The government of Libya has admitted that it had lost its ministries to a coalition of militias that had taken over the capital Tripoli. Libya’s impotent interim government, led by Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thani, announced late last Thursday that it had tendered its resignation to the elected parliament, days after a rival Islamist administration was created. The cabinet was resigning to enable the elected parliament to choose a new, inclusive government. But with more losses to militias, the Fajr Libya (Libya Dawn), Thani has been reinstated. Tripoli is basically gone, with the weak government operating from Tobruk 900 miles from the capital.
As the country slides deeper into anarchy, former rebels, who helped topple Muammar Gaddafi in a NATO-backed uprising in 2011, have turned against each other in the struggle for command of the country’s political agenda as well as its vast oil reserves. The situation in Tripoli is in constant flux, with separate clashes in the eastern port city of Benghazi where Khalifa Haftir, a renegade general from the Libyan army, has declared war on Islamist militants. Fajr Libya rejects the legitimacy of the elected parliament because it allegedly supported air raids last month, which US officials said were carried out by the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, against its fighters deployed at the airport before they defeated nationalist militia rivals.
One would think that with neighboring examples of Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Iraq, militants would also learn their lessons, put down arms, and find some tables and chairs instead. There was indeed a time that the people of the Arab states were not standing up to tyranny and lived for decades under dictatorships. Now that that mould has been broken, it is now time to sit down and give back some power to a body that can try to govern, and then give that system some time to strengthen before it is attacked again. There is no nobility anymore in killing and every rebel now is a terrorist or murderer. Sure, the US has been a constant monster, the ruling elites are corrupt, and the governance is weak, but why is war, guns and murder any different? Change always comes in increments; all revolutionaries tend to forget that, even if a revolution has come to pass. Splinter groups that can hardly be kept track of, a government that can’t govern, insecurity, poverty, and terrorism. Another state slowly disintegrates.