Pedrophile posted:

Ya know it does make a lot of sense that there would be pro-gadaffi supporters undercover as waiters to keep an eye on these supporters.

Canadian Surf Club posted:

God it feels good to see regular people identify something wrong happening and actually attempting to intervene

This could have been anything bystander effect incident and probably not received the same kind of coverage

Cartouche posted:

Well, from the point of view of the Daffy supporters, they were acting after identifying something "wrong". It is amazing to see how different people have different moral compasses.

quote:

AJE Pro-democracy activist Ahmed Al Misrati in Misurata tells al Jazeera:

quote:

The city of Misurata is besieged from all sides. Gaddafi's troops had laid siege to the city and after the no-fly zone [was imposed] Gaddafi troops who were stationed in certain [areas] are now spreading out around the city.Some of them are also positioned inside the city in the main road called Tripoli Street. As a matter of fact, the city of Misurata since morning has been under heavy gunfire and heavy bombardment ... by tanks or mortar shells. This bombardment is indiscriminate and arbitrary, sometimes targeting residential plots and one entire family was killed - the father and his children.They are also stationed in other rooftops, especially the high buildings ... Anybody in the street comes under heavy gunfire and now the situation is exacerbating and is very, very dire.

quote:

LibyanDictator CONFIRMED: Aggressive shelling on #Misrata port and red cross camps continues. #Libya #Feb17

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LibyanDictator Red cross camps include workers from Bangladesh and African countries, but most are from #Egypt.

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Liberty4Libya #Misurata, huge explosions heard in the area surrounding #Misurata.

quote:

Liberty4Libya#Tripoli #Gadafi Militias R reported to have left city to joing assault on #Misurata, heavy bombardment of the city takes place now #Libya

quote:

Tripolitanian Reports that refugee camp in #Misrata is being hit with BM-21 Grad missile launcher - confirmation to come soon

quote:

Tripolitanian CONFIRMED: #Gaddafi has sent busloads of mercenaries+tanks+grad missile launchers to #Misrata, if they don't receive help, city will fall!

Tripolitanian CONFIRMED: Mercenaries arrived in plain clothes in city buses!

quote:

ChangeInLibya Revolutionaries are combing through every house in Ajdabiya and Brega and fortifying positions to avoid any Gaddafi counter-attacks.

quote:

LibyanDictator Libyan #NTC announce that revolution fighters are on their way to Ras Lanuf. Allahu akbar.

quote:

bungdan also met 3 captured #libya "mercenaries." One shoeless, one aged, the other just terrified. 2 from chad -- shanghaied laborers, not fighters

quote:

Tripolitanian Coalition forces flying recon over #Zintan - guess they got the tweets

RunningOnEmpty posted:

AJE report bombs are falling out side of Misarata, hitting Pro-gov fighters.

quote:

AJE: 6:53pm

ِAn eye-witness of the protest in Latakia tells Al Jazeera that at least three people were shot dead by unidentified gunmen:

" We rallied in front of Al Sultan mosque and started to march, peacefully, to another mosque. At the time we reached there we were met by live fire. Many were injured, three people were dead.

Live ammunition was fired indiscriminately. There were thugs or plain-clothed members of the police who where were firing on the protesters.

Any person in the street is fired upon, even if he is going to the grocery. I am in my home now and I still hear gunfire outside. We are receiving reports that all the exit-points of Latakia are completely sealed-off by security forces."

The witness also said that today they marched calling for both freedom AND the toppling of the regime, which hasn't happened before in the coastal town.

6:18pm
Syrian security forces fire tear gas on serveral hundred protesters staging a sit-in in the main square of Daraa, a witness told Reuters news agency.

2:48pm
Thousands of mourners in the village of Tafas, near the southern Syrian town of Daraa, burned the local Baath Party headquarters and a police station during the funeral, residents said.

The mourners, chanting for freedom, were marching in the funeral procession of Kamal Baradan, who was killed yesterday in Daraa.

2:00pm

Al Jazeera's special correspondent reports from the Syrian town of Sanamin, where a funeral is under way for six protesters killed in Friday's crackdown on pro-reform demonstrations.

Our correspondent says the locals are "very, very angry".

http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/meast/03/26/yemen.president.interview/?hpt=T2 posted:

(CNN) -- Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh told an Arab television network that he is "ready to step down with respect and dignity, even within a two hours notice."

But Saleh, speaking to Al Arabiya television on Saturday, also warned that some leadership factions have a "foreign agenda."

The interview came one day after after the Yemeni president spoke to thousands at a pro-government demonstration in an effort to underscore his intentions to have a dialogue with anti-government protesters and make concessions to avoid bloodshed.

Saleh told the crowd that while he is ready to hand over authority, he won't do so to "gangs," "drug dealers" or the Houthi rebels fighting the government

Protesters have called for the ouster of Saleh, who has ruled Yemen since 1978.

The country has been wracked by a Shiite Muslim uprising, a U.S.-aided crackdown on al Qaeda operatives and a looming shortage of water.

Protesters cite government corruption, a lack of political freedom and high unemployment that have fueled much of the anger among a growing young population steeped in poverty.

Saleh had promised not to run for president in the next round of elections. But Yemen's parliament this week approved a 30-day extension of emergency powers Saleh declared last week in response to protests.
The emergency law expands the government's powers of arrest, detention and censorship.

Brown Moses posted:

It really sounds like Gaddafi is throwing everything at Misarata, either to destroy it or take if over. He must know that Sirte can be easily bypassed, and once the rebels reach Misarata he's done for. They really need coalition help there, it's a really desperate situation. I'm hoping those reports of loud explosions outside of Misarata are bombs being dropped on Gaddafi forces.

Lareous posted:

My guess is the push on Misurata is going to end in a fireball of NATO munitions, especially if they are shelling near Red Cross positions.

Vincent Van Goatse posted:

The Agence France-Presse? Or do you mean Chad's president?

cioxx posted:

This is fantasy, but it would be nice for Egypt to use the attacks on their citizens as pretext to send a heavily armed contingent and blow the gently caress out of Gaddafi's forces outside of Misrata. Egyptian army has both the know-how and the muscle to beat back pro-Government forces more effectively than NATO.

Brown Moses posted:

It really sounds like Gaddafi is throwing everything at Misarata, either to destroy it or take if over. He must know that Sirte can be easily bypassed, and once the rebels reach Misarata he's done for. They really need coalition help there, it's a really desperate situation. I'm hoping those reports of loud explosions outside of Misarata are bombs being dropped on Gaddafi forces.

RunningOnEmpty posted:

I do wonder, why did Gaddafi risk sending his forces to hit Misarata? Such a large force, moved even in civilian vehicles like buses, would garner some attention, none of it polite. It's not like all those tanks and technicals would be hard to spot from above.

To have any chance of taking the city, especially if you consider that the time-window for the attack and the time needed to allow the subjugation of an entire city - to the extent where men and materials could be safely hidden - was very, very low.

It just seems pointless. A waste of anything he might have used to protect the capital. Desperation, perhaps?


edit: pretty much answered above.

edit edit: AJE just said rebels in Misarata report the shelling of the city has stopped. CQ fall down, go boom.

farraday posted:

"We're not Tunisia"
"We're not Egypt or Tunisia"
"We're not Bahrain, Egypt, or Tunisia"
"We're not Yemen, Bahrain, Egypt, or Tunisia"
"We're not Libya, Yemen, Bahrain, Egypt, or Tunisia"
"We're not Syr.. ahh gently caress it."

farraday posted:

Even if they wanted to, they couldn't really get there in time. There's miles and miles of desert.

One of the best parts of this to me is the slowly growing list of countries the remaining dictatorships are not.

"We're not Tunisia"
"We're not Egypt or Tunisia"
"We're not Bahrain, Egypt, or Tunisia"
"We're not Yemen, Bahrain, Egypt, or Tunisia"
"We're not Libya, Yemen, Bahrain, Egypt, or Tunisia"
"We're not Syr.. ahh gently caress it."

Warcabbit posted:

Mohamed Bouazizi, Time Man of the Year, 2011.
http://www.time.com/time/world/arti...2043557,00.html

Warcabbit posted:

Mohamed Bouazizi, Time Man of the Year, 2011.
http://www.time.com/time/world/arti...2043557,00.html

Nonsense posted:

Did one of the waitress actually pull out a knife on the victim? I didn't catch that, but then I didn't fully watch it all, too sad.

Ace Oliveira posted:

Do we have any confirmation about Gaddafi's postions outside of Misrata getting bombed to poo poo? The response seems a bit too quick for the NATO Coalition.

Ace Oliveira posted:

Do we have any confirmation about Gaddafi's postions outside of Misrata getting bombed to poo poo? The response seems a bit too quick for the NATO Coalition.

farraday posted:

Silly warcabbit, Mohammed Bouazizi wasn't an American!
Clearly it should go to Jack Dorsey for inventing twitter which created these revolutions and demonstrates the continuing theme of American technological might helping oppressed people achieve fre...

We're less than three months in 10 2011, but you're right that it's fairly hard to imagine a better candidate could come around.

Warcabbit posted:

Mohamed Bouazizi, Time Man of the Year, 2011.
http://www.time.com/time/world/arti...2043557,00.html

Narmi posted:

The position has gone to groups of people before though, so it would be nice if it went to guys like Ghoneim and Bouazizi. Alternatively, they can go in the complete other direction and give the position to Gaddafi (both Hitler and Stalin have been awarded the position) since it still fits in the whole "influential person" category.

In any case, they already hit the bottom of the barrel when they put a mirror on the cover and named "you" the person of the year.

farraday posted:

Looking ahead, now that it appears protests are kicking off in a major way in Syria, and regardless of what else happens, what other countries in the region are susceptible?

evilweasel posted:

The siege of Misrata has been going on for some time.

Narmi posted:

The position has gone to groups of people before though, so it would be nice if it went to guys like Ghoneim and Bouazizi. Alternatively, they can go in the complete other direction and give the position to Gadaffi (both Hitler and Stalin have been awarded the position) since it still fits in the whole "influential person" category.

In any case, they already hit the bottom of the barrel when they put a mirror on the cover and named "you" the person of the year.

Contraction mapping posted:

I'm not saying that Time never puts monsters on it's cover, but they don't intentionally put universally reviled individuals on their covers, only people who are universally controversial and polarizing.

King Dopplepopolos posted:

Considering said protests have already happened in countries where they were previously thought to have been impossible or next to impossible, it almost seems like they could happen in any Middle Eastern country. Saudi Arabia seems least likely, but I even there I wouldn't put money on them not happening.

farraday posted:

Or they could just declare "Arab protesters " as the people of the year.

Contraction mapping posted:

Uh, I wouldn't really call that going in the 'other' direction. Hitler was POTY well before the start of WW2 when his goal to unite German-speakers through small territorial acquisitions was very much sympathized with in the West, while Stalin was probably put in the second time for the only good thing (the defence of the Soviet Union) he ever did in his life. I'm not saying that Time never puts monsters on it's cover, but they don't intentionally put universally reviled individuals on their covers, only people who are universally controversial and polarizing.

quote:

iyad_elbaghdadi Reports that revolutionaries have progressed till Bishr and Ugailah.

quote:

iyad_elbaghdadi To give an idea how hastily Gaddafi troops retreated: Several Grad launchers taken by revolutionaries in Ajdabia & Brega.

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FreeLibyan87 Freedom Fighters Colonel through AJA saying that the are arranging their actions with the coalition forces

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iyad_elbaghdadi Night time air strikes have resumed. Confirmed hits on Gaddafi forces in Misurata.

quote:

WefaqLibya Gaddafi forces attack parts of Misurata, some Egyptionis are dead among other Foreign citizens.

quote:

feb17libya Reuters: French warplanes destroy 5 Libyan planes & 2 helicopters on ground in Misrata airport http://t.co/Zi2J1V5

quote:

LibyanDictator Contact confirms that an Aljazeera team reached #Misrata and were there for 3 days. Nothing's been aired yet..

farraday posted:

Interesting blog post on The Arabist about the context for US military intervention.

http://www.arabist.net/blog/2011/3/...-went-with.html

Ballz posted:

That is in my opinion, a great and logical analysis of the West's intervention. But once again, reading the comments to it will kill many brain cells.

comments posted:

What a bunch of wanking to justify sure killing by the U.S. because of hypothetical killing by Gaddafi.