the effect would be to slow Gaddafi forces and allow the Berbers to regroup. Nato planes have been seen in the sky but little has been done. Now is the time for Nato and the US to act. A Berber presence or victory over the Gaddafi forces threatens vital supply lines to Gaddafi from the resource-rich Ghadames basin to the south. Should rebels in the Nafusa succeed and link with rebel tribes in the Kufra area, Gaddafi is finished. A minor investment by Nato now will make all the difference.

The fall of the city of Gharyan on March 1st signaled the pro-Gaddafi invasion of the Nafusa region. Gaddafi has persecuted the Berbers throughout his reign, banning their language and signs of ethnicity. Other cities have fallen since and in each case Gaddafi terrorists have gone door to door carrying out murders of suspected rebels and their families. Currently a savage battle rages around the city of Zintan where rebel Berber and Arab allies are surrounded by Gaddafi forces with tanks and rocket launchers. The city is being bombarded by pro-Gaddafi shells night and day killing hundreds of civilians. The battle for Libya will be won or lost in the Nafusa. Information and independent sources have been posted on Wikipedia for this struggle (http://en.wikipedia.org/...) and (http://en.wikipedia.org/...).

al-Jazeera reports today that Nato failed to defend Misurata against pro-Gaddafi air attacks that destroyed Misurata's oil and petro storage tanks (http://english.aljazeera.net/) but also on the failure of Nato planes to neutralize pro-Gaddafi tanks and rocket launchers in Nafusa out side Zintan. It is obvious that Nato cannot deal effectively with the situation and American drones are needed to force Gaddafi's forces out of the Nafusa.

Strangely enough, Gaddafi is a member of an Arabized Berber tribe so one might imagine that his oppression of the Berbers originates from not only a dogmatic modernism, but a psychology of self-hatred.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/07/946332/-Berber-RebellionGaddafi?showAll=yes