How powerful and dangerous is "IS" in Libya?
Since October 2014 (within a space of only four months), the influence of "IS" has spread from Darna, a city on the north-eastern coast of Libya near the border with Egypt to Sirte, the coastal city which is about 900 km further west. This was the birthplace of al-Gaddafi. Sirte, which is where the massacre of the Egyptian Copts took place, was overrun by Libyan jihadists who had returned from the war in Syria and in Iraq. They received support from other Islamist groups such as Ansar al-Sharia.