Tripoli Jails: Controlled by Militias and Where Prisoners are Locked up to Be Forgotten

Libyans stand in front of a mural depicting a torture scene outside Tripoli's Abou Salim jail. (AFP)
Libyans stand in front of a mural depicting a torture scene outside Tripoli's Abou Salim jail. (AFP)
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Tripoli Jails: Controlled by Militias and Where Prisoners are Locked up to Be Forgotten

Libyans stand in front of a mural depicting a torture scene outside Tripoli's Abou Salim jail. (AFP)
Libyans stand in front of a mural depicting a torture scene outside Tripoli's Abou Salim jail. (AFP)

Twenty-four years ago, a special forces unit raided the Abou Selim prison in the suburbs of the Libyan capital Tripoli, shooting dead 1,269 opponents of Moammar al-Gaddafi’s regime. The case was not closed until December 2019. This is but one of the horrific crimes that took place in Tripoli’s prisons during the rule of the Gaddafi regime and after its overthrow.

The United Nations has documented the imprisonment of thousands of men, women and children in centers that are officially under the control of the interior and defense ministries of the Tripoli-based Government of National Accord, headed by Fayez al-Sarraj, or his allied armed factions.

After Gaddafi’s ouster, the prisons now hold members of his former regime, who are held on charges of torture. People who have been detained in these jails have spoken of a “secret and scary world where detainees do not carry out a sentence, but rather are locked up away in the darkness, hoping that they would be forgotten, temporarily or permanently.”

Head of the Libyan Organization for Political Development, Jamal al-Fallah told Asharq Al-Awsat that the secret prisons or the ones held by the armed factions are not controlled by the state. Rather, they are controlled by the militias. Each militia has its own prison, some of which are secret and whose location are unknown.

Fallah, who hails from the eastern city of Benghazi, said that these groups act as judge and jailor, whereby they can arrest whoever they choose and release them whenever they want without any legal ground.

Ruwaymi prison
Prisons in western Libya are infamous for their varying degrees of notoriety. The Ruwaymi prison in the Ain Zara suburb is the most infamous. Rights groups have documented flagrant human rights violations there since the ouster of Gaddafi’s regime in 2011. The facility is run by militias even though, officially, it is affiliated with the GNA. The jail holds some 2,000 prisoners, who are detained on political or military charges.

Human Rights Watch has reported on the nine years of torture and arbitrary arrests at the prison. It famously spoke of riots in 2013 when prisoners rose up against the excessive violence against them. Rights activists and the relatives of the prisoners revealed that the guards violently suppressed the riot by opening live fire against them.

In March 2020, a rocket attack targeted Ruwaymi, prompting the GNA justice ministry to plead with the international community to intervene to end the assault. The attack left at least three workers wounded. The GNA held “hostile” forces responsible for the attack, a reference to the rival Libyan National Army, commanded by Khalifa Haftar.

Libyan rights organizations have reported on the appalling conditions in Ruwaymi, revealing that prisoners are being exposed to deadly infectious disease. Ten percent of inmates were at one point infected with tuberculosis. In a report on Libya in January 2020, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres also spoke of the spread of infectious diseases, such as scabies, hepatitis and HIV among the inmates. The UN mission in Libya had cooperated with the justice ministry to improve conditions at the facility.

“During the reporting period, some 8,500 individuals, of whom an estimated 60 percent were in pretrial detention, were held in 28 official prisons under the authority of the Ministry of Justice. In total, 280 women, including 180 non-Libyans, and 109 children were held in prisons and/or in judicial police custody. Thousands of others were held in facilities nominally under the control of the Ministry of the Interior or the Ministry of Defense, as well as facilities directly operated by armed groups. Those detained had little opportunity to challenge the legality of their detention or seek redress for violations suffered,” he said.

Eliminating inmates
Head of Investigation Bureau of the Libyan Tripoli-based Attorney General's Office Al-Siddiq Al-Sour revealed that in June 2016, 12 prisoners held at Ruwaymi were “eliminated” shortly after a judicial order for their release was announced. Several Libyan rights groups accused militias of killing the inmates, who hailed from the Wadi al-Rabih region. Paying no heed to the accusations, the militias continued to detain more people in the facility.

Sour said the prisoners were being held for their involvement in violence that accompanied the 2011 revolution. When the judge ordered the release of 19 of the detainees, prison records showed that they had left the facility with their families, but in reality, 12 never made it out alive.

Judicial expert at the interim government in the east, Wissam al-Werfalli blamed the frequent violations at the prisons on the failure of successive governments in stemming them. He explained that after the revolution, several armed groups opposed to Gaddafi began to emerge on the ground and they gradually began to gain influence and started to arbitrarily arrest sympathizers of the former regime.

Another notorious prison was al-Hadaba, which was known for holding former regime members such as Baghdadi Mahmudi, the last of Gaddafi’s prime ministers, Abuzed Omar Dorda, former chief of external security, Abdullah Senussi, former military intelligence chief, and Al-Saadi Gaddafi, the late ruler’s son. The facility was raided in 2017 in wake of clashes between militias, forcing the GNA to eventually shut it down and transfer the prisoners to Ruwaymi.

Dorda and several former regime figures were released in 2019 after eight years of arrest. In his first televised appearance, Dorda announced his support for the LNA and warned against Turkey and the Muslim Brotherhood’s plans in Libya and the region.

Opponents silenced
Tripoli has been notorious for the abduction and disappearance of politicians, journalists and citizens. The most prominent victim was former PM Ali Zeidan, who was kidnapped from a hotel in the capital in August 2017. The building was stormed by a militia that took the 67-year-old official to an unknown location. The GNA mediated his release after a ten-day ordeal.

The GNA claims that it controls all prisons, but rights activists state that jails in Tripoli are facilities where people are locked up to be forgotten because keeping them outside undermines the interests of militias.

An official at one of these militias acknowledged to Asharq Al-Awsat that some groups are “dedicated” to the abduction and extortion of citizens. Speaking on condition of anonymity, he said: “Those groups commit acts punishable by law, but we are the authority that applies the law.”

Violations behind bars
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) had previously blamed armed groups of the prolonged arbitrary and unlawful detention of thousands of people in Libya. In a report, it said: “Armed groups across Libya, including those affiliated with the State, hold thousands of men, women and children in prolonged arbitrary and unlawful detention, and subject them to torture and other human rights violations and abuses. Victims have little or no recourse to judicial remedy or reparations, while members of armed groups enjoy total impunity.”

“To date in 2019, an estimated 8,813 individuals have been held in 28 official prisons under the authority of the Ministry of Justice, of whom an estimated 60 percent were in pre-trial detention. We have continued to receive credible reports of arbitrary detention, torture, enforced disappearances, sexual and gender-based violence, and overcrowding in detention facilities under the control of the Ministry of the Interior. Conditions in unofficial places of detention, often run by armed groups, are even more difficult to monitor and are likely to be even worse.”

Systematic torture
Torture is also rampant at the prisons. Witness, medical reports and rights groups have all documented torture at facilities throughout Libya. Detainees are tortured during interrogation to drag “confessions” out of them and are also punished for committing alleged crimes.

Former detainees detailed how they would be beaten on the head with various implements, including metal bars and pipes and rifle butts. They would be hung up for long hours, electrocuted, burned with cigarettes or hot bars.

Fallah said that in many cases judicial orders for the release of prisoners are often left unheeded, which shows the influence these armed groups hold in managing prisons.



Palestinians’ Dangerous Ordeal to Reach Israeli-Approved Aid in Gaza

Palestinians collect what remains of relief supplies from the distribution center of the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, June 5, 2025. (Reuters)
Palestinians collect what remains of relief supplies from the distribution center of the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, June 5, 2025. (Reuters)
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Palestinians’ Dangerous Ordeal to Reach Israeli-Approved Aid in Gaza

Palestinians collect what remains of relief supplies from the distribution center of the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, June 5, 2025. (Reuters)
Palestinians collect what remains of relief supplies from the distribution center of the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, June 5, 2025. (Reuters)

When university professor Nizam Salama made his way to a southern Gaza aid point last week, he came under fire twice, was crushed in a desperate crowd of hungry people and finally left empty handed.

Shooting first started shortly after he left his family's tent at 3 a.m. on June 3 to join crowds on the coast road heading towards the aid site in the city of Rafah run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a new US-based organization working with private military contractors to deliver aid in Gaza.

The second time Salama came under fire was at Alam Roundabout close to the aid delivery site, where he saw six dead bodies.

Twenty-seven people were killed that day by Israeli fire on aid seekers, Palestinian health authorities said. Israel said its forces had shot at a group of people they viewed as a threat and the military is investigating the incident.

At the aid delivery site, known as SDS 1, queues snaked through narrow cage-like fences before gates were opened to an area surrounded by sand barriers where packages of supplies were left on tables and in boxes on the ground, according to undated CCTV video distributed by GHF, reviewed by Reuters.

Salama said the rush of thousands of people once the gates opened was a "death trap."

"Survival is for the stronger: people who are fitter and can make it earlier and can push harder to win the package," he said. "I felt my ribs going into each other. My chest was going into itself. My breath...I couldn't breathe. People were shouting; they couldn't breathe at all."

A Palestinian man, next to a child, displays the aid supplies he received from the US-supported Gaza Relief Organization, in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, June 5, 2025. (Reuters)

Reuters could not independently verify all the details of Salama's account. It matched the testimonies of two other aid seekers interviewed by Reuters, who spoke of crawling and ducking as bullets rattled overhead on their way to or from the aid distribution sites.

All three witnesses said they saw dead bodies on their journeys to and from the Rafah sites.

A statement from a nearby Red Cross field hospital confirmed the number of dead from the attack near the aid site on June 3.

Asked about the high number of deaths since it began operations on May 26, GHF said there had been no casualties at or in the close vicinity of its site.

The Israeli military didn't respond to detailed requests for comment. Israeli military spokesman Brigadier General Effie Defrin told reporters on Sunday that Hamas was "doing its best" to provoke troops, who "shoot to stop the threat" in what he called a war zone in the vicinity of the aid sites. He said military investigations were underway "to see where we were wrong."

Salama, 52, had heard enough about the new system to know it would be difficult to get aid, he said, but his five children - including two adults, two teenagers and a nine-year-old - needed food. They have been eating only lentils or pasta for months, he said, often only a single meal a day.

"I was completely against going to the aid site of the American company (GHF) because I knew and I had heard how humiliating it is to do so, but I had no choice because of the bad need to feed my family," said the professor of education administration.

In total, 127 Palestinians have been killed trying to get aid from GHF sites in almost daily shootings since distribution under the new system began two weeks ago, Gaza's health authority said on Monday.

The system appears to violate core principles of humanitarian aid, said Jan Egeland, head of the Norwegian Refugee Council, a major humanitarian organization. He compared it to the Hunger Games, the dystopian novels that set people to run and fight to the death.

"A few will be rewarded and the many will only risk their lives for nothing," Egeland said.

"International humanitarian law has prescribed that aid in war zones should be provided by neutral intermediaries that can make sure that the most vulnerable will get the relief according to needs alone and not as part of a political or military strategy," he said.

GHF did not directly respond to a question about its neutrality, replying that it had securely delivered enough aid for more than 11 million meals in two weeks. Gaza's population is around 2.1 million people.

A Palestinian man shows blood stains on his palm after he carried casualties among people seeking aid supplies from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. (Reuters)

FAMINE RISK

Israel allowed limited UN-led aid operations to resume on May 19 after an 11-week blockade in the enclave, where experts a week earlier warned a famine looms.

The UN has described the aid allowed into Gaza as "drop in the ocean."

Separate to the UN operation, Israel allowed GHF to open four sites in Gaza, bypassing traditional aid groups. The GHF sites are overseen by a US logistics company run by a former CIA official and part-owned by a Chicago-based private equity firm, with security provided by US military veterans working for a private contractor, two sources have told Reuters.

An Israeli defense official involved in humanitarian matters told Reuters GHF's distribution centers were sufficient for around 1.2 million people. Israel and the United States have urged the UN to work with GHF, which has seen a high churn of top personnel, although both countries deny funding it.

Reuters has not been able to establish who provides the funding for the organization but reported last week that Washington was considering an Israeli request to put in $500 million.

GHF coordinates with the Israeli army for access, the foundation said in reply to Reuters questions, adding that it was looking to open more distribution points. It has paused then resumed deliveries several times after the shooting incidents, including on Monday.

Last week, it urged the Israeli army to improve civilian safety beyond the perimeter of its operations. GHF said the UN was failing to deliver aid, pointing to a spate of recent lootings.

Israel says the UN's aid deliveries have previously been hijacked by Hamas to feed their own fighters. Hamas has denied stealing aid and the UN denies its aid operations help Hamas.

The UN, which has handled previous aid deliveries into Gaza, says it has over 400 distribution points for aid in the territory. On Monday it described an increasingly anarchic situation of looting and has called on Israel to allow more of its trucks to move safely.

SHOOTING STARTS

Salama and four neighbors set out from Mawasi, in the Khan Younis area of the southern Gaza Strip, at 3 a.m. on Tuesday for the aid site, taking two hours to reach Rafah, which is several miles away near the Egyptian border.

Shooting started early in their journey. Some fire was coming from the sea, he said, consistent with other accounts of the incidents. Israel's military controls the sea around Gaza.

His small group decided to press on. In the dark, the way was uneven and he repeatedly fell, he said.

"I saw people carrying wounded persons and heading back with them towards Khan Younis," he said.

By the time they reached Alam Roundabout in Rafah, about a kilometer from the site, there was a vast crowd. There was more shooting and he saw bullets hitting nearby.

"You must duck and stay on the ground," he said, describing casualties with wounds to the head, chest and legs.

He saw bodies nearby, including a woman, along with "many" injured people, he said.

Another aid seeker interviewed by Reuters, who also walked to Rafah on June 3 in the early morning, described repeated gunfire during the journey.

At one point, he and everyone around him crawled for a stretch of several hundred meters, fearing being shot. He saw a body with a wound to the head about 100 meters from the aid site, he said.

Palestinians gather to collect aid supplies from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. (Reuters)

The Red Cross Field Hospital in Rafah received a mass casualty influx of 184 patients on June 3, the majority of them injured by gunshots, the International Committee of the Red Cross said in a statement, calling it the highest number of weapon-wounded patients the hospital had ever received in a single incident. There were 27 fatalities.

"All responsive patients said they were trying to reach an assistance distribution site," the statement said.

When Salama finally arrived at the aid point on June 3, there was nothing left.

"Everyone was standing pulling cardboard boxes from the floor that were empty," he said. "Unfortunately, I found nothing: a very, very, very big zero."

Although the aid was gone, more people were arriving.

"The flood of people pushes you to the front while I was trying to go back," he said.

As he was pushed further towards where GHF guards were located, he saw them using pepper spray on the crowd, he said.

GHF said it was not aware of the pepper spray incident, but said its workers used non-lethal measures to protect civilians.

"I started shouting at the top of my lungs, brothers I don't want anything, I just want to leave, I just want to leave the place," Salama said.

"I left empty-handed... I went back home depressed, sad and angry and hungry too," he said.