Tripoli
East is East and West is West, as Kipling once reminded us, but in Libya at least the twain have certainly met. For the past six months Free Libya has been headquartered in eastern Libya, or ancient Cyrenaica. When Tripoli started sliding out of Gaddafi’s control on 20 August, the dribble from east to west began. It was given added oomph on Wednesday with the arrival in Tripoli of the interim prime minister Mahmoud Jabril. Now we’re going to see if Libyans can upset the gloomiest predictions once again.
There have been all sorts of received wisdoms about Libya and the NATO campaign since the revolution kicked off in February. We have heard how Al-Qaeda was infiltrating the freedom-giddy rebels. Journalists were quick to diagnose a military “stalemate”. The rebels were a ragtag bunch of no-hopers.
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