ZAWIYA, Libya -- Fierce street fights broke out in several neighborhoods of Tripoli on Saturday night, according to Tripoli residents and rebel fighters, as rebels inside the capital took to the streets and clashed with heavily armed government forces.
After six months of war, it appeared that the climactic final battle for control of the capital of two million residents, had at last begun. After over four decades in power, Col. Moammar Gadhafi's rule teetered on the brink of collapse just 12 days shy of the 42nd anniversary of his coming to power on September 1, 1969.
As reports poured in to rebel-held areas of Libya of Tripoli's budding uprising, Libyans poured into the streets to celebrate. In Zawiya, the coastal city 30 miles west of Tripoli which rebels cleared of Mr. Gadhafi's fighters on Friday night, jubilant residents paraded through the streets, honking car horns, screeching tires, and firing celebratory gunfire into the air.
In Benghazi, the rebels' de facto capital in eastern Libya and the city where the uprising against Col. Gadhafi's rule first began on Feb. 17, thousands of people poured into the seaside courthouse square.
Residents tracked Tripoli's developments minute-by-minute by phone calls from friends in the capital, and by news reports on Al Jazeera and the rebel controlled news network Libya Ahrar. Cellular phone networks in Libya were overloaded by the traffic.
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Gunfire, anti-aircraft fire and explosions rang out across the city on Saturday night as rebel commanders hailed the start of an attack on the dictator’s final stronghold.
Residents reported fighting in several neighbourhoods and said rebels were in the streets, although the Libyan government insisted the capital was “safe and stable”.
Jumma Ibrahim, a rebel spokesman, said: “The revolution from inside Tripoli has officially started in many parts...of Tripoli, and is expected to spread to all of Tripoli.”
Colonel Fadlallah Haroun, a rebel military commander in Benghazi, claimed the fighting marked the beginning of an assault on the capital coordinated with NATO forces.
Col Haroun said that weapons were assembled and sent by tugboats to Tripoli on Friday night.
But perhaps be measured in our exuberance as a headless Libya would be a pretty complicated situation.
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Sustained automatic gunfire and a series of explosions have rung out in Tripoli, according to reports from the Libyan capital.
Blasts and gunfire rocked the city after sunset on Saturday, and witnesses reported fighting in the eastern neighbourhoods of Souq al-Jomaa, Arada and Tajoura.
A government spokesman had earlier said an attack on Tripoli by rebels seeking to depose Muammar Gaddafi had been "dealt with".
"Sure, there were some armed militants who escaped into some neighbourhoods and there were some scuffles, but we dealt with it within a half hour and it is now calm," Moussa Ibrahim said.
"The situation is under control," Ibrahim said on television, adding that pro-regime volunteers had repelled insurgents’ attacks in several neighbourhoods.
Ibrahim dismissed mounting speculation that the regime was on the brink as a "media attack," but more gunfire was heard after he spoke on television.
Gaddafi message
In a live audio broadcast aired on state television early on Sunday morning, Gaddafi congratulated his supporters for repelling an attack by rebel "rats".
Gaddafi accused French President Nicolas Sarkozy of trying to steal the country's oil and said that the rebels were "bent on the destruction of the Libyan people".
Gun battles and the explosion of apparent mortar rounds could be heard clearly at the hotel where foreign correspondents stay in the capital. Their movements are tightly restricted by the regime.
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[h=2]Libyan rebels have entered Tripoli and are advancing into the centre of the city, meeting almost no resistance along the way.[/h]
Benghazi Erupts With Joy as Rebels Advance in Tripoli - Dispatch - WSJ
By Muneef Halawa
Amid the rebel advances against Col. Gadhafi’s stronghold in Tripoli, the rebel-held heartland of Benghzai erupted with joy overnight at what appeared to be a quick victory by the opposition forces in the capital.
Hundreds of cars crammed the streets of Benghazi, with drivers honking their horns and passengers waving the rebel flag. “Your day has come, Gadhafi, your day has come,” they chanted as cars flooded the streets.
Crowds congregated around the city’s famous seafront courthouse, chanting “Allah is Great” and “We are one voice united.” They urged Libyan soldiers to drop their weapons and join the rebels in the capital Tripoli to present bloodshed.
“This is our revolution,” said Zainab Al Houni, a 27-year-old old expatriate who returned to Libya from Paris to witness the end of the Gadhafi regime.
AJE - Al Jazeera EnglishI am not seeing any footage from inside Tripoli on tv...
AJE - Al Jazeera English
and
CNN.com International - Breaking, World, Business, Sports, Entertainment and Video News
As they Both have Videos and people on the ground tho limited at the moment.
Reports have him teetering.
I wonder whether Qadaffy will still be Libya 48 hours from now.
The most censorship by the Lamestream media on any particular subject in some time. All the liberal talk hosts hope to ignore the subject and then hope for a quick Obama victory. Then, they will all in unison boast a victory for the Party and defend this horrendous illegal invasion, saying "See - the Preznit made the right decision.":roll:
The future govt remains an iffy situationWhile I'm glad that Gaddafi will finally be gone and I'm hopeful that this means that we can extricate ourselves from this messy situation as soon as possible, I'm deeply pessimistic that the new Libyan government will form anything resembling a functional democracy anytime soon. Either they'll become dictators allied with the United States (in which case it won't be long before they're regarded in the same low esteem as Hosni Mubarak), or they'll become America's newest enemy which we'll regret assisting just like we do with Saddam Hussein or the Taliban.
I don't see any conceivable way that a democracy is formed and sustained. The combination of oil money, a lack of civil institutions, and a history of totalitarianism doesn't bode well for aspiring democrats.
Seems conflicting whether his sons were captured or will be offered asylum/exile.Rebel forces in Libya surged into Tripoli Sunday, in what looks like the final days in power for Moammar Gadhafi and his sons. How the end plays out will go a long way to determining how peaceful the transition in that country of seven million will be.
The U.S. and NATO interest lies in executing as rapid a denouement as possible consistent with a minimum of bloodshed. The best outcome would be a quick Gadhafi exit, if not directly to some jail cell then to an Arab redoubt where he can sit in the prison of exile. The worst result would be an urban bloodbath, which would exacerbate tribal furies and make post-Gadhafi reconciliation that much harder.
As we went to press Gadhafi wasn't cooperating, saying he would fight in Tripoli "until the end" and calling on allies around the country to save him. But journalists entering Tripoli with the rebels said they were greeted more by exultant residents waving rebel flags than by armed resistance.
Wire reports out of the rebel capital of Benghazi said the rebels had Captured two of Gadhafi's sons, including Seif al-Islam, his heir apparent and for years the regime's face to the West.
The rebels lack any dominant single leader, which could mean a fractious scramble for power. So it's at least a hopeful sign that Husam Najjair, one of their leaders, has said that "the first thing my brigade will do is set up checkpoints to disarm everyone, including other rebel groups, because otherwise it will be a bloodbath."
Another leader, Mustapha El Jalil, told Al Arabiya television that Gadhafi and his sons would get safe passage out of Libya if they left immediately.
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