MISURATA, Libya — For the 500,000 residents of this once-prosperous port city, there is nowhere to run.
The city is surrounded by forces loyal to Moammar Gaddafi. His snipers lurk on rooftops and peer from open windows. Entire neighborhoods are off-limits because of indiscriminate artillery and mortar fire. Hospitals are overflowing with the wounded, some of them children.
As a boat carrying the displaced and injured from Misurata arrived in Benghazi Monday night, the U.N.'s top humanitarian official said the Libyan government has promised that she can visit the beleaguered town. (April 19)
For residents, it is not just a question of whether to fight, but how long they can survive. After living under siege for nearly two months, many are reaching their breaking point as Gaddafi escalates his attacks and supplies become ever more scarce. Lines for bread and gasoline go on for blocks. Sewage has seeped into the water system. Most of the city is run on generators or has no power. Cellphone service has been cut.
Misurata is the last opposition stronghold in western Libya, but it is unclear how long the ragtag rebel force will be able to hold out amid daily assaults by the government. To the rebels, this city is a potent symbol of resistance and a reminder that the uprising that swept the country in late February was not confined to the east. It also poses a dangerous threat to Gaddafi, giving his opponents a base that is uncomfortably close to the capital, Tripoli.
But unlike the rebels in the east, fighters in Misurata have no room to retreat when they are overwhelmed by government firepower. They also have only one way of getting supplies — the port — but few boat captains have dared to come ashore amid regular shelling. The city’s isolation has also kept most foreign journalists away, though some have arrived in recent days after a perilous journey by sea.
Without a reliable supply chain, would-be fighters must wait until a comrade dies so they can inherit his weapon. Most use old Kalashnikov assault rifles, stolen from a Gaddafi base soon after the uprising began.
Intense urban warfare
On the coastal road Monday, one fighter held up a soda bottle filled with gasoline and a diesel-soaked cloth.
“These are our antitank weapons,” said Ismail Kraweed, 23.
The rebels throw the homemade bombs at government vehicles, but to little effect.
Kraweed hid Monday behind dirt barriers fashioned in the middle of the street near an abandoned gas station scarred with bullet holes. Gaddafi’s forces loomed less than half a mile away. The rebels typically attempt to lure the government tanks into residential areas, so they can surround and try to destroy them.
As Kraweed and his fellow fighters waited to spring their trap, mortar shells sailed overhead and explosions rocked the city. Tripoli Street — the city’s main drag — has become a shell of its former self, with buildings along it reduced to rubble.
Overhead, snipers eyed their targets while camped out in the insurance building — the tallest on the block — and in an adjacent bank. Rebels said the snipers are remarkably efficient, picking off their marks with shots to the head and chest. Rebels don’t bother to operate at night, because the snipers use night-vision goggles to target anything that moves.
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