Libyan rebels said Friday a close associate to leader Muammar Qaddafi, who was once the No. 2 top regime official has defected, marking another blow to the increasingly isolated Libyan leader.
The man is Abdel Salam Jalloud, who helped Qaddafi stage the 1969 coup that propelled him to power and transformed Libya from a monarchy to a republic.
The Associated Press reports that Jalloud was Qaddafi’s most trusted deputy for two decades but began to clash with the leader starting in the 1990s.
A spokesman for the rebels, Mahmoud Shammam, told AP on Friday that Jalloud had fled to a rebel-held area in the western mountains and was on his way to Europe. Pictures showing Jalloud in the western town of Zintan appeared on rebel Facebook pages.
Earlier this week, Qaddafi’s interior minister was reported to have defected and having flown to Cairo with nine family members.
Egyptian officials said Libyan Interior Minister Nassr al-Mabrouk Abdullah and his relatives arrived in Egypt early Monday on a private jet from the Tunisian resort island of Djerba.
The defections come as rebels have closed in on Zawiya and Gharyan, two key cities on the way to the capital Tripoli. The rebels have said they expect Qaddafi’s 42-year reign to end by August.
The rebels’ confidence may have come a bit too soon, as it was reported on Friday that Qaddafi’s forces launched a fierce counterattack against rebels in Zawiya, using rockets, mortar shells and anti-aircraft guns.
Nevertheless, another rebel official, Abdel-Hafiz Ghoga, told AP that Jalloud’s defection “gives us assurance that Qaddafi is weakening.”
(Arutz Sheva’s North American Desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Arutz Sheva articles, however, is Israeli time.)