At Least 6 Killed in Libya’s Tripoli in Clashes Prompted by Killing of Armed Group Leader 

Members of the police are seen in the Libyan capital Tripoli. (EPA)
Members of the police are seen in the Libyan capital Tripoli. (EPA)
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At Least 6 Killed in Libya’s Tripoli in Clashes Prompted by Killing of Armed Group Leader 

Members of the police are seen in the Libyan capital Tripoli. (EPA)
Members of the police are seen in the Libyan capital Tripoli. (EPA)

Clashes between heavily armed militias rocked the Libyan capital, with gunfire and explosions heard across the city following the killing of a powerful armed group leader, officials said. At least six people were killed, they said. 

The hourslong clashes, which involved heavy weapons, took place Monday evening into the early hours of Tuesday and centered in Tripoli’s southern neighborhood of Abu Salim, the officials said. 

The fighting stemmed from the killing of Abdel-Ghani al-Kikli, commander of the Stabilization Support Authority, SSA, on Monday by another rival militia, a senior government and health official said. 

The SSA is an umbrella group of militias that rose to become one of the most powerful groups in western Libya during the country’s long-running conflict. Al-Kikli, who was known as “Gheniwa”, has been accused by Amnesty International of war crimes and other serious rights violations over the past decade. 

Al-Kikli was killed in a facility run by the 444 Brigade, a militia commanded by Mahmoud Hamza, another warlord close to head of the Government of National Unity (GNU) Abdulhamid al-Dbeibah, one of the officials said. 

Hamza’s group and their allies then attacked the offices of SSA across the capital, seizing their assets and detaining dozens of SSA fighters, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity for their safety. 

The Health Ministry’s Ambulance and Emergency Services said in a statement that at least six people were killed in the vicinity of Abu Salim, the SSA stronghold. It said it helped evacuate many families trapped in the clashes. 

Residents reported heavy clashes and explosions in multiple areas in the capital, with dozens of vehicles carrying fighters affiliated with different groups in the streets. 

“It was a nightmare,” said Ahmed Ammer, who lives in the city center, adding that the clashes were reminiscent of the war that engulfed the North African country following the 2011 overthrow and killing of longtime ruler Moammar al-Gaddafi. 

He said the clashes subsided early Tuesday morning, but the situation has been tense with many fighters in the streets. 

Classes in the capital’s schools were suspended on Tuesday, according to the Tripoli-based education ministry. The University of Tripoli also said it suspended studies, exams and administrative work until further notice. 

Dbeibah’s government posted on its social media platforms early Tuesday that its forces carried out a military operation in Abu Salim and took full control of the area. It didn’t provide further details. 

In a statement, the UN mission in Libya expressed alarm about the “intense fighting with heavy weaponry in densely populated civilian areas” and warned that “attacks on civilians and civilian objects may amount to war crimes.” 

Libya has been divided for years between rival administrations in the east and west. Currently, it is governed by Dbeibah’s government in Tripoli and by the administration of Prime Minister Ossama Hammad in the east. 



Israeli Likud Party Ministers Urge Netanyahu to Annex West Bank

Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
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Israeli Likud Party Ministers Urge Netanyahu to Annex West Bank

Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)

Cabinet ministers in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party called on Wednesday for Israel to annex the Israeli-occupied West Bank before the Knesset recesses at the end of the month.

They issued a petition ahead of Netanyahu's meeting next week with US President Donald Trump, where discussions are expected to center on a potential 60-day Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal with Hamas.

The petition was signed by 15 cabinet ministers and Amir Ohana, speaker of the Knesset, Israel's parliament.

There was no immediate response from the prime minister's office. Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, long a confidant of Netanyahu, did not sign the petition. He has been in Washington since Monday for talks on Iran and Gaza.

"We ministers and members of Knesset call for applying Israeli sovereignty and law immediately on Judea and Samaria," they wrote, using the biblical names for the West Bank captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war.

Their petition cited Israel's recent achievements against both Iran and Iran's allies and the opportunity afforded by the strategic partnership with the US and support of Trump.

It said the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel demonstrated that the concept of Jewish settlement blocs alongside the establishment of a Palestinian state poses an existential threat to Israel.

"The task must be completed, the existential threat removed from within, and another massacre in the heart of the country must be prevented," the petition stated.

Most countries regard Jewish settlements in the West Bank, many of which cut off Palestinian communities from one another, as a violation of international law.

With each advance of Israeli settlements and roads, the West Bank becomes more fractured, further undermining prospects for a contiguous land on which Palestinians could build a sovereign state long envisaged in Middle East peacemaking.

Israel's pro-settler politicians have been emboldened by the return to the White House of Trump, who has proposed Palestinians leave Gaza, a suggestion widely condemned across the Middle East and beyond.