Libya: Mohammed "Mo" Al Nabbous, founder of Benghazi webcast "Libya Alhurra TV," killed in firefight

Watch live streaming video from libya17feb at livestream.com

Via LibyaFeb17.com and via the Twitter updates from NPR's Andy Carvin, terrible news that the brave citizen journalist Mohammed Al-Nabbous, known to fans as "Mo," was killed last night.

From currently available information, it appears Mo was killed in a firefight, while recording.

Mo created and operated the widely-viewed live video channel Al Hurra TV on Livestream, broadcasting raw footage and commentary from Benghazi, Libya.

Andy Carvin writes:

Mohammad Nabbous was my primary contact in Libya, and the face of Libyan citizen journalism. And now he's dead, killed in a firefight. A few hours ago he went out to record some more audio and was caught in a firefight. [Link]. Audio stops 6:30 into it. For several hours we heard rumors that he had been shot but we didn't want to say anything until we knew for sure. And now I can't stop thinking, what if those French planes began to arrive 12 hours ago. Would Mo be alive now? I just don't know.

Nabbous' wife, speaking on his Livestream channel earlier:

I need everyone to do as much as they can for this cause. They are still shooting. More people will die. Don't let Mo's life go in vain.

Here was one of Mo's early reports.

Here was his last.

Those last two links via Bilal at Al Jazeera, who writes: "Remember Mohammed Nabbous, known to all as Mo. His mission: to get the news about what's happening in #Libya out to the world." Bilal created a tribute to Mo here.

• [emmdeeaych]

  RIP Mr Nabbous. Bravo Sir.

• [Anonymous]

  If the US hadn’t dragged their heels over the ‘no fly zone’, he (and many others) might well still be alive. Britain and France were calling for this a week ago.

  • [Rindan]

    If the US hadn’t dragged their heels over the ‘no fly zone’, he (and many others) might well still be alive. Britain and France were calling for this a week ago.

    Scrw y. The US is the bogyman when they go kick over psychopath dictators like Saddam or the jackass who was running the Taliban, but they are the devil when they don’t launch a military invasion when give two weeks to respond to another psychopath dictator? Europe let the Yugoslavian civil war drag on for a decade and the Arab world let the Lebanon civil war drag on for decades.

    Pissed at how and when the US sends its military? Think they are too slow, too enthusiastic, too unenthusiastic, whatever? Here is an idea. Go bitch and moan to your own government to build a big nasty military to go stomp on people with.

    My heart goes out to the Libyan people, but I want no part in it. If we jump in, people are going to be pissed. If we don’t invade given a week or two’s notice, people are going to be pissed. I personally wish that the US would take its toys, go home, slash military spending so it is as big per capita as say Spain, and call it a day.

    • [wn]

      Y dctfl wrmngrng lttl trd.

      The war against Iraq was started DESPITE ALL EVIDENCE! Instead of a surgical strike to remove the dictator they started a war that has killed hundreds of thousands, literally on a lie.

      The war in Afghanistan was started despite them being mad at a Saudi who they NEVER PROVED was even in Afghanistan at the times in question. They have similarly killed hundreds of thousands.

      So yes, those wars are rightly criticized because the people who started them are intentional cold-blooded murdering bastards who started a war on false pretenses.

      There’s a world of difference between these intentional attacks and functioning as peacekeepers. Your pathetic all-or-none fallacy can’t disguise the difference between peacekeeping (what was needed in Rwanda, and is now needed in Libya, yemen, Bahrain, etc) and wars of aggression under false pretenses (Iraq, Afganistan, Vietnam, etc…)

      I hope we send you to Iraq with Bush, eventually, for the war-crime trials. Your lies are killing people.

    • [Anonymous]

      @ Rindan, you know what Rindan? The US has gotten very rich, and enjoyed a great lifestyle off the backs of the rest of the world. Like us here in Australia you owe. So pay it forward without bitching and moaning yourself, and thank God many times you don’t have the misfortune to live in a repressive regime. Face up to the facts here – like American banking you’ve done another crap, half-assed job, by dithering and prevaricating. You had to be led by the FRENCH and the British. That’s gotta hurt!

      • [Wally Ballou]

        Can’t have it both ways. 95% of the world gets a case of the flaming, shrieking fantods every time the US tries to take out a bad guy. So I can’t blame any American who starts thinking it’s time to take a pass.

        Want to get rid of Khadafy? Go get Hans Blix, and Jimmy Carter, and Ramsey Clark. Give ‘em all M-16s and tell them to have fun.

        • [SeattlePete]

          Sweeet! When did the world become black and white?!? Dammit I missed it! Whatever…I’m just glad I can finally sit back, relax, and get comfortable on my smug rug and watch the world go by.

        • [wn]

          N, y lyng crtn. The world gets pissed every time the USA manufactures some convenient excuse to go to war, despite having continually ignored the suffering until then.

          Saddam’s treatment of the Iraqis, Iranians, Kurds, and Kuwaitis, was fine the USA. He was damned because Bush Jr wanted him dead.

          Bush’s government had plans to invade Iraq since before 9/11 and started trying to implicate Iraq the instant the attack happened – despite good and plentiful intelligence data saying exactly the opposite.

          You’re fine breaking out wholesale murder on false pretenses for oil or imperialism but not helping out the international community when you don’t see a profit.

        • [Wally Ballou]

          You don’t actually know what I think about our other two active wars.

          I was against them both and still am, and caught a shitload of grief from my conservative friends.

          But at least I’m not one of those who is against wars when we have a tongue-tied Texan in the WH, and for them when we have a cool black guy from Harvard sitting there.

• [Anonymous]

  My heart is breaking. I hope he knew his last film was aired on Al Jazeera and Fox News as soon as it was submitted last night. He is a hero of mine and I can’t stop crying right now. I wonder also if he would be alive now had the French been in the air too.

• [Anonymous]

  May you be lifted from you condition and freed to live your life as your hearts’ would will it.

  My thoughts, prayers and condolences go out to you and your families. You inspire me to be a better human-being.

  -
  oS

• [Sapa]

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_MPVc9gwx0

• [Anonymous]

  RIP Mo, you will be remembered forever in the hearts of millions.

• [morristhewise]

  There comes a time for house cleaning and Libya is dirty. Political observers estimate that there are over 100 thousand rabid dirties hiding in Libya. Unless they are flushed out their disease will spread to North Africa. A hygienic leader of Libya is needed, he must use a wide brush with cans of bug spray and clean house.

• [Anonymous]

  You are a hero and a martyar….Viva Los Rebaldes de Libya !

• [Anonymous]

  Freedom isn’t free.

  R.I.P.

• [Anonymous]

  Have you read the interview of an italian journalist with Gaddafi??? That man is completely crazy… You have to know: http://muscvlvs.blogspot.com/2011/03/interview-of-fausto-biloslavo-with.html

• [spincycle]

  Shocked but not surprised. Saddened and sickened.

• [Willie McBride]

  I submitted the news a few minutes ago, I’ve been watching his stream in the last days…

  When the first report came that a friend had told Perditta (Mo’s wife, it seems she’s waiting for their child) that he was injured and she had to go immediately to the hospital I hoped that he would be ok but it was exactly what they said us when my grandmother died, so I was afraid that they just wanted to give her the news in person, and in fact some time later she announced he was dead… RIP, Mo.

• [Anonymous]

  thank you for focusing on libya again, xeni. please keep it up.

  .~.

• [Anonymous]

  So… now Muammar Gaddafi thinks Obama is his son? http://gtcha.me/hJR1ZM

• [mcarrick]

  They will only stop bearing witness when their recording devices are pried from their cold, dead hands. Go free press. RIP “Mo”.

• [Anonymous]

  I think that behind the decision of the French president there are electoral, economic and strategic reasons… This article explains it
  http://muscvlvs.blogspot.com/2011/03/libya-sarkozys-attack-here-is-real.html

• [Anonymous]

  We will not forget you. I cannot imagine what your friends and family are feeling right now. I never knew you but through your bravery, your words and your eyes, I knew Libya, and specifically Benghazi. You were the voice who refused to be silenced and who reported so we could be witnesses to Gaddafi’s atrocities. Words are insufficient to capture truly our gratitude to you and to the ultimate sacrifice you have made in the name of not just journalism, but what is right. Thank you, Mo. I still feel as if someone has kicked me in the stomach. Thank you and rest in peace.