Ancient Libya The coastal plain of Libya was inhabited by
Neolithic peoples from as early as 8000 BC. The
Afroasiatic ancestors of the
Berber people are assumed to have spread into the area by the
Late Bronze Age. The earliest known name of such a tribe was the
Garamantes, based in
Germa. The
Phoenicians were the first to establish trading posts in Libya. By the 5th century BC, the greatest of the Phoenician colonies,
Carthage, had extended its
hegemony across much of North Africa, where a distinctive civilisation, known as
Punic, came into being. In 630 BC, the
ancient Greeks colonised the area around
Barca in Eastern Libya and founded the city of
Cyrene. Within 200 years, four more important Greek cities were established in the area that became known as
Cyrenaica. The area was home to the renowned philosophy school of the
Cyrenaics. In 525 BC the
Persian army of
Cambyses II overran Cyrenaica, which for the next two centuries remained under Persian or Egyptian rule.
Alexander the Great ended Persian rule in 331 BC and received tribute from Cyrenaica. Eastern Libya again fell under the control of the Greeks, this time as part of the
Ptolemaic Kingdom. , the first Roman emperor native to
Roman Africa, was born in Leptis Magna. After the fall of
Carthage the Romans did not immediately occupy
Tripolitania (the region around Tripoli), but left it instead under control of the kings of
Numidia, until the coastal cities asked and obtained its protection.
Ptolemy Apion, the last Greek ruler, bequeathed Cyrenaica to Rome, which formally annexed the region in 74 BC and joined it to Crete as
a Roman province. As part of the
Africa Nova province, Tripolitania was prosperous, It was heavily devastated during the
Kitos War and almost depopulated of Greeks and Jews alike. Although repopulated by
Trajan with military colonies, In 647 an army led by
Abdullah ibn Saad took Tripoli from the Byzantines definitively. For the next several decades, Libya was under the purview of the
Umayyad Caliph of Damascus until the
Abbasids overthrew the Umayyads in 750, and Libya came under the rule of Baghdad. When Caliph
Harun al-Rashid appointed
Ibrahim ibn al-Aghlab as his governor of
Ifriqiya in 800, Libya enjoyed considerable local autonomy under the
Aghlabid dynasty. By the 10th century, the Shiite
Fatimids controlled Western Libya, and ruled the entire region in 972 and appointed
Bologhine ibn Ziri as governor. For the next 50 years, Tripolitania was the scene of numerous battles among
Ayyubids, the
Almohad rulers and insurgents of the
Banu Ghaniya. Later, a general of the Almohads, Muhammad ibn Abu Hafs, ruled Libya from 1207 to 1221 before the later establishment of the Tunisian
Hafsid Kingdom In time, real power came to rest with the pasha's corps of
janissaries. The latter conquered also Cyrenaica. boarding a Tripolitan gunboat during the
First Barbary War, 1804 In the early 19th century war broke out between the United States and Tripolitania, and a series of battles ensued in what came to be known as the
First Barbary War and the
Second Barbary War. By 1819, the various treaties of the
Napoleonic Wars had forced the Barbary states to give up piracy almost entirely, and Tripolitania's economy began to crumble. As Yusuf weakened, factions sprung up around his three sons. Civil war soon resulted. Ottoman Sultan
Mahmud II sent in troops ostensibly to restore order, marking the end of both the Karamanli dynasty and an independent Tripolitania. From 1912 to 1927, the territory of Libya was known as
Italian North Africa. From 1927 to 1934, the territory was split into two colonies,
Italian Cyrenaica and
Italian Tripolitania, run by Italian governors. Some 150,000 Italians settled in Libya, constituting roughly 20% of the total population.
Omar Mukhtar rose to prominence as a
resistance leader against Italian colonisation and became a national hero despite his capture and execution on 16 September 1931. His face is currently printed on the Libyan ten dinar note in memory and recognition of his patriotism. Another prominent resistance leader, Idris al-Mahdi as-Senussi (later
King Idris I), Emir of Cyrenaica, continued to lead the Libyan resistance until the outbreak of the
Second World War. The so-called "
pacification of Libya" by the Italians resulted in mass deaths of the indigenous people in Cyrenaica, killing approximately one quarter of Cyrenaica's population of 225,000.
Ilan Pappé estimates that between 1928 and 1932 the Italian military "killed half the Bedouin population (directly or through disease and starvation in
Italian concentration camps in Libya)." in 1911 In 1934, Italy combined
Cyrenaica,
Tripolitania and
Fezzan and adopted the name "Libya" (used by the
Ancient Greeks for all of
North Africa except
Egypt) for the unified colony, with
Tripoli as its
capital. The Italians emphasised infrastructure improvements and public works. In particular, they greatly expanded Libyan railway and road networks from 1934 to 1940, building hundreds of kilometres of new roads and railways and encouraging the establishment of new industries and dozens of new agricultural villages. In June 1940,
Italy entered World War II. Libya became the setting for the hard-fought
North African Campaign that ultimately ended in defeat for Italy and its
German ally in 1943. From 1943 to 1951, Libya was under
Allied occupation. The British military
administered the two former Italian Libyan provinces of Tripolitana and Cyrenaïca, while the French
administered the province of Fezzan. In 1944, Idris returned from exile in
Cairo but declined to resume permanent residence in Cyrenaica until the removal of some aspects of foreign control in 1947. Under the terms of the
1947 peace treaty with the
Allies, Italy relinquished all claims to Libya.
Independent Kingdom (1951–1969) of Libya|223x223px A national assembly crafted a constitution that established a
monarchy and extended an offer for the throne to
Sayyid Idris, the
Emir of Cyrenaica. Sayyid Idris held the esteemed position as the leader of the influential
Senussi religious brotherhood, which was founded by his grandfather in the preceding century as a response to Western influence in the
Arab world. Idris represented Libya in the subsequent UN negotiations. By 24 December 1951, Libya declared its independence as the
United Kingdom of Libya, a constitutional and hereditary
monarchy under King
Idris. However, the new kingdom faced challenging prospects. it was later renamed the "Day of Friendship" because of an improvement in
Italy–Libya relations. , leader of Libya () Libya's increase in prosperity was accompanied by increased internal political repression, and political dissent was made illegal under Law 75 of 1973. Gaddafi also wanted to ease the strict social restrictions imposed on women by the previous regime, establishing the
Revolutionary Women's Formation to encourage reform. On 25 October 1975, a coup attempt was launched by a group of 20 military officers, mostly from the city of
Misrata. This resulted in the arrest and executions of the coup plotters. In March 1977, Libya officially became the "Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya". Gaddafi, in his vision of democratic government and
political philosophy, published
The Green Book in 1975. His short book inscribed a representative mix of utopian socialism and Arab nationalism with a streak of
Bedouin supremacy.In February 1977, Libya started delivering military supplies to
Goukouni Oueddei and the
People's Armed Forces in Chad. Hundreds of Libyans lost their lives in the country's support for
Idi Amin's
Uganda in
its war against Tanzania. On 2 March 1977, Libya officially became the
Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya. Libya adopted its plain green national flag on 19 November 1977. while the
Human Development Index became the highest in Africa and greater than that of
Saudi Arabia. This was achieved without borrowing any foreign loans, keeping Libya
debt-free. The
Great Manmade River was also built to allow free access to fresh water across large parts of the country. Much of Libya's income from oil, which soared in the 1970s, was spent on arms purchases and on sponsoring dozens of paramilitaries and terrorist groups around the world.
An American airstrike led by then U.S. president
Ronald Reagan intended to kill Gaddafi failed in 1986. In the 1990s, the government's rule was threatened by militant Islamism and an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate Gaddafi. The government responded with repressive measures. Libya's authoritarian regime led by Muammar Gaddafi put up much more of a resistance compared to the regimes in Egypt and Tunisia. While overthrowing the regimes in Egypt and Tunisia was a relatively quick process, Gaddafi's campaign posed significant stalls on the uprising in Libya. The first announcement of a competing political authority appeared online and declared the
Interim Transitional National Council as an alternative government. One of Gaddafi's senior advisors responded by posting a tweet, wherein he resigned, defected, and advised Gaddafi to flee. By 20 February, the unrest had spread to
Tripoli. On 27 February 2011, the
National Transitional Council was established to administer the areas of Libya under rebel control. On 10 March 2011, the
United States and many other nations recognised the council headed by
Mahmoud Jibril as acting prime minister and as the legitimate representative of the Libyan people and withdrawing the recognition of Gaddafi's regime. Pro-Gaddafi forces were able to respond militarily to rebel pushes in
Western Libya and launched a counterattack along the coast toward Benghazi, the
de facto centre of the uprising. The town of
Zawiya, from Tripoli, was bombarded by
air force planes and army tanks and seized by
Jamahiriya troops, "exercising a level of brutality not yet seen in the conflict." Organizations of the United Nations, including
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and the
United Nations Human Rights Council, condemned the crackdown as violating international law, with the latter body expelling Libya outright in an unprecedented action. On 17 March 2011, the UN Security Council passed
Resolution 1973, with a 10–0 vote and five abstentions including
Russia,
China,
India,
Brazil and
Germany. The resolution sanctioned the establishment of a
no-fly zone and the use of "all means necessary" to protect civilians within Libya. On 19 March, the first act of
NATO allies to secure the no-fly zone began by destroying Libyan air defences when French military jets entered Libyan airspace on a
reconnaissance mission heralding attacks on enemy targets. In the weeks that followed, U.S. American forces were in the forefront of NATO operations against Libya. More than 8,000 US personnel in warships and aircraft were deployed in the area. At least 3,000 targets were struck in 14,202 strike sorties, 716 of them in Tripoli and 492 in
Brega. The U.S. air offensive included flights of
B-2 stealth bombers, each bomber armed with sixteen 2000-pound bombs, flying out of and returning to their base in
Missouri. The support provided by the NATO air forces contributed to the ultimate success of the revolution. By 22 August 2011,
rebel fighters had entered Tripoli and occupied
Green Square, which they renamed Martyrs' Square in honour of those killed since 17 February 2011. On 20 October 2011, the last heavy fighting of the uprising came to an end in the city of
Sirte. The
Battle of Sirte was both the last decisive battle and the last one in general of the
First Libyan Civil War where Gaddafi was captured and killed by NATO-backed forces on 20 October 2011. Sirte was the last Gaddafi loyalist stronghold and his place of birth. The defeat of
loyalist forces was celebrated on 23 October 2011, three days after the fall of Sirte. At least 30,000 Libyans died in the civil war. In addition, the
National Transitional Council estimated 50,000 wounded.
Interwar period and the Second Libyan Civil War (2011–2020) , updated 11 June 2020:
Tobruk-led Government Government of National Accord Petroleum Facilities Guard Tuareg tribes Local forces Following the defeat of loyalist forces, Libya was torn among numerous rival, armed militias affiliated with distinct regions, cities and tribes, while the central government had been weak and unable to effectively exert its authority over the country. Competing militias pitted themselves against each other in a political struggle between
Islamist politicians and their opponents. On 7 July 2012, Libyans held their first parliamentary elections since the end of the former regime. On 8 August, the
National Transitional Council officially handed power over to the wholly elected
General National Congress, which was then tasked with the formation of an interim government and the drafting of a new
Libyan Constitution to be approved in a general
referendum. On 25 August 2012, in what Reuters reported as "the most blatant sectarian attack" since the end of the civil war, unnamed organised assailants bulldozed a
Sufi mosque with graves in the centre of the Libyan capital
Tripoli. It was the second such razing of a Sufi site in two days. Numerous acts of vandalism and destruction of heritage were carried out by suspected Islamist militias, including the removal of the Nude Gazelle Statue and the destruction and desecration of
World War II–era British grave sites near
Benghazi. Many other cases of heritage vandalism were reported to be carried out by Islamist-related radical militias and mobs that either destroyed, robbed, or looted a number of historic sites. . On 11 September 2012, Islamist militants mounted an
attack on the American diplomatic compound in Benghazi, killing the U.S. ambassador to Libya,
J. Christopher Stevens, and three others. The incident generated outrage in the
United States and Libya. On 7 October 2012, Libya's Prime Minister-elect
Mustafa A.G. Abushagur was ousted after failing a second time to win parliamentary approval for a new cabinet. On 14 October 2012, the General National Congress elected former GNC member and human rights lawyer
Ali Zeidan as prime minister-designate. Zeidan was sworn in after his cabinet was approved by the GNC. On 11 March 2014, after having been ousted by the GNC for his inability to halt a rogue oil shipment, Prime Minister Zeidan stepped down, and was replaced by Prime Minister
Abdullah al-Thani. The
Second Civil War began in May 2014 following fighting between rival parliaments with tribal militias and
jihadist groups soon taking advantage of the power vacuum. Most notably, radical Islamist fighters seized
Derna in 2014 and
Sirte in 2015 in the name of the
Islamic State. In February 2015, neighbouring
Egypt launched airstrikes against IS in support of the Tobruk government. In June 2014,
elections were held to the
House of Representatives, a new legislative body intended to take over from the
General National Congress. The elections were marred by violence and low turnout, with voting stations closed in some areas. Secularists and liberals did well in the elections, to the consternation of Islamist lawmakers in the GNC, who reconvened and declared a continuing mandate for the GNC, refusing to recognise the new House of Representatives. Armed supporters of the General National Congress occupied Tripoli, forcing the newly elected parliament to flee to
Tobruk. , the head of the
Libyan National Army, one of the main factions in the
2014 civil war In January 2015, meetings were held with the aim to find a peaceful agreement between the rival parties in Libya. The so-called Geneva-Ghadames talks were supposed to bring the GNC and the Tobruk government together at one table to find a solution of the internal conflict. However, the GNC actually never participated, a sign that internal division not only affected the "Tobruk Camp", but also the "Tripoli Camp". Meanwhile, terrorism within Libya steadily increased, also affecting neighbouring countries. The
terrorist attack against the Bardo Museum in
Tunisia on 18 March 2015 was reportedly carried out by two Libyan-trained militants. During 2015 an extended series of diplomatic meetings and peace negotiations were supported by the United Nations, as conducted by the Special Representative of the Secretary-General (SRSG), Spanish diplomat
Bernardino León. UN support for the SRSG-led process of dialogue carried on in addition to the usual work of the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL). In July 2015 SRSG Leon reported to the UN Security Council on the progress of the negotiations, which at that point had just achieved a political agreement on 11 July setting out "a comprehensive framework... includ[ing] guiding principles... institutions and decision-making mechanisms to guide the transition until the adoption of a permanent constitution." Talks, negotiations and dialogue continued on during mid-2015 at various international locations, culminating at Skhirat in Morocco in early September. Also in 2015, as part of the ongoing support from the international community, the UN Human Rights Council requested a report about the Libyan situation and the High Commissioner for Human Rights,
Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, established an investigative body (OIOL) to report on human rights and rebuilding the Libyan justice system. Chaos-ridden Libya emerged as a major transit point for
people trying to reach Europe. Between 2013 and 2018, nearly 700,000 migrants reached Italy by boat, many of them from Libya. In May 2018 Libya's rival leaders agreed to hold parliamentary and presidential elections following a meeting in
Paris. In April 2019,
Khalifa Haftar launched
Operation Flood of Dignity, in an offensive by the
Libyan National Army aimed to seize Western territories from the
Government of National Accord (GNA). In June 2019, forces allied to Libya's UN-recognised Government of National Accord successfully captured
Gharyan, a strategic town where military commander Khalifa Haftar and his fighters were based. According to a spokesman for GNA forces, Mustafa al-Mejii, dozens of LNA fighters under Haftar were killed, while at least 18 were taken prisoner. In March 2020, Prime Minister of the GNA
Fayez Al-Sarraj commenced Operation Peace Storm. The government initiated the bid in response to the state of assaults carried by
Field Marshal Haftar's
LNA. "We are a legitimate, civilian government that respects its obligations to the international community, but is committed primarily to its people and has an obligation to protect its citizens," Sarraj said in line with his decision. On 28 August 2020, the
BBC Africa Eye and
BBC Arabic Documentaries revealed that a drone operated by the
United Arab Emirates (UAE) killed 26 young cadets at a military academy in Tripoli, on 4 January. Most of the cadets were teenagers and none of them were armed. The Chinese-made drone
Wing Loong II fired Blue Arrow 7 missile, which was operated from UAE-run Al-Khadim Libyan air base. In February, these drones stationed in Libya were moved to an air base near
Siwa in the western Egyptian desert.
The Guardian probed and discovered the blatant violation of
UN arms embargo by the UAE and
Turkey on 7 October 2020. As per the reporting, both the nations sent large-scale military cargo planes to Libya in support of their respective parties. On 23 October 2020,
a permanent ceasefire was signed to end the war.
Post-civil war years (2020–present) In December 2021, the
country's first presidential election was scheduled, but was delayed to June 2022 and later postponed further.
Fathi Bashagha was appointed prime minister by the parliament in February 2022 to lead a transitional administration, but standing prime minister
Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh refused to hand over power as of April 2022. In protest against the Dbeibah government, tribal leaders from the desert town of
Ubari shut down the
El Sharara oil field, Libya's largest oil field, on 18 April 2022. The shut down threatened to cause oil shortages domestically in Libya, and preclude the state-run National Oil Corp. from exploiting the increase in oil prices resulting from the
2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. On 2 July, protesters stormed the parliament building in Tobruk and lit fires. On 10 September 2023, catastrophic floods due to
dam failures generated by
Storm Daniel devastated the port city of
Derna, killing more than 5,900 and possibly as many as 24,000. The floods were the worst natural disaster in Libya's modern history. In November 2024, the
Government of National Unity announced it would instate a morality police to crack-down on "weird haircuts", enforce "modest" clothing, and require male guardians for women. == Geography ==