Civilian accounts of life in Libya during the war

[Turbulent98]

Are there any published accounts written by members of the civilian population of Libya during the war time? I would be interested to know how the war against the convoys affected the food supply and also how the arrival of huge amounts of fighting men affected daily life.I believe that a lot of Italian citizens were evacuated back to Italy . I would also be interested to know how supportive the citizens were of the war.

 

[jwsleser]

About a month ago I ran across a book written by a doctor in Libya during my research. Unfortunately I can't remember the title nor the search terms I was using at the time. I sense that any civilian accounts are likely found as a part of a book covering an individual's life rather than a standard alone work focused on Libya. But I am very willing to be proven wrong.

Pista! Jeff

 

[Macchi202]

Are there any published accounts written by members of the civilian population of Libya during the war time? I would be interested to know how the war against the convoys affected the food supply and also how the arrival of huge amounts of fighting men affected daily life.I believe that a lot of Italian citizens were evacuated back to Italy . I would also be interested to know how supportive the citizens were of the war.

This is a most excellent question, I was wondering the same thing myself.

 

[Andreas]

There are official Italian reports on the situation of Libyan civilians. Regardless of whatever rosy picture they give, the short answer is, grim.

The RAF bombarded population centers with not insubstantial civilian casualties (absolute numbers are low by comparison to the UK or Germany, but so were the absolute population numbers - the Italian authorities tracked dead by race, BTW). When locations changed hands the Libyan Arabs went and murdered/raped/pillaged the colonizers, returning the favor of Graziani's genocidal campaign against the Senussia. Jews ended up in Giado concentration camp from 1942 onwards. Retaliatory killings saw in some cases apparently hundreds of Arabs shot. Civilians lost their homes and livelihoods (e.g. anyone living in Tobruk, or Bardia, colonists in Cyrenaica).

None of the campaign was pretty in social terms, and the idea that the desert war was somehow clean and didn't see civilians harmed (which originated in war time) is but a joke. Libya was a place that had been brutalized by the Italian colonization and terror warfare against the native population. The desert war was ladled on top of that.

Missing: a social history of the war in North Africa

Background The war in North Africa is often seen as having taken place on the ‘perfect battlefield’. Space for maneuver, no civilians or settlements to get in the way. Histories of the war conseque…

rommelsriposte.com

https://www.jstor.org/stable/26416470

https://www.jstor.org/stable/2562055

All the best

Andreas

 

[Bry]

The actual number of Jews liberated at Giado is of some interest to me.Number of inmates has variously been listed as between 2500 and 3500 iirc.Fairly certain only the very young were liberated there.