Libyan government forces launched a second attack on the western town of Zawiyah today after rebels drove them out in a morning of fierce fighting, while in the east, opponents of Muammar Gadafy pushed towards his home town.
"The fighting has intensified and the tanks are shelling everything on their way. They have shelled houses. Now they are shelling a mosque where hundreds of people are hiding," Abu Akeel, a Zakiyah resident, said. "We can't rescue anyone because the shelling is so heavy," he said.
Another resident in the main square told Reuters news agency by telephone: "The attack has started. I see more than 20 tanks." Gunfire could be heard in the background.
It was the second attempt by Gadafy's forces to win control over the town in a matter of hours. Rebels pushed back an early morning attack in which residents said the government forces had fired high explosive rounds at civilians and dragged people from their homes.
"We captured three APCs, two tanks and one pick-up after an hour and a half of fighting," Youssef Shagan, the rebel force spokesman in the town, 50 kilometres west of the capital, said after the first battle.
People opposed to Gadafy's 41-year rule have been fighting his forces in Zawiyah for more than a week, after rebels took over large parts of eastern Libya in an uprising inspired by the overthrow of veteran rulers in Egypt and Tunisia this year.
Residents said Gadafy forces stormed residential buildings and killed people inside to secure the rooftoops for snipers.
A doctor in Zawiyah told Reuters at least 30 people, mostly civilians, had been killed during the morning clashes today, bringing to 60 the death toll from two days of battles for control of the coastal town.
A reporter for Britain's Sky television said she had seen at eight dead soldiers and five burning armoured vehicles in the central square.
The doctor said Gadafy's tanks had fired at residential buildings and civilian cars trying to flee. "There is a lot of destruction in the city, I look around and all I see is destruction.
Bombed buildings and burning cars everywhere - I cannot even count how many," he said.
Before the latest fighting, the rebels appeared to have half a dozen armoured vehicles, a similar number of anti-aircraft guns and numerous machine guns. One fighter vowed to fight to the death.
"Gadafy will never enter this city. He will never set foot here. The only way for him to enter the city is when we are all dead. He has to kill us all to control the city," the rebel, who gave his name as Ibrahim, said by telephone.
Rebels in eastern Libya said they were pushing further west after driving forces loyal to Gadafy from the oil town of Ras Lanuf yesterday.
Doctors said at least 26 people had died in yesterday's fighting around Ras Lanuf and what rebels said was an attack by Gadafy's forces on an arms store on the edge of the eastern town of Benghazi, where the uprising began in mid-February.
Rebel fighters said they had taken the town of Bin Jawad some 525 kilometres east of Tripoli and were moving on towards Sirte, Gadafy's heavily guarded home town 160 kiloemtres away.
"We're going to Bin Jawad to attack Sirte. Bin Jawad is ours," said Abdul Rahim Massoud, a rebel fighter on one of a column of pick-up trucks on the road to Bin Jawad.
In the town itself, rebels played the pre-Gadafy monarchist national anthem over a loudspeaker. Government fighter jets and a helicopter circled overhead but did not open fire, although the rebels fired at the helicopter with anti-aircraft guns.
The latest fighting suggested front lines between government forces, including militia and mercenaries, and the rebels, who are fighting with everything from captured tanks to sticks and winning support from some police and soldiers along the way, were far from clear and could shift quickly.
Dissident soldiers manned a rebel checkpoint at the entrance to Ras Lanuf and said it was safely in rebel hands.
A day earlier, flashes and thuds had resounded from fighting around the town, 660 kilometres east of Tripoli. Helicopters had strafed positions of rebels, who fired rifles back.
Today the offices of the Harouge Oil Operations, a key oil terminal in the North African Opec member, were abandoned and rebels commandeered vehicles.
Reuters