There are widespread rumours that are circulating across Benghazi in Libya, following reports that the senior commander of the notorious 20/20 Battalion, Ali Al-Mashai, has been seriously injured in a car accident.
Al-Mashai serves under the Tariq Bin Ziyad Brigade, one of the most powerful and influential Twenty-Twenty units operating under the command of Saddam Khalifa Haftar in the Eastern Region of Libya.
Al-Mashai has long been viewed as a shadow figure within the military structure, often referred to as a ‘Trojan horse’ due to his deep and murky involvement in covert operations across the Eastern and Southern regions.
The battalion commander is widely believed to be responsible for carrying out numerous controversial and “dirty” missions on behalf of the military’s inner circle.
And his road accident comes just days after the 20/20 Battalion was embroiled in yet another scandal.
According to reliable sources, a senior commander from the battalion reportedly shot an ordinary civilian, a person known as Murad Mansour Al-Warfali, during a land dispute.
Initial outrage spread over the use of force, however, it was later clarified by the army that Al-Warfali was allegedly illegally occupying the land and had opened fire on the unit with unauthorized weapons.
In response, the armed forces shot him in the leg and left the scene.
Al-Warfali later died of his injuries at the hospital.
The Tarek Ben Ziyad Brigade and Brigade 20/20 of the Libyan Arab Armed Forces (LAAF), the armed group are controlling eastern and much of southern Libya, they forcibly evicted on short notice more than 20,000 residents of Benghazi and forced them to rescind their property or ownership documents without an appropriate compensation scheme for residents.