
British special forces have corralled hundreds of Islamic State jihadis in ‘kill boxes’ in the besieged Libyan city of Sirte, but the desperate fanatics are using pregnant women and girls as human shields to prevent them storming the town.

Elite commandos from the SAS and SBS – the Special Boat Service – secretly co-ordinated attacks by land, sea and air to overpower IS fighters, retaking control of a crucial oil port in the terror group’s last bastion in Libya.

The British forces, working jointly with US Navy Seals, deployed drones and high-tech infra-red cameras to locate hundreds of jihadis who have run the city as an extremist caliphate for the past 18 months.

Reports are only now starting to emerge of how, last Saturday, during a surprise assault, the special forces working with the Libyan army, air force and coastguard guided fighter bombers and helicopter gunships on a series of raids that destroyed target buildings where there were clusters of IS militants, driving them into the open.

Russian-made Hind attack helicopters then strafed the jihadis as they made for the harbour. Coastguard vessels blocked any possible escape by sea, and ground troops drove in under sniper fire, building a new frontline with sand berms.

Airborne and land-based equipment managed by remote control had guided in a Mirage fighter jet that dropped two 500lb bombs and two MiGs that dropped up to six bombs.

By the early hours of the following day, the jihadis were cornered in multiple ‘kill boxes’ within an urban area of six square miles.

British and American strategists are now working with Libyan field commanders to determine the next move.

The parts of Sirte still under IS control are the last remaining areas held by the terror group in Libya.

Among the armed IS fighters and snipers positioned on rooftops, the sophisticated spotter cameras used by the SBS could make out the outlines of women and children being held as hostages by the fanatics, presenting the coalition forces with a dilemma.

A senior military adviser who has knowledge of the top-secret operations, said: ‘Storming the kill boxes is a tempting option for the Libyan military forces, who are desperate to get IS out of their country. But there would be risks to families they are holding hostage.

‘If our hands were not tied by UN Security Council sanctions against training and equipping these former militias we would be confident of a speedy victory in the sort of undercover operation we are trained for.

‘Instead, the best option might be to starve them out. We calculate these fighters will run out of ammo, food and water within a month.

‘The worrying risk is that they would use the time to plant landmines and IEDs in buildings and homes, even in piles of rubble. That is the way they operate.’

A nearby power plant that was retaken from IS in recent months is still a no-go area, riddled with booby-trap explosives.

Front line: Libyan fighters and dead jihadis during the battle in Sirte. IS have run the city as an extremist caliphate for the past 18 months

About 100 SBS and US Navy Seals personnel are directing operations from bases in Malta and Cyprus, and from the Libyan city of Misrata, around 150 miles from Sirte.

British reconnaissance teams are also deployed a few miles from Sirte, scanning for IS targets.

During the operation on Saturday, the SBS used state-of-the-art imaging on cameras mounted on airborne drones and land vehicles that enabled them to see accurate details within Sirte.

The heat-seeking equipment provides such detailed images that the special forces were able to make out about 650 men with weapons, and many unarmed people being held hostage. Among them were several pregnant girls.

The British-made equipment used in the operation is the most sophisticated available. The source said it made earlier heat-seeking devices ‘look like Stone Age tools’.

As Libyan Brigade fighters advanced, the resistance from IS fighters was intense. The forces of the UN-backed Libyan Government suffered 35 fatalities and 55 wounded.

Unusually, about 12 IS fighters were captured and are now under interrogation in the holding cells of a military command centre in Misrata, the city two hours away which bred the most effective fighters in the Libyan uprising against Colonel Gaddafi of 2011.

A Libyan intelligence officer who welcomes Western support for the battle of Sirte, said: ‘We value the advice and co-ordination support but we are frustrated that promises of equipment and a joint combat role have not been fulfilled. We hope Britain and America will play a bigger role once our new unity government has proved itself. But our immediate priority is to get Islamic State out of our country.

‘They have imposed terrible suppression on the people of Sirte and we want our city back. With the help of special forces, we have managed to destroy their stranglehold.

During the operation on Saturday, the SBS used state-of-the-art imaging on cameras mounted on airborne drones and land vehicles that enabled them to see accurate details within Sirte (file picture)

‘In one last big move, we should be able to eliminate them altogether.’

Senior Field Commander Ramzi Ali warned that many IS fighters had fled into villages and desert areas around Sirte and were already sending out aggressive signals to show they were not defeated. Last week, there were five suicide bomb attacks – one on a military hospital – in which 18 Libyan fighters were killed.

The commander said: ‘The British special forces have said they will stay till the end and we need their help.’

Panic-stricken civilians who tried to flee the fighting found themselves caught up in crossfire.

A dozen families packed themselves into cars and formed a convoy that spent eight hours avoiding sniper bullets to reach the coastal highway, a journey that normally takes just 15 minutes.

Misrata military forces guided them out and helped to find emergency accommodation once they reached the city, which is three hours’ drive away.

Last night, an exhausted and fearful man named Mustafa, who brought his parents and pregnant wife to safety said: ‘We have been cut off from the world since Islamic State took over Sirte last year and made our lives hellish.

‘We had no idea there was going to be an attack last week. The first we knew was when our windows shattered with the blast from fighter bombers. Then people ran screaming through the streets outside and I saw IS men kicking down doors. I thought we were going to die.’

I saw them [ISIS] shoot my own cousin and hang his body from the steel structure at Zafaran roundabout, a place of murder Mustafa, a former resident of Sirte

Mustafa said terrifying explosions could be heard in the residential area where he had lived all his life with his elderly parents and younger brothers.

‘We wanted IS to be defeated, eliminated,’ he said. ‘But we thought our own lives would end too. We have been through terrible times but that day was the most frightening.

‘We heard the rattle of gunfire from helicopters and shots all over town from snipers who got on our friends’ and neighbours’ rooftops.

‘Many people we know are still there, we can’t help them.’

His wife, who was three months pregnant, lost her baby the day after they fled and spent two days last week in Misrata hospital. ‘It was to be our first child, the pain and misery is terrible,’ Mustafa, 31, said.

He added: ‘My younger brother, who is 22, was kidnapped by IS on August 5 last year.

‘We have done everything possible to find him and he is the only reason we stayed in Sirte. Life became unbearable, with people we know being shot and hanged in the street, and young girls taken from their parents, but my mother was distraught over the loss of my brother Mahmoud and wept every day for him. She didn’t want to leave until we found him.’

The man said that after 25 days of going to an office that IS had declared the police station to ask about his brother, he was told he had been killed because he worked with the Libyan forces.

Mustafa had been a senior civil servant in Misrata until IS fighters closed down his department at gunpoint last March.

He said: ‘I have lived on my savings ever since. I feel I have been losing my mind. I’ve been trying to find my brother, with my mother begging me not to go near IS but saying she will never leave Sirte till he is found.

‘I have sat at home day after day believing we should leave, or stay and die at the hands of these brutes. On Saturday the decision was made for us.

'There was a war going on just above our heads. I looked at my parents and my pregnant wife and I decided we should go. We took nothing, just a few clothes, and I put them all in the car and set off. We had nowhere to go and no money or work. But there were people dead in the street and our neighbours’ homes taken over by terrorists.’

Mustafa is using his car as an unregistered taxi in Misrata to earn money for food.

‘Life is hard but we feel safe here,’ he said. ‘We’re glad our fighters are doing everything to get Sirte back under control but we will never return. How could I live near families whose sons have fought with IS, those butchers? I saw them shoot my own cousin and hang his body from the steel structure at Zafaran roundabout, a place of murder. I had to tell his wife, it was one of the worst days of my life.

‘I pray that the rest of the world will help us find peace again in Libya.’