Fearing domestic protest, Libya's government implemented preventative measures, reducing food prices, purging the army leadership of potential defectors and releasing several Islamist prisoners. They proved ineffective, and on 17 February 2011, major protests broke out against Gaddafi's government. Unlike Tunisia or Egypt, Libya was largely religiously homogeneous and had no strong Islamist movement, but there was widespread dissatisfaction with the corruption and entrenched systems of patronage, while unemployment had reached around 30%.
Accusing the rebels of being "drugged" and linked to al-Qaeda, Gaddafi proclaimed that he would die a martyr rather than leave Libya. As he announced that the rebels would be "hunted down street by street, house by house and wardrobe by wardrobe", the army opened fire on protests in Benghazi, killing hundreds. Shocked at the government's response, a number of senior politicians resigned or defected to the protesters' side. The uprising spread quickly through Libya's less economically developed eastern half. By February's end, eastern cities like Benghazi, Misrata, al-Bayda and Tobruk were controlled by rebels, and the Benghazi-based National Transitional Council (NTC) had been founded to represent them.
In the conflict's early months it appeared that Gaddafi's government – with its greater firepower – would be victorious. Both sides disregarded the laws of war, committing human rights abuses, including arbitrary arrests, torture, extrajudicial executions and revenge attacks. On 26 February the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 1970, suspending Libya from the UN Human Rights Council, implementing sanctions and calling for an International Criminal Court (ICC) investigation into the killing of unarmed civilians.
In March, the Security Council declared a no fly zone to protect the civilian population from aerial bombardment, calling on foreign nations to enforce it; it also specifically prohibited foreign occupation. Ignoring this, Qatar sent hundreds of troops to support the dissidents, and along with France and the United Arab Emirates provided the NTC with weaponry and training.
A week after the implementation of the no-fly zone, NATO announced that it would be enforced. On 30 April a NATO airstrike killed Gaddafi's sixth son and three of his grandsons in Tripoli, though Gaddafi and his wife were unharmed. Western officials remained divided over whether Gaddafi was a legitimate military target under the U.N. Security Council resolution. U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said that NATO was "not targeting Gaddafi specifically" but that his command-and-control facilities were legitimate targets—including a facility inside his sprawling Tripoli compound that was hit with airstrikes on 25 April.
Following the 2011 revolution in Tunisia and the civil war in Libya, the Italian island of Lampedusa saw a boom in illegal immigration from those countries. In February, Italian Foreign Minister Frattini expressed his concerns that the amount of Libyan refugees trying to reach Italy might reach between 200,000 and 300,000 people. More than 45,000 boat people arrived on Lampedusa in the first five months of 2011.
It has always been my contention that the US was pressured into the intervention in Libya by the Europeans for two reasons: the oil interests and the flood of refugees streaming into Italy and elsewhere. The civil war in Libya was well underway prior to the UN and NATO's involvement. There is no doubt that the disintegration of Libya to this day has caused a continuous stream of refugees into Italy. And the refugees are coming not only from Libya but sub-Saharan Africa.
Obama's leading from behind destabilized Libya. The question is whether Gaddafi could have survived if NATO and the UN had not intervened. And if he did, wouldn't the flood of refugees have still continued?
Re Iran, there has been a steady flow of Iranians out of Iran, especially the educated ones. The fertility rate in Iran is 1.83 children born/woman (2015 est.), below the replacement level of 2.1.
The net migration level is minus 0.08 compared to plus 2.45 for the US. When you look at the number of migrants per 1,000 it is readily apparent that the countries bordering the various conflicts or using guest workers have the greatest number of migrants. Net migration rate compares the difference between the number of persons entering and leaving a country during the year per 1,000 persons (based on midyear population). The top ten:
1. Lebanon -- 83.82
2. Qatar -- 27.35
3. Zimbabwe -- 21.78
4. British Virgin Islands -- 17.69
5. Jordan -- 17.22
6. Libya -- 16.01
7. Cayman Islands -- 14.71
8. Singapore -- 14.55
9. Bahrain -- 13.60
10. UAE -- 13.58