Tripoli is in flames. A large fire that started July 27 during fighting between rival militias on the city's central airport road now engulfs two major fuel tanks and has continued to spread while the body count ticks upward.

Not only are Tripoli's few firefighters, who must brave what is effectively a war zone to do their job, making little progress, but bullets continue to hit the huge storage facility of the Brega Oil and Gas Co. The fires were so large that at their peak they were visible on satellite images.

Aside from the physical danger posed by the fires, the sight of what is Libya's overwhelmingly most important resource billowing into the sky adds to the sting of gasoline prices in the capital, now more than 30 times the standard rate.

The Brega depot is under the control of the most prominent militias from the western city of Zintan. These militias, principally Uthman Mulayqithah's al-Qaqaa and Isam al-Trabulsi's al-Sawaiq, have been fighting Islamist militias from Misrata that first attacked their position at Tripoli airport on July 13. While former Defence Minister Osama al-Juwali is believed to be helping coordinate the Zintani forces, the former parliamentarian Salah Badi is leading the Misratans.