Libya: Tripoli in dangerous standoff as PM set on reining in last opponents in the west

Like every evening in Libya’s capital Tripoli, the main roads are clogged with traffic.

At the entrance to the densely populated district of Souq al-Juma, four fighters try to keep the flow moving. With brand new uniforms and last-generation Kalashnikovs, they look far better equipped than the lone police officer helping nearby.

These young men are part of the Deterrence Apparatus, one of Tripoli’s most powerful armed factions, known in Arabic as Radaa.

“We are here to prevent accidents or fights, and to protect citizens,” one tells Middle East Eye.

Asked whether he fears an attack by forces loyal to the Government of National Unity (GNU), he answers soberly.

“The situation is calm now; we are under the protection of Allah.”

Since the October 2020 ceasefire ending the civil war that followed the Nato-backed uprising overthrowing longtime ruler Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, Libya has remained split between two rival authorities in the west and east.

Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah, based in Tripoli, leads the internationally recognised GNU, while a rival administration under Prime Minister Osama Hammad operates from the eastern city of Benghazi with backing from powerful General Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan Arab Armed Forces (LAAF).

Meanwhile, western Libya has been the scene of power struggles between militias, who vie for influence and control of lucrative oil and gas resources, as well as extortion and ransom schemes targeting migrant people.

The capital in particular has seen renewed tensions in recent months as Dbeibah has increased pressure on rival militias, sparking fears of a large-scale conflict.

A fragile security agreement

At the gates of the Mitiga military camp, Radaa’s headquarters, the mood is far more tense than in the streets of Tripoli. The entrance has been barricaded, heavy machine guns posted, and dozens of soldiers guard the checkpoint.

That caution is not without reason: the GNU’s last offensive on its most powerful rivals in the capital also came at dawn.

In May, Dbeibah ordered his affiliated militias to conduct an offensive on Radaa and an armed group known as the Security Support Apparatus (SSA), killing its leader Abdelghani al-Kikli, aka "Gheniwa".

‘We don’t want war and we won’t start it, but we are ready to defend ourselves’

- A senior Radaa officer

In the weeks prior, Dbeibah had engaged in a power struggle with Gheniwa over control of revenues from the state-owned Libyan Post, Telecommunications and Information Technology Company (LPTIC), a typical contest for the capture and diversion of public funds in Tripoli.

At least eight people were killed in the clashes, the deadliest toll since August 2023, when infighting between rival factions left 55 people dead.

Radaa subsequently retreated from its downtown positions, regrouping around Souq al-Juma and the Mitiga airport in the east of the city.

It now stands as the only faction openly resisting Dbeibah’s forces in Tripoli, as the SSA has been forced out of the city and left significantly weakened.

The ground once held by the SSA and Radaa is now “secured” by GNU-allied groups, including the 444 Brigade, the 111 Brigade and the General Security Apparatus.

While Dbeibah’s objective has been to bring rival armed factions under his control and centralise power in the capital, replicating what Haftar has done in eastern Libya, the security situation is as tense and volatile as ever.

“Clearly, the security situation hasn’t improved with these changes. In particular, the General Security Apparatus has gained a very bad reputation,” Wolfram Lacher, a researcher at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, tells MEE.

Online, numerous videos show abuses committed by the new “protectors”.

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“They basically behave like criminals,” says Said*, a senior Radaa officer who wants to remain anonymous, tells MEE.

Asked whether his group plans to retake its former positions, he is unequivocal: “We don’t want war and we won’t start it, but we are ready to defend ourselves.”

Another round of fighting could erupt at any moment.

In fact, the war nearly resumed at the end of August, when Dbeibah issued several ultimatums for Radaa to surrender and leave Mitiga airport. Situated next to Radaa’s headquarters, the airport is the capital’s only functioning international hub and one of its most strategic assets.

In early September, heavy artillery and tanks were spotted moving into GNU-aligned camps in Tripoli, especially from Dbeibah’s allied city of Misrata, 160km east of the capital.

An agreement to avoid a fully fledged war was finally reached on 13 September under Turkish mediation: Radaa gave up its formal office inside the civilian airport, but was not forced out of its headquarters.

New recruits still perform daily drills on training grounds just 200 meters from the runway.

According to a spokesperson from the group’s media office, “more than 15,000 people currently serve in Radaa”.

‘There has been no disarmament, no withdrawal from the base - it’s a cosmetic deal’

- Jalel Harchaoui, Royal United Services Institute

On the other hand, Said insists that GNU forces “didn’t remove the cannons and tanks they brought from Misrata”.

Contacted by MEE, the GNU made no comment on the deal.

“There has been no disarmament, no withdrawal from the base - it’s a cosmetic deal,” Jalel Harchaoui, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, tells MEE.

At the Mitiga base, a few Turkish officers can be seen moving around, living in dedicated barracks. At night, Ankara’s drones are heard circling over Tripoli, monitoring movements.

According to Harchaoui, “Turkey has no confidence in Dbeibah” and thus continues to keep the city under close watch.

Since the start of the war in Libya, Ankara has closely monitored its interests in Tripoli, where it helped repel a major offensive by Haftar's forces in 2020. Since then, Turkey established ties with both Radaa and Dbeibah, while also opening channels in the east in recent months.

“There is an Ottoman doctrine of not allowing war in Tripoli under their supervision,” says Harchaoui.

Fight for legitimacy over Tripoli

While the armed clashes have subsided for now, the battle currently plays out in the political narrative and alliances.

Dbeibah, who was appointed prime minister in 2021 as a consensus candidate with a mandate to usher Libya into elections which never took place, seems to have lost public trust.

Following the clashes in May, protesters from Tripoli neighbourhoods, as well as western Libyan towns, gathered for peaceful demonstrations whose scale had not been seen since the 2011 revolution.

Frustrated by Dbeibah’s political manoeuvres and rampant corruption, demonstrators demanded his resignation, with Radaa covertly backing them. In armoured pickups equipped with Starlink terminals, militiamen encourage people to take to the streets and demand the end of his rule.

Seven GNU ministers resigned as a consequence, and none of them have yet been replaced.

On 21 August, the UN Security Council also adopted a roadmap calling for elections and the creation of a “new, unified government” within 18 months, strongly undermining the GNU’s international legitimacy, once Dbeibah’s greatest asset.

The announcement of the UN roadmap was welcomed with fireworks in front of Souq al-Juma’s social council, a local structure that networks with neighbourhood and tribal leaders across eastern Tripoli.

Radaa enjoys wide popular support in the area.

The faction, which was formed during the civil war, is led by Abdul Rauf Kara, whose wartime influence and Salafist background earned him respect among Souq al-Juma’s tribal and conservative leaders.

“Everybody in Souq al-Juma wants them to stay, because they know Radaa works well and protects us from insecurity more than anyone could,” one of the council’s communications officers tells MEE.

Radaa is the only armed faction to invite foreign journalists to enter Tripoli, portraying itself as the sole legitimate force in the capital and unfolding a narrative that emphasises discipline within its ranks.

‘Radaa has been trying for years to build a reputation as a professional unit with real capabilities. They were the first in Tripoli to adopt this model’

- Wolfram Lacher, German Institute for International and Security Affairs

“I joined the force because they are the only ones who operate within the law,” a colonel and former army officer tells MEE. “If one of my officers abuses his power, we impose disciplinary sanctions.”

“Radaa has been trying for years to build a reputation as a professional unit with real capabilities. They were the first in Tripoli to adopt this model,” says Lacher.

This narrative is attacked by Dbeibah: when he launched his offensive in May, he vowed to destroy “the militias that survive by extorting the state”.

In fact, Radaa has long held a reputation for unlawful conduct. As early as 2021, Amnesty International highlighted abuses such as involvement in kidnappings, enforced disappearances, torture, unlawful killings and forced labour.

Yet, the same report made similar allegations against Emad Trabelsi, Dbeibah’s interior minister, as well as the SSA and Misrata armed groups loyal to the prime minister.

“In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king,” comments Harchaoui when asked about the allegations directed at Radaa. For the analyst, if there is a “hierarchy” of armed groups involved in financial crimes, Radaa ranks somewhere in the middle, not at the top.

Like most armed groups in the country since the end of the war, the faction receives funding from the national budget, as it officially operates under the Presidential Council, Libya’s top executive body, which represents both eastern and western Libya even if with limited powers.

Radaa also collects money from Mitiga through informal channels, such as extortion and local taxes. But this remains less significant than the activities of the SSA or Ministry of Interior forces like the General Security Apparatus, according to Libyan experts.

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Considering the recent abuses committed by GNU forces in the capital, such as thefts and violent behaviour towards civilians, Dbeibah’s rhetoric has failed to sway public opinion.

“Dbeibah still needs to eliminate his opponents in Tripoli in order to secure his grip on power,” says Lacher.

Meanwhile, Radaa is becoming less isolated, gaining support from armed factions in other western cities. Once highly fragmented, the militias now split into two camps: those backing the GNU and those rallying behind Radaa, “brought together by their hostility toward Dbeibah,” says Lacher.

The group views the head of the Presidential Council, Mohamed Menfi, as the only legitimate actor to oversee elections, as he de facto holds a neutral stance, not endorsing the GNU’s actions in Tripoli.

“Now, Dbeibah has to leave power and bring us democracy,” argues Said.

Reports suggest Radaa also reinforced contacts with Haftar in Benghazi. Said insists that, for now, this is just “normal cooperation and exchange of information, as has long existed”.

By late September, new troop movements by Haftar’s LAAF and the GNU-allied 444 Brigade near the frontline in Sirte fueled fears that another war between the east and the west could erupt, with Haftar’s camp determined to prevent Dbeibah from fully taking over the capital.

* Name has been changed.