Libya Faces Deepening Chaos

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Overshadowed by events in Syria, Yemen and elsewhere in the Middle East, Libya has slipped deeper into chaos in recent weeks. This trend was accentuated in mid-August when the Islamic State in Libya, a group that has pledged allegiance to the Syria and Iraq-based Islamic State organization, made fresh territorial gains in and around the central coastal city of Sirte, having previously taken control of much of the city in June. The fighting in Sirte reportedly began after the Islamic State branch assassinated a prominent imam, Khalid bin Rajab Ferjani, who was from the local al-Farjan tribe, a substantial force in many of Libya's central coastal cities. Although the al-Farjan tribe has traditionally been strongly represented in the region's Sufi orders, the assassination came after local Salafists and al-Farjan tribesmen had refused to pledge allegiance to the Islamic State (Libya Herald, August 16).

Significantly, one of the Islamic State foreign fighters killed in the fighting in Sirte is reported to have been Abdullah Abu Zaid Mohamed Hamza, whose father, Abu Zaid Mohamed Hamza, and other relatives, were prominent Sudanese militant Salafists (Libya Herald, August 17). Abdullah's involvement in the Sirte fighting shows both that Libya continues to attract foreign fighters, particularly from elsewhere in Africa, and that some fighters have decades-old family linkages to radicalism. Medical sources in the town were separately reported as saying that Islamic State fighters only allowed doctors to treat their own injured (ANSA, August 17). The bodies of 12 tribal fighters were later put on public display in the city by the group, which then prohibited their relatives from giving them Muslim burials, on the grounds that by resisting the Islamic State, they had become infidels (Libya Herald, August 16). The group was also reported to have executed a suspected "spy" in the eastern city of Derna (Libya Herald, August 17). Although the Islamic State in Libya may only be linked tenuously to the Iraq and Syria-based Islamic State group, its tactics-which include the targeting of rival and more moderate religious leaders, their treatment of their enemies as non-Muslims and their calculated use of atrocities to instill fear in their enemies-nonetheless indicate the close ideological links between the two organizations.

In response to the Islamic State in Libya's latest gains in Sirte, the country's internationally-recognized government, which is based in the eastern city of Tobruk, called for Arab countries to carry out airstrikes against the group, saying that it was itself "unable to ward off these terrorist groups because of the arms embargo" (France24, August 17). The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, the main pan-Islamic global body, however, merely issued a statement expressing "strong condemnation" of the Islamic State attacks, underlining that many Arab countries remain too overstretched by their own internal problems, or with other situations such as Syria, to offer much effective action on Libya (KUNA, August 17). Egypt, meanwhile, reported the disappearance of an unspecified number of Egyptian soldiers in the vicinity of the Libyan border, raising the possibility that extremists in Libya may be testing Egyptian defenses in the area, perhaps with a view to carrying out raids deeper into Egypt (al-Ahram, August 17).

Meanwhile, Libya's various governments-seemingly unaware that the country has collapsed around them-have continued to pump out bizarre and out-of-touch announcements. The Tripoli-based government, despite being desperately short of money, declared on August 16, that the city's destroyed airport would be rebuilt, a project which would cost many millions of dollars; just the previous week, the Tobruk-based government had unilaterally announced that the airport would be renamed after the country's former monarch, King Idris (Tripoli, August 16). The internationally-recognized government in Tobruk also announced the appointment of the head of the state oil firm, ignoring the fact that the oil ministry and associated bureaucracy remain based in Tripoli and firmly under the control of its rivals (Reuters, August 15). The continuing divisions between these governments are both a cause and a consequence of the rise of the Islamic State's local variant, reflecting that the Libya has effectively ceased to exist as a functional state and also underlining the difficulties involved in tackling extremist groups in the country.