Benghazi or Bengasi
[key], city (2021 est. pop. 807,000), capital of Benghazi municipality, NE
Libya, the main city of Cyrenaica and a port on the Mediterranean Sea. It is
primarily an administrative and commercial center. Manufactures include
processed food, beverages, textiles, and cement. On the site of Benghazi the
Greeks founded (7th cent. b.c.) the colony of Hesperides, which was
later (3d cent. b.c.) renamed Berenice after the wife of Ptolemy III of Egypt. Under the Romans,
who conquered it in the mid-1st cent. b.c., the city had a large
Jewish colony. In the 5th cent. a.d., the Vandals severely damaged
the city, and in the 7th cent. it was captured by the Arabs. The Ottoman
Turks took the city in the mid-16th cent., and they held it until it was
captured by Italy in 1911. The Italians modernized the city and enlarged its
port. At the start of World War II, Benghazi had about 22,000 Italian
inhabitants, but they were evacuated before the city fell to the British in
late 1942. From 1951 to 1972, Benghazi was the cocapital (with Tripoli) of
Libya. After the fall of Qaddafi, the city gained international
attention when the U.S. Embassy was attacked in 2012 by Islamic militants,
leading to the death of the U.S. Ambassador among others. The city was the
scene of heavy fighting beginning in 2014 as various sides contested for
control; by mid-2016 it was largely controlled by forces aligned with the
Tobruk government. Benghazi is the site of Garyounes Univ., founded in
1955.
The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. Copyright © 2024, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.
See more Encyclopedia articles on: Libyan Political Geography
