Tunesia, Egyt and now Yemen: a domino effect in the Middle East?

Remind you of anyone y'all know?

Am I the one who makes excuses for war criminals?

You're the most anal retentive guy I've ever come across.

Libyan warplanes have bombed the oil refinery and port town of Marsa El Brega on Wednesday.

"It’s now an air attack. We just watched an air force jet from Libyan air force fly over Brega and drop at least one bomb and huge plumes of smoke are now coming out over Brega," Al Jazeera's Tony Birtley said as a battle between pro-Gadhafi forces and opponents continued.

The warplane from Gadhafi's air force struck a beach near where the two sides were fighting at a university campus. The witness says the blast raised a plume of sand from a dune but caused no casualties, apparently an attempt to scare off the anti-Gadhafi fighters besieging regime forces in the campus.

Forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi are also reported to have regained control of two strategic towns in the country's northwest.

The bombing of Brega and reports about the fall of Gharyan and Sabratha came as Gaddafi appeared on state television once again.

"They tried to take Brega this morning, but they failed," Mustafa Gheriani, a spokesman for the February 17th Coalition, an anti-government group, told the Reuters news agency.

"It is back in the hands of the revolutionaries. He is trying to create all kinds of psychological warfare to keep these cities on edge."


Al Jazeera's Jacky Rowland, reporting from Bengazi, Libya's second largest city now controlled by rebels, described the situation in the Brega region as fluid.

" I think it's fair to say that here is a fair amount of fighting going on in that area," she said.

Earlier the Associated Press news agency quoted Ahmed Jerksi, manager of the oil installation in Brega, as saying that pro-Gaddafi forces took control of the facility at dawn without using force.

There were conflicting claims about the casualties from these battles.

Located between Gaddafi's hometown of Sirte -- still under government control -- and the opposition-held eastern port of Benghazi, Brega also sits near ethnic fault lines between tribes loyal to Gaddafi and eastern groups opposed to him.

Government forces were also reported to be battling to regain control of rebel-held towns close to Tripoli, trying to create a buffer zone around what is still Gaddafi's seat of power.

Our correspondent said an air raid carried out by forces loyal to Gaddafi reportedly targeted a weapons store about 6km outside the eastern town of Ajdabiya.

Witnesses told the Associated Press news agency that they saw two warplanes bomb the town's eastern outskirts at 10am local time.

They also said pro-Gaddafi forces were advancing on the town. "I see two jets bombing now,'' one witness said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

Another witness said rebel forces were rushing to the western side of Ajdabiya to meet the advancing pro-Gaddafi force.

Repeated air raids

Libyan forces have launched repeated air raids during the two-week revolt but all of them have been reported to target facilities that store weapons in areas controlled by the rebels.

Wednesday's developments come as the US sent warships to the region as part of a Western effort to pile more pressure on Gaddafi to stop his violent crackdown and step aside.

The destroyer USS Barry moved through the Suez Canal on Monday and into the Mediterranean Sea.

Two amphibious assault ships, the USS Kearsarge, which can carry 2,000 marines, and the USS Ponce passed through the canal on Wednesday.

The White House said the ships were being redeployed in preparation for possible humanitarian efforts but stressed it "was not taking any options off the table".

"We are looking at a lot of options and contingencies. No decisions have been made on any other actions," Robert Gates, the US defence secretary, said.

The US says Libya could sink into civil war unless Gaddafi quits amid fears that the uprising - the bloodiest
against long-serving rulers in north Africa and the Middle East - could cause a humanitarian crisis.

Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, has cautioned that "Libya could become a peaceful democracy or it could face protracted civil war".

But Gaddafi remains defiant and his son, Saif al-Islam, has warned the West against launching military action, insisting that his father would neither step down nor go into exile.

Eyewitness reports varied but several who spoke to the Herald estimated that up to 400 troops attacked the city's oil and gas plants early in the morning.

A Sirte Oil company engineer, Mufta Khafaji, said at least eight oil workers were killed.

The attack signalled the first major attempt by Colonel Gaddafi to regain control of the country's east.

Two jets dropped bombs near Ajdabiya but they appeared deliberately off target. After the bombs were released the jets turned around and flew west.

Ahmed Jerksi, the manager of Sirte Oil, which runs the facility in Brega, told Associated Press pro-Gaddafi forces took control of the plant, about 70 kilometres south-west of Ajdabiya.

But the rebels had then pushed the pro-Gaddafi forces away and were back in control, according to several of their leaders in Ajdabiya.

''Brega is now under the full control of the revolution,'' a police general in Ajdabiya said on condition of anonymity.

''People have gone from Ajdabiya to help,'' he said.

Mehdi Suleiman Hussein, a fighter from Ajdabiya, told AFP that ''Gaddafi's forces arrived in Brega and fought, but now they are pulling back''. He said that some ''mercenaries'' were still battling the rebels.

Rebel leaders frustrated at Colonel Gaddafi's diminished but unyielding grip on power have asked the United Nations for air strikes as the Arab League considered a resolution opposing foreign military intervention.

Two US warships have passed through the Suez canal and closer to Libya (see 2.58pm). But the US defence secretary, Robert Gates, told a congressional committee that establishing a no-fly zone would have to begin with an attack on Libyan territory, in order to destroy Muammar Gaddafi's air defence weapons. He noted that the overall military effort would require more planes than are available from a single US aircraft carrier, but said if Barack Obama wanted a no-fly zone established, the Pentagon could do it. However, the idea has been rejected by Russia, which holds a veto-wielding seat on the UN security council. Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, said she was worried Libya would descend into chaos and become "a giant Somalia" ie a haven for al-Qaida

I think they are talking no-fly zones as a method of having something to say which makes it sound like they are doing something when they are not. How would it be enforced?