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The United Arab Emirates launched a series of airstrikes from Egyptian bases against Islamist-allied militias fighting in Tripoli over the summer. And Egyptian forces have actively aided anti-Islamist military units fighting around Benghazi in eastern Libya.

Western diplomats familiar with intelligence reports say that Egyptian special forces have participated in raids near the airport in Benghazi, Libya, as well as at a camp near the Libyan stronghold of Derna, with mixed results.

Each side in Libya’s conflict now claims its own government — one in Tripoli and the other in Tobruk. The anti-Islamist government in Tobruk includes the headquarters of a recently elected Parliament, although it operates with little visibility and the number of lawmakers attending its sessions has been difficult to assess.

The Islamist-allied government in Tripoli contends that a recent Supreme Court decision invalidated the election of the Parliament in Tobruk. The government in Tobruk argues that the court was intimidated by the threat of militias in Tripoli.

r lived and died

bedrock of faith and tradition

Both play a role in perpetuating FGM

It has been outlawed since 2008

religious duty

highest prevalence rates in the world.

Over 90%

under 50 have experienced it, according to government figures.

removal of all or part of the external genitalia

promoting chastity.

still widely practised in Egyp

girls aged between nine and 13

young as six,

unconfirmed reports of newborns being subjected to it.

"It is God's will

asked if it was right to subject Suhair to FGM

"Yes of course,

People here are used to i

circumcision, girls are full of lust

Hidden death toll

"We were four sisters, and we were circumcised in one day

Afterwards they gave us food and drinks."

Gypsies used to carry out the circumcisions, she told us, placing dust and salt on the wounds

70% of FGM procedures in Egypt.

"It's perceived as being safer, but no-one learns how to do this at medical school. We should definitely assume more girls are dying as Suhair did,

his is a form of violence against children”

private clinic in his home.

dozen procedures carried out there every day.

enied performing FGM on Suhair and said he had only treated her for genital warts.

Dr Halawa on trial, together with Suhair's father, who brought her to his clinic

FGM is hard to quash

"The case has started a debate among the liberal-minded," said Mohamed Ismail, who works for a local women's rights organisation.

A thousand or so girls were circumcised after she died."

plans to have the curly-haired infant circumcised, by a doctor, when she reaches her teens

"In the past there was ignorance,

brought barbers to their homes to circumcise girls.

we are more modern

Campaigners warn that it will take more than one prosecution to spare other girls. More on This Story

they just turn up at the doctor's office with their daughters.

This is a form of violence against children,"

"It's an irreversible act. There are mental and physical scars that stay with the girl for a lifetime."

only one opponent of FGM in Suhair's village

"It's a very bad thing for girls," said Amira. "There's no need for it. It's wrong because it's dangerous."

he problem is the mentality of the farmers."

still easy to arrange.

Egypt: Deadly risks, but female genital mutilation persists

Mr Pack points out that the country has three main power blocks: Libya Dawn (a mixture of Islamist and non-Islamist militias allied with the Tripoli-based government), Operation Dignity (led by forces loyal to General Khalifa Haftar and allied with the internationally recognised government based in the eastern city of Tobruk) and Jihadist groups (which include IS, al-Qaeda and Ansar al-Sharia - the most powerful of them). "There is a civil war between the two main groups [Libya Dawn and Operation Dignity]. The jihadists act as spoilers," Mr Pack says.

"We have a culture of silenc

"Most women won't share their stories because they are afraid of what will happen to them, what will happen to their parents."

The shame runs so deep that girls are taught to never look at or touch their genitals, and most of them have never been to a gynecologist

don't even know they have been mutilated until they attempt to have sex, at which time they often need to be cut open again to consummate a marriage.

Dukureh has been the only U.S.-based survivor to speak up so publicly against FGM

I was 6 and my sister was 3 at the time.

We were there three months. We ate out of one shared bowl.

We went into a home, and immediately women grabbed and blindfolded us and tied us to some thick bushes.

There was loud drumming and older women were singing songs, which I was too young to understand.

. I saw an old woman holding a knife so sharp I could see the drops of blood sliding down the edge.

Three other women were holding down my arms and legs, and another was sitting right on my chest, covering my mouth

I can still feel the weight of her today

t. What the cutter does is hold on to your clitoris to make sure she gets that and scrapes everything else that comes along with it — all of the labia,

we were left to bleed into little dirt holes for hours.

it is common practice to circumcise infant

receive our "treatment

They took dried leaves and placed them on the wound and that would stay on for two to three days

We were also taught, every day, that if we ever talked about this, if we even mentioned it, they would kill us.

I learned two of them later died in childbirth, which was too difficult for them because of FGM. They bled to death.

h the rite of passage

This is who we are."

She cannot have kids as a result of her FGM.

I will never take them back. My family will never see them.

Ansar al-Shariah, the hard-line Islamist group involved in the assault on the American diplomatic Mission in Benghazi in 2012

Their opponents, including the militias stocked with former Qaddafi soldiers

The ideological differences are blurry at best: both sides publicly profess a similar conservative but democratic vision.

an escalating war among its patchwork of rival cities and tribes.

Motorists wait in lines stretching more than three miles at shuttered gas stations, waiting for them to open. Food prices are soaring, uncollected garbage is piling up in the streets and bicycles, once unheard-of, are increasingly common.

Tripoli, the capital and the main prize, has become a battleground

The fighting has destroyed the airport

Constant shelling between rival militias has leveled blocks

Storage tanks holding about 25 million gallons of fuel have burned unchecked for a month

with daily blackouts sometimes lasting more than 12 hours.

many Libyans despaired of any resolution

In Benghazi, Libya’s second-largest city, the fighting has closed both its airport and seaport, strangling the city.

the rush toward war is also lifting the fortunes of the Islamist extremists of Ansar al-Shariah, the Benghazi militant group.

The United Nations, the United States and the other Western powers have withdrawn their diplomats and closed their missions

“We cannot care more than you do,” the British ambassador, Michael Aron, wrote

Until now, a rough balance of power among local brigades had preserved a kind of equilibrium, if not stability

the transitional government scarcely existed outside of the luxury hotels where its officials gathered, no other force was strong enough to dominate. No single interest divided the competing cities and factions.

But that semblance of unity is now in tatters, and with it the hope that nonviolent negotiations might settle the competition for power and, implicitly, Libya’s oil.

In May, a renegade former general, Khalifa Hifter, declared that he would seize power by force to purge Libya of Islamists, beginning in Benghazi. He vowed to eradicate the hard-line Islamists of Ansar al-Shariah, blamed for a long series of bombings and assassinations.

General Hifter also pledged to close the Parliament and arrest moderate Islamist members

he has mustered a small fleet of helicopters and warplanes that have bombed rival bases around Benghazi, a steep escalation of the violence.

moderate Islamists and other brigades who had distanced themselves from Ansar al-Shariah began closing ranks, welcoming the group into a newly formed council of “revolutionary” militias

a broad alliance of Benghazi militias that now includes Ansar al-Shariah issued a defiant statement denouncing relative moderates like the Libyan Muslim Brotherhood. “We will not accept the project of democracy, secular parties, nor the parties that falsely claim the Islamic cause,”

the general’s blitz has now stalled, it polarized the country, drawing alarms from some cities and tribes but applause from others.

the loudest applause came from the western mountain town of Zintan, where local militia leaders had recruited hundreds of former Qaddafi soldiers into special brigades

the rival coastal city of Misurata, where militias have allied with the Islamists in political battles and jostled with the Zintanis for influence in the capital

the Misurata and Islamist militias developed a reputation for besieging government buildings and kidnapping high officials to try to pressure the Parliament. But in recent months the Zintanis and their anti-Islamist allies have stormed the Parliament and kidnapped senior lawmakers as well.

the newly elected Parliament, led at first, on a seniority basis, by a member supportive of Mr. Hifter, announced plans to convene in Tobruk, an eastern city under the general’s control.

About 30 members, most of them Islamists or Misuratans, refused to attend,

Tripoli’s backup airport, under the control of an Islamist militia, has cut off flights to Tobruk, even blocking a trip by the prime minister.

a spokesman for the old disbanded Parliament, favored by the Islamists and Misuratans, declared that it would reconvene in Tripoli

In Tobruk, a spokesman for the new Parliament declared that the Islamist- and Misuratan-allied militias were terrorists, suggesting that Libya might soon have two legislatures with competing armies

Each side has the support of competing satellite television networks financed and, often, broadcast from abroad, typically from Qatar for the Islamists and from the United Arab Emirates for their foes.

Hassan Tatanaki, a Libyan-born business mogul who owns one of the anti-Islamist satellite networks, speaking in an interview from an office in the Emirates. “We are in a state of war and this is no time for compromise.”

Fighters and tribes who fought one another during the uprising against Colonel Qaddafi are now coming together on the same side of the new fight, especially with the Zintanis against the Islamists. Some former Qaddafi officers who had fled Libya are even coming back to take up arms again.

“It is not pro- or anti-Qaddafi any more — it is about Libya,” said a former Qaddafi officer in a military uniform

Beneath the battle against “extremists,” he said, was an even deeper, ethnic struggle: the tribes of Arab descent, like the Zintanis, against those of Berber, Circassian or Turkish ancestry, like the Misuratis. “The victory will be for the Arab tribes,”

US wants Bashar al-Assad out of power, and is pushing for the transitional government called for in the Geneva communique.

President Barack Obama sought Congressional support for military action but postponed the vote - which was not certain to pass - when Syria indicated it would surrender its chemical stockpile

United States has been one of the most prominent advocates of firm action against the Syrian government, which it has accused of using chemical weapons and other atrocities.

It is backing Syria's "moderate opposition" with "non-lethal" assistance, including communications equipment, generators, and office supplies - but is also believed to be supplying light weapon

Russia is one of Mr Assad's most important international backers and has warned the US and its allies against taking one-sided action against Syria

Russia was key to Syria agreeing to give up chemical weapons, and backs the Geneva Communique. But it has repeatedly said Syria's future should be decided by Syrians and blocked anti-Assad resolutions at the UN Security Council. It continues to supply Syria with arms, including missile systems and aircraft

Britain has been a big critic of the Assad government and signed a statement in 2013 calling for a "strong international respons

supported military action but had to rule out Britain's involvement when he failed to secure the backing of parliament in August 2013.

UK, along with France, successfully lobbied for the EU's arms embargo to be lifted so as to allow further supplies to Syrian rebels

France has been among the most hawkish Western countries and was the first to stop recognising the Syrian government and deal with the main opposition coalition instead.

France up to join US military action until plans were put on hold. The president acknowledged that France could not, and would not, act on its own

China has joined Russia in blocking resolutions critical of Syria at the UN Security Council. It has criticised the prospect of strikes against Syria, insisting any military action without UN approval would be illegal.

Turkish government has been one of the most vocal critics of Syrian President Assad since early on in the uprising and signalled its willingness to join international action even without UN approval

Saudi Arabia has been a rival of the Syrian government for years. It has been particularly active in pushing for action against Mr Assad, and called for "all legal means possible" to be used to stop the bloodshed

Qatar is thought to be one of the main suppliers of weapons to Syrian rebels and says outside military intervention has become a necessity to protect the Syrian people.

ebanon there is deep division between supporters and opponents of President Assad. The country has suffered from an overspill of violence, including bomb attacks, as well as a huge flood of refugees. It has said it thinks military intervention might make the situation worse.

Jordan has also received hundreds of thousands of refugees and has called for a political solution to the conflic

Iran has been Syria's main backer in the region since well before the current conflict.

Iran has warned that any foreign intervention risks sparking a regional war.

Israel regards President Assad as an enemy, but has refrained from publicly backing military action against him. It fears its backing could alienate the Arab world,