Dear readers,
We would like to thank you all for your tremendous support throughout an unbelievable year in Libya and in our lives. When we first started feb17.info we set out with the goal to make the Libyan people’s voices heard during their fight for freedom, to gain worldwide support, to expose the ruthlessness of the Gaddafi regime, and to show the world the truth about the Libyan revolution.
We did not know if anyone would listen or care about our cause. It was difficult to predict whether it would reach one person or one thousand people. We also did not know how long the fight would last, but that all did not matter. As long as one person was hearing the truth and was able to help make a difference, it would be worth it.
A year later we are blessed to look back on it and to have been a part of history. After millions of visits to the site and support and money raised to aid Libya, we believe that we have accomplished our goal.
It comes with a heavy heart that we announce that this is the end of the road for feb17.info. We are sad to see it end, but Libya is turning a page in its history, and so are we. It is time to move beyond the computer screen and start building our country in other ways. The site will remain a historical archive of the revolution. It is a piece of history that belongs to Libya and the world.
Many of you had asked us to reveal who we are, and we considered your request with great thought. We never hid our identities for safety purposes, as we all had nothing to fear while our brothers and sisters in Libya courageously risked and lost their lives. We did so because this was bigger than just a few people. It was about all the brave people that were behind the revolution that made their story worth telling – the shopkeepers and students who defended their cities, the mothers who supported them and endured the pain of losing their children, the journalists and aid workers who came to our assistance. It was our obligation and honor to do what we could for Libya and mankind. That requires no recognition.
You all made our experience on Feb17.info worthwhile and without all of your help and support it wouldn’t have had the effect that it did. We shared in the tears and the pain throughout the difficult road, and in the laughter and celebrations of a joyous, new beginning. Thank you for allowing us to show you who Libyans truly are. We hope you continue your support as Libya rebuilds and you all one day get the chance to see the beautiful land and its people.
God bless and long live Free Libya
- The team at Feb17.info
Good luck for new future in Libya.
Beautifully said. Your work sustained many who clamored for critical information about their country and loved ones. I salute you for all you did and thank you for the many hours it must have taken – a labor of love most certainly. And I appreciate the timeliness of your appearance last year and again now as indeed Libya needs you more on the ground than in the ether. I wish you good fortune as you move forward.
Well said guys, I have followed you through all the ups and downs of the Libya campaign from the amazing beginnings in Benghazi through the French intervention stopping the advance into Benghazi through to the finale in Tripoli. What a journey and thanks for the info you gave along the way. Well done guys
You know, before feb.17 Libya to me was like “never ever visit” place, now it’s upgraded to “why not someday soon”.
Thank you for all you did, you brought much information to the world. I was an avid follower of your website. Many thanks again, Feb17 will be remembered always. I wish you well in all that you do.
You did a great work and many of us will miss you. You were our eyes, ears, voices…. thanks to you we could know what is happening there, in our friends country… We could be beside them; we could pray, cry, hope.. with them , for them…. we enjoyed every victory together…. I’m sure, this difficult year, marked many who have been with you in this virtual fight , made them to discover how Libyans really are, how they lived, what they faced in 42 years, what they want and hope from the future… Thank you for each hour of day or night that you spent here, letting us to know the truth about the uprising. May Allah bless you, keep you always safe and all you’re dreams come true.
May Allah bless Free Libya
I’ve followed you for a year now – since I came back from Libya on February 23rd last year. I knew little about Libya. I went on holiday there and got caught up in events. I am planning to return later this year. I can’t tell you how much this site has meant to me over this time. I have followed the ups and downs of the revolution and indeed continue to do so. I have made new friends and learned SO much. Thank you!!!
I can express enough how happy I’m for the Libyan people and their new country. I’m from Peru living in Montreal-Canada and I followed the Libyan revolution in an hourly basis for 8 months. It was incredible and the end was amazing.
Thanks for all the good work. The quality from this place and others was outstanding. I dream on visiting Libya one day in the near future and meeting the fine people that live there.
I can only echo what has already been said: you provided a very valuable and much appreciated service to the many people around the world who were riveted by events in Libya. Sincere thanks, and congratulations on a job really well done. I suspect many of us will continue to follow events in Libya for years to come, with the hope that we will get to visit it soon.
Best wishes to the team at Feb17.info.
Thank YOU for all that you have done keeping us connected and updated. A sincere deep heartfelt thank you and congratulations on a job very really well done….May Allah bless you, keep you always safe and may Allah bless Free Libya and her people today and always.
Wishing you all the best Feb17.info.
You did a really good job, and you did the revolution proud. I hope that (as I am sure you will) your future endeavors will make the new Libya proud. Good luck! Well done! I hope that one day I can visit Libya.
goodluck and godspeed
Job well done!
Congratulations for a great job on Libya’s journey towards freedom.
The Libya Revolution shall live always in our hearts and minds.
All moments in the past, present and future exist always.
…
Hello. Farewell. Hello. Farewell.
Eternally connected, eternally embracing.
Hello. Farewell.
Bless you for all the work you have done to liberate Libya.
I have so appreciated your work in spreading the news of the Libyan revolution to the outside world, and support your choice in devoting your energies now to work within Libya.
You did a great job, beginning to end.
The Syrian people are currently going through exactly what we went through and they deserve to be in our prayers too. The makers of this site have made a very similar site dedicated to keeping everyone up to date with what is going on there: http://www.mar15.info
Great job with feb17, and I hope the Syrians witness Bashar’s end as vividly as we did Gadhafi’s. Words cannot describe how satisfying that was….
My Libyan friends ! I have read this website over the last year, nearly day by day. This website has done a good job, and you, who made it, are exellent. I appreciate your work. I nearly cried when I passed the Libyan Embassy in Vietnam and I saw the new Libya’s red-black-green flag waving in the sky, on some day of September last year. Many works to do for a new Libya. But I believe Libyan people will work well. .. Your friend from Vietnam.
Thanks to you and your wife for creating this website.
I love Libya and all those tough rebels who defeated Kaddafi to death.
Make sure that Libya’s wealth is spread out fairly. It doesn’t look like that
is going to be the case.
I know all of you Libyan will be watchful of your money.
Best Wishes.
Love.
Dr. Alfredo A Atwater.
Join the Mar15.info Syrian revolution website. I’m the only one posting my messages there. By the way today is their anniversary.
The Arab Uprise is moving on.
The war against Kaddafi is over but Libya is on the verge of being divided and I would like to know if any of you know of any other Libyan news website that has not quit.
Maybe you know James.
Here is one:
http://tweepforum.ly/
Greak work, all of you.
Well done to you! I will miss your site in the mornings.
For anyone wanting a decent site:
http://newsblogged.com/libya-latest-news-real-time-updates
Bye
Thank you! Thank you for everything you have done for us, your readers, the Libyans, and the revolution. You really have changed the way I think about Libyans and even about the Arab spring in general, to the better, might I add. :)
CELEBRATION!
A HAPPY ENDING.
Abdullah al-Senoussi was arrested today in Mauritania!
This time it’s True!
They got him!!!!!
He will be extradited! Three countries are lining up for him.
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/1147961–ex-libyan-intelligence-chief-for-gadhafi-regime-arrested?bn=1
A grand note to close this chapter of Libyan History.
Let all free peoples rejoice.
Fredy –
Go to http://www.shabablibya.org/ and you can get lots of links to other sites and talk to Libyan people and expats from following Libyan Youth Movement on facebook.
Hang in there – Libya will weather the storm. .
thank you for so much info during this past year. I hope one day soon the new airport terminal will be completed and open for service because the people of Benghazi deserve such a nice facility
Thanks James,Adam and Nandra for your links.
Indeed Al Senussi was arrested in Mauritania . Let’s hope he gets deported to Libya.
Thank You. I would like to ask from all of you, to please support The Syrian Revolution at Mar15.info. I have been the only one placing comments for weeks.
We should let those Syrian Rebel Fighters know that they are not alone.
Today Saudi Arabia announced they are sending arms to Jordan to support the Syrian revolution. It’s been just two months they are fighting back with arms. They’re losing many people but they don’t stop revolting and defending their positions.
Your support is important.
Thanks again buddies for your response.
Fredy
Thanks so much for your coverage. I have followed this site for much of the last year. My father, a Libyan national, directed me to Feb 17 and it was very educational throughout the crisis. He has been exiled in the US for 30 years and it has been an incredible year for all of us, here in the states and in Libya. His perspective on the remarkable events: http://tropicsofmeta.wordpress.com/2011/09/13/another-look-at-the-fall-of-tripoli/
So many posts on here and I couldn’t find a like button!
Thank you for all the information you provided in my hours, days, weeks, months of desperate need. I do hope the site will stay up for the wealth of information.
Before the uprising, Libya wasn’t on my list of must visit places. Since the uprising it’s gone right to the top. Though Libya has many glitche’s to work out, I have faith.
Thank you.
Thank you very much for all the info.
And all my best wishes for your future in a new Libya.
HUG*
I’d like to add my thanks … February 17th has carried some great articles during the year just past as well as informative, up-to-date news.
Dear – “The team at Feb17.info”,
I appreciate your great thought behind whether or not to reveal yourself, however, I find it contradictive and irrational that you play a part in Libya’s transition to a free media and an open transparent democracy…if as you say in your farewell letter its “bigger than just a few people” and its about the “brave people”, surely you are part of these few brave and you should hold your head up high for your role. Nevertheless, I appreciate your work and effort but maybe we also have to go through such great thought before simply accepting your concealed identity.
Regards,
Libyan Revolutionary
“regards”?
After that BS?
What’s it to you anyway who they are anyway, you got an assassination squad going?
You get what you earned, you earned nothing so get lost.
Jerk!
Thank you for all your work over the last year, it has been much appreciated.
Good Luck! I’m confident that Libya has a bright new future :)
feb17th info, I will never forget you! I followed you for weeks and months ; my heart was battling when seeing and reading the stories and the braveness of Libyan rebels.
Thank you and good continuation to all of you. Sooner or later, freedom shall rise over Libya and world!
from France – Khemais
We want a special invitation to Libya. We want to feel you love us as much as we love you. I feel used and dumped.
I feel like a Nafussa mountain fighter. Ignored.
Hey Fredy!
You sound like you got Post-Revolution Depression Blues. PTSD letdown after high excitement and scarred by so many tragedies.
..
You need a rest cure. Take break , relax in coffee shops , go bowling, go to beach. Next year go to Nafusa, buy ticket. Go to Tunisia and take bus to Tripoli.
..
Life is JOY , all Libya won – they got them all , all the big bad guys one by one.
..
Take relax cure long long time. Life is Joy, life is only once, don’t miss it.
Pingback: NATO and Libya « Mariah | LunaDeAzahar
Members of my family including myself have followed your updates during the uprising. We are eternally greatful for the service you’ve done . And, by the way, you do not have to reveal your identities to anyone. What matters most is you set out to do a job and you’ve done it!
Thank you, and good luck to you all.
Want to thank you for having helped highlight the voice of our people, for all the great work and effort you put. You all are amazing and Libyans like you and others make me very proud to call myself a Libyan -so THANK YOU.
Your right now is the hard part..building our country – so I send you a pray of hope, courage, strength and much patience.. its a long road ahead. .but together we can help build our country.
Best
Sara M
HI JAMES :
DO YOU KNOW OF ANOTHER SYRIAN NEWS FORUM BESIDES MAR15.INFO ?
THANKS
FREDY
funny cia bots.
Oh that’s too bad about you closing the website …. I started coming here once Al-Jazeera stopped updating its “Libya Live Blog” (right after “Jirddafi” died). Your site was the best place to get news on the happenings in Libya. Thank you soooo much for all your hard work! I’m sure God will reward you for all you’ve done. Best of luck with rebuilding Libya, and thanks again!
To the feb17.info team,
Thank you *so* much for all your work during Libya’s year of revolution, during which you did such an excellent job of posting news out of Libya for your English-speaking friends. I didn’t know a lot about Libya before, but I found myself checking your website every day, and I cheered your victories and grieved for the setbacks and losses. Through your work, I have come to know Libya better, and hope to visit some day, to see your country and to meet the courageous Libyan people.
Thank you also for your post with links to other reliable sources of news about Libya. The work of re-building a civil society is long and hard, but it isn’t as flashy as armed conflict and so doesn’t receive nearly as much reporting in the world media. Now I can look forward to following Libya’s progress through these other sites.
God bless all of you who bravely reported throughout the revolution, often at risk to your own lives. And God bless the new work that you will be (are now) doing, to bring forth the kind of society you have dreamed about. I will be cheering you on from a distance!
Pingback: NATO and Libya « Mariah'Blog
There’s only one word that comes into my mind and that is – AMAZING!
I can never forget the courage I have witnessed on the videos uploaded and articles I have read during Libya’s fight for freedom – I’m thankful for these amazing sites that worked tirelessly to inform people from all over the world.
I am deeply saddened for the lost of many (such as ‘Mo’ Nabbous) but their deaths were not in vain and their memory forever cherished by their Libyan countrymen.
Thank you for your amazing site and I hope that someday I will be able to visit Libya and meet some of these courageous people – wishing you all a better & brighter future :)
Hello. I am conducting an academic research study, and would love to interview you about this website. As you can see from my email, I am affiliated with an accredited university in the US, and the protection of your identity would be guaranteed. Please send me an email if you are interested. Your participation would be invaluable.
Wish you all the best & hopefully you will continue your effort to bring your country on the track of prosperity that faded during long period of depose leadership . You are so rich in natural resources . Just well planed implement & patriotic feeling & moreover closing the gap among your tribe conflict . These are the prime condition that you have to negotiate with . I am very optimistic that within the short period of time your country will become richest country within the Muslim world as well a country of front liner country in modern world . One thing you can add in country’s sport ! That is introducing Cricket in your sport . This could bring your country a new dimension in that part of world .
May Libya become a black country.
Soon all Libyan rats will be deported from Libya!
Gheddafi’s dream come true!
“I would like Libya to become a black country”.
Moammar Gheddafi
Mohammad.