CAIRO -- Twice in the past seven days, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates have secretly teamed to launch airstrikes against Islamist-allied militias battling for control of Tripoli, the capital of Libya, four senior U.S. officials said, in a major escalation between the supporters and opponents of political Islam.
The United States, the officials said, was caught by surprise: Egypt and the Emirates, both close allies and military partners, allegedly have acted without informing Washington or seeking its consent, leaving the Obama administration on the sidelines.
Egyptian officials explicitly denied the operation to U.S. diplomats, the officials said.
Meanwhile, Libya's former parliament, dominated by Islamist lawmakers, reconvened Monday and voted to disband the country's current interim government, defying voters who elected its opponents to take over.
The power grab highlights the lawlessness that has swept Libya since rebels overthrew dictator Moammar Gadhafi in 2011 and later formed powerful militias that successive governments have been unable to tame. It also leaves troubled Libya with two governments and two parliaments, deepening divisions and escalating the political struggle that's torn the country apart.
The Islamist-led past parliament voted unanimously to appoint a new "national salvation government" headed by Omar al-Hassi, a university professor.
Libya's newly elected parliament meanwhile continues to meet in the eastern city of Tobruk, far from the militia violence. Those lawmakers have branded Islamist militias as terrorists, sacked the country's chief of staff over his alleged links to Islamists and named a new one who vowed Monday to wage war against "terrorists."
Libya's interim government is also unable to return to the capital and has been holding its meetings in the eastern city of Bayda. It sent its foreign minister to Egypt to meet officials from neighboring countries to discuss ways to stop the spiraling violence.
The meeting ended with calls for disarming the militias and opposition to outside military intervention in Libya's affairs. That appears to be an attempt to mute those accusations that Libya's neighbors, including Egypt, played a role in recent airstrikes.
Egypt's Foreign Minister Sameh Shukri warned the gathering that the situation in Libya threatens the entire region and other parts of the world.
"The developments in Libya have left an impact we have felt on the security of neighboring countries, with the presence and movement of extremist and terrorist groups whose activists are not only limited to the Libyan territories but also spill over to neighboring countries," he said.
Since the military ouster of the Islamist president in Egypt one year ago, the new Egyptian government, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have formed a bloc exerting influence in countries around the region to roll back what they see as a competing threat from Islamists. Arrayed against them are the Islamist movements, including the Muslim Brotherhood, backed by friendly governments in Turkey and Qatar, that sprang forward amid the Arab Spring revolts.
Libya is the latest and hottest battleground. Several officials said that U.S. diplomats were fuming about the airstrikes, believing they could further inflame the Libyan conflict at a time when the United Nations and Western powers are seeking a peaceful resolution.
"We don't see this as constructive at all," said one senior U.S. official.
Officials said the government of Qatar has already provided weapons and support to the Islamist aligned forces inside Libya, so the new strikes represent a shift from proxy wars -- where regional powers play out their agendas through local allies -- to direct involvement.
The strikes have also proved counterproductive so far: The Islamist militias fighting for control of Tripoli successfully seized its airport the night after they were hit with the second round of strikes.
Also Monday, retaliatory attacks swept Tripoli, targeting houses and buildings of Islamist rivals, including Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thinni. He accused Islamists of attacking his house in Tripoli, then torching and looting it.
U.S. officials said Egypt had provided bases for the launch of the strikes. President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi of Egypt and other officials have issued vigorous but carefully worded public statements denying any direct involvement inside Libya by Egyptian forces.
The officials said that UAE -- believed to have one of the most effective air forces in the region, thanks to U.S. aid and training -- provided the pilots, warplanes and aerial refueling planes necessary for the fighters to bomb Tripoli out of bases in Egypt.
UAE has not commented directly on the strikes. But Monday an Emirati state newspaper printed a statement from Anwar Gargash, minister of state for foreign affairs, calling questions about an Emirati role "an escape" from the recent election that he suggested showed a desire for "stability" and a rejection of the Islamists. The allegations about the UAE role, he said, came from a group who "wanted to use the cloak of religion to achieve its political objectives," and "the people discovered its lies and failures."
The first strikes occurred before dawn a week ago, hitting positions in Tripoli controlled by Islamist-friendly militias, blowing up a small weapons depot, and killing six people.
A second set of airstrikes took place south of the city early Saturday, hitting rocket launchers, military vehicles and a warehouse all controlled by Islamist-allied militia.
Responsibility for the airstrikes was initially a mystery. After the first set, several U.S. officials initially said that signs pointed to the United Arab Emirates, but some said that the evidence was not conclusive.
On Monday, however, U.S. officials said that the second set of strikes had provided enough evidence to conclude that the Emirates were responsible.
The officials said this was not the first time that the Egyptians and Emirates had teamed up to strike against Islamist targets inside Libya. In recent months, a special forces team operating out of Egypt but possibly composed primarily of Emirates personnel had also successfully destroyed an Islamist camp in eastern Libya without detection.
Information for this article was contributed by David D. Kirkpatrick and Eric Schmitt of The New York Times and by Maggie Michael of The Associated Press.
A Section on 08/26/2014