Misrata Militias Mobilize to Save Libya’s Sarraj

A member of the LNA is seen as he heads out of Benghazi to reinforce the troops advancing to Tripoli, in Benghazi, Libya April 7, 2019. (Reuters)
A member of the LNA is seen as he heads out of Benghazi to reinforce the troops advancing to Tripoli, in Benghazi, Libya April 7, 2019. (Reuters)
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Misrata Militias Mobilize to Save Libya’s Sarraj

A member of the LNA is seen as he heads out of Benghazi to reinforce the troops advancing to Tripoli, in Benghazi, Libya April 7, 2019. (Reuters)
A member of the LNA is seen as he heads out of Benghazi to reinforce the troops advancing to Tripoli, in Benghazi, Libya April 7, 2019. (Reuters)

Militias in Libya’s Misrata have amassed thousands of fighters to head to Tripoli and its surroundings to prop up embattled Government of National Accord (GNA) chief Fayez al-Sarraj against the offensive launched by Libyan National Army (LNA) commander Khalifa Haftar against the capital.

The operation is aimed at ridding Tripoli of terrorist and criminal gangs.

LNA commander of the western region operations, General Abdulsalam al-Hassi refused to disclose to Asharq Al-Awsat the timetable for completing the liberation of Tripoli.

He said that the army was not waging a regular war the end of which can be estimated.

“We are waging a guerrilla war,” he stressed.

Meanwhile, the GNA announced the launch of Operation Volcano of Anger to counter the LNA offensive.

It said that it was aimed at ridding Tripoli of all “outlaws”.

Hassi assured that his forces were marching steadily on the capital.

Everything is going according to plan, he said.

The GNA announced that 21 people have been killed and 27 wounded in the ongoing offensive. The LNA revealed that 14 of its soldiers were killed in the operation that it kicked off on Wednesday.

The Libyan Red Crescent has evacuated an undisclosed number of families from areas that are caught in the fighting.

In a sign of worsening security, a contingent of US forces supporting the US Africa Command evacuated Libya for security reasons, a US statement said.

AFRICOM spokesman John Manley, meanwhile, told Asharq Al-Awsat that the forces have not received any appeal for military support in Libya.

The Command has not direct contact with the GNA, he explained.

He added that the security situation was a cause for concern, reiterating the UN call for reaching a political solution to the crisis.

There can be no military solution to reach stability in Libya, said the agency last week.



Israeli Writer Grossman Denounces Gaza 'Genocide'

A girl runs from the scene after Israeli strikes on a school sheltering displaced people at the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, July 17, 2025, in this screen grab from a video obtained by Reuters. Handout via REUTERS.
A girl runs from the scene after Israeli strikes on a school sheltering displaced people at the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, July 17, 2025, in this screen grab from a video obtained by Reuters. Handout via REUTERS.
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Israeli Writer Grossman Denounces Gaza 'Genocide'

A girl runs from the scene after Israeli strikes on a school sheltering displaced people at the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, July 17, 2025, in this screen grab from a video obtained by Reuters. Handout via REUTERS.
A girl runs from the scene after Israeli strikes on a school sheltering displaced people at the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, July 17, 2025, in this screen grab from a video obtained by Reuters. Handout via REUTERS.

Award-winning Israeli author David Grossman called his country's campaign in Gaza "genocide" and said he was using the term with a "broken heart".

This came days after a major Israeli rights group also used the same term, amid growing global alarm over starvation in the besieged territory.

"For many years, I refused to use that term: 'genocide'," the prominent writer and peace activist told Italian daily La Repubblica in an interview published on Friday, AFP reported.

"But now, after the images I have seen and after talking to people who were there, I can't help using it."

Grossman told the paper he was using the word "with immense pain and with a broken heart."

"This word is an avalanche: once you say it, it just gets bigger, like an avalanche. And it adds even more destruction and suffering," he said.

Grossman's works, which have been translated into dozens of languages, have won many international prizes.

He also won Israel's top literary prize in 2018, the Israel Prize for Literature, for his work spanning more than three decades.

He said it was "devastating" to "put the words 'Israel' and 'famine' together" because of the Holocaust and our "supposed sensitivity to the suffering of humanity."

The celebrated author has long been a critic of the Israeli government.