The unrelenting struggle

It's been just a little less than a month since President Obama took time out from his Martha's Vinyard vacation to update Americans on the bombing campaign in Libya. Two notable trends have developed in the four weeks since: 1) Libya has mostly vanished from the news, and 2) NATO has conducted 3,254 combat air sorties, including 1,178 strike sorties. (Totals through August 22 here, and through September 19 here.)

In spite of those numbers, a defiant Muammar Gaddafi this week warned Libyan rebels through a recorded message that NATO planes would not be able to protect them forever, prompting a quick response from US President Obama:

In remarks released ahead of the international meting, Obama called on those fighters still supporting Gaddafi to lay down their arms, warning that the NATO mission in the country would continue.

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen says that Qadaffi and his forces continue to threaten civilians, and NATO "will continue military operations under our United Nations mandate as long as necessary to protect the people of Libya." Like President Obama, he's also in New York this week, to attend a "Friends of Libya" meeting and to urge the UN General Assembly to "take the leading role in assisting the people of Libya in the aftermath of the conflict."

Meanwhile, back in Libya, many of the 1,178 air strikes delivered over the past weeks have been aimed at Sirte, Gaddafi's home town. Sirte has been besieged by rebels since late August, but the AP reports their latest attempt to assault the city over the weekend was "driven back by fierce rocket and gunfire" from those inside. They've since "pulled back to regroup, although the two sides exchange fire daily."

Sirte is described as "under constant rocket fire and NATO bombardment." With food, water and fuel supplies running low, those families lucky enough to be able to flee are doing so. Comprehensive casualty reports from the town are obviously not available, however a doctor at a local mosque transformed into a field hospital reported "four people were killed and seven wounded on Tuesday, most hit by shrapnel."

The anti-Gaddafi rebels now claim to have "heavy weapons" inbound from the port city of Misrata, and advised Sirte residents that today is the last day to leave if they want to escape the coming attack.

Meanwhile, in Tripoli, where the arrival of rebels in Gaddafi's abandoned compound (the target of more NATO air strikes through the previous months of the civil war than any other single location) last month proved to all the world he wasn't there (and prompted President Obama's August address), NATO reports some positive signs:

The restaurant and café culture may not yet be restored to the level Tripoli is used to, but as sporadic shipments of fresh produce come in, restaurants improvise their menu and word quickly spreads of an open eatery.

"The shops are opening, it is getting more calm, getting more safety, it's getting better I think," says a woman in Tripoli's main square. But her friend confides, "It is kind of dangerous though, I mean, like wherever you go you see these guys with guns everywhere."

Disarmament is clearly an issue and the fractured security structure of the different brigades of the National Transitional Council (NTC) offers plenty of opportunities for the progress to be reversed. Restoring the police service is top of the agenda for Tripoli's hastily assembled council.

Libya's interim government chief, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, made his first speech to a crowd of about 10,000 in the capital Tripoli on Monday -- a sign of growing confidence from the former rebels. Abdel Jalil arrived in Tripoli on Saturday for the first time since his allies chased Muammar Gaddafi out of the city...

Jalil can also take heart that after long delays (citing ongoing fighting in Libya as a reason), the African Union has at last recognized Libya's interim leaders as the country's de facto government. However, he may find other leaders in Libya may be harder to win over.

A prominent critic of Libya's new rulers said on Tuesday interim Prime Minister Mahmoud Jibril should resign over what he said was a failure to supply ammunition to troops fighting forces still loyal to Muammar Gaddafi.

Demands have been made before for members of the country's National Transitional Council (NTC) to step down, but the latest intervention is likely to add to pressure on Jibril, who is already struggling with a stalled military offensive and a failure to form a new government.

Influential Islamist scholar Ali Al-Sallabi told Reuters that Jibril was responsible for failing to get enough ammunition to anti-Gaddafi forces struggling to take Sirte, one of the last remaining bastions of the former veteran ruler.

Whether well armed or not, "a fighter from the Libyan National Transitional Council at the eastern Sirte front tells Al Jazeera that there is a sandstorm obscuring visibility. He does not think that there will be any significant advance today, at least not until the wind slows down." This is actually good timing for such an Insha'Allah weather event; headlines of combat (and casualty figures) would not be appreciated in New York City today anyway.

More from Al-Sallabi - who is described as having both "good relations with Qatar, an influential backer of the NTC" and "a wide network of contacts in global Islamist circles":

"Now there is an immense mass of revolutionaries that do not want Jibril. Accordingly, Mr. Jibril should resign. Why is he insisting to continue? Such persistence I see is a political mistake which is not in the interest of the Libyan people."

NTC military spokesman Ahmed Bani denied that supplies were a problem. "There's enough ammunition. The fighters say there is enough," he told Reuters.

Since the fall of Tripoli a month ago, Sallabi has emerged as a prominent spokesman for groups of Islamists unhappy about what they see as attempts by Benghazi-based NTC leaders to exclude them from political life.
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He also is a friend of Tripoli's military commander Abdel Hakim Belhadj, a rising Islamist figure in post-Gaddafi Libya.

Sallabi's brother, Ismail, a commander of anti-Gaddafi fighters, earlier this month called on the NTC to resign because they were "remnants of the old regime."

Sallabi's pressure comes at a delicate moment for Jibril. His administration is in political limbo after he failed to get the full backing of the NTC for an enlarged executive committee, or cabinet, with himself ruling as both prime minister and foreign minister.

The executive committee was dissolved last month after procedural errors in an investigation into the unexplained killing of the NTC's military chief. Sources familiar with the negotiations said that one of the sticking points in the weekend meeting was the future role of Jibril in the new cabinet.

Meanwhile, other rebel assaults are being repulsed near one of NATO's other "hot targets"...

In Bani Walid, revolutionary commanders tried to reorganize their forces after three days of chaotic fighting, with frustration high over weeks of standoff. Official forces withdrew to regroup after a fierce battle, and untrained volunteers have been launching sporadic assaults and drawing retaliatory fire from Gadhafi's forces.

Eight military leaders met with volunteer representatives on Monday evening and field commander Younis al-Toumi said the young men had agreed to follow the national army's commands.

"The national army is back at the checkpoints and we are only allowing those who have registered with us to pass into the front line," al-Toumi told The Associated Press.

Lack of discipline has been a common problem since largely ragtag groups of anti-Gadhafi activists first took up arms after the uprising started in mid-February and evolved into a civil war.

On Tuesday at a feed factory being used as a checkpoint outside Bani Walid, men passed a list around to take down the names and information of the volunteers in a bid to organize them into official brigades. One army official shouted at volunteers to stop randomly shooting for target practice and ordered them to introduce themselves to fighters from the national army.

"These young boys have more than the necessary enthusiasm, but after seeing that many of them are dying needlessly they realize it is the time to organize," said al-Toumi.

Speaking of youthful enthusiasm, Chris Jeon, the California college student who ran away to join the rebels, has promised his father that he's coming home soon. (He'd better hurry, classes began this week...)

US President Barack Obama on Tuesday met Libya's interim leader Mustafa Abdel Jalil on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, ahead of talks between the United States and its allies on Libya's future.

Footnote: for clarity, Mustafa Abdul Jalil (pictured above), former justice minister under the Gaddafi government, is the Chairman of the Libyan National Transitional Council (NTC). Mahmoud Jibril, (who served in the Gaddafi regime as head of the National Economic Development Board), is described as "Chairman of the Executive Board of the National Transitional Council." (The board that dissolved following the murder of General Abdel Fatah Younis in July.) He has also been referred to at various times by various sources as the NTC's interim Prime Minister and Foreign Minister and Chief of Staff.