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| Africa North |
| Army makes further costly advance in Benghazi |
| 2016-12-15 |
| [Libya Herald] The least 11 soldiers died today and eight were maimed during heavy fighting as the Libyan National Army worked its way further into the terrorist-held enclave in Benghazi’s Ganfouda district. Airstrikes and artillery fire preceded the advance to secure the Tarek Alharaba (Smugglers’ Road) between Ganfouda and Bousneeb which army commanders consider strategically significant. In the course of the last 24 hours it is said that a major food dump has been overrun along with a building housing an IS radio station. A small ammunition store was also said to have been found and destroyed. The flow of civilians leaving the enclave continues to be intermittent. LNA sources have denied that social media pictures of fleeing families which were published earlier in the week were fakes. Today the army said that only four families had come over. There are however reports that two prisoners held by the hard boyz somehow found freedom. The pair had originally been picked up in 2011 during the Revolution and later fell into the terrorists’ hands. Despite now being apparently entirely cut off from any resupply, fighters from the Benghazi Revolutionaries’ Shoura Council and their terrorist allies from IS and Ansar al-Sharia ...a Salafist militia which claims it is not part of al-Qaeda, even though it works about the same and for the same ends. There are groups of the same name in Libyaand Yemen, with the Libyan versions currently most active. Tunisia's Shabaab al-Tawhid started out an Ansar al-Sharia and changed its name in early 2014. It still uses the old name now and then, probably because the stationery's not all used up and the web site hasn't expired yet... continue to exact a heavy toll. The fight has been notable for the number of senior officers to be killed. Saiqa Special Forces ...Libya's elite army unit, insofar as they have one, formed from a mixture of paratroopers and commandos. The group emerged from a militia with the same name in 2010. It now numbers a few thousand and reports to the Ministry of Defence. It deployed in Benghazi in an attempt to control the carnage. As a result, it has been attacked and several of its officers murdered. The force is popular in Benghazi for its stance against Ansar al-Sharia group... field commander Akhram al-Bassiouni was the latest victim, one of four soldiers to die on Sunday. |
| Posted by:Fred |