Libyan people

Libyan people

Anas Notables: Muammar Gaddafi • Idris of Libya •  • Claudio Gentile •  • Anas al-Liby • Mustafa Ben Halim • Anna eshoo • Yusuf Borahil Almsmare •
Regions with significant populations
Libya	7,000,000
Italy	150,000
Tunisia	120,000
Israel	120,000
Greece	60,000
United States	20,000
Languages
Arab, Greek, Berber(native) and Italian
Religion
Sunni Islam, Jews, Roman Catholic, Atheism, amd Berber
Related ethnic groups
Arab, Berber

The Libyan are people from Libya, a country located in North Africa. The Libyan population is a mixture of the ancient Berbers and Greek who inhabited the region and the Arabs who conquered and emigrated to Libya since the seventeenth century after Christ. Their culture is basically a Muslim, but still retains the Berber culture in certain parts of the country, representing, according some Statistics over 10% of the total population. Although, according to DNA studies, most of the Libyan population descended from Berbers. The population has also had significant growth since the early twentieth century, rising from hundreds of thousands of residents to more than 4,000,000 today.

History

Main article: History of Libya

At various times in its history Libya was occupied by Carthage, Rome, Arabia,Egypt, and Spain. The occupied of Libya by Carthage was since the VIII BC a.C. More late, in the VII century, was conquered by Arabia. The Ottoman Empire conquered Libya in 1551 and mained in his power until 1911. So, in the 18th cent. was a important place for the arrived of pirates who was his base. This year, the country was conquered pr Italy. In the Second World War was one of the main battlegrounds of North Africa. During the war, the territory was an Anglo-French military Government until it was defeated. His government, Axis Were Defeated In This Territory in 1943. In 1951 the country get the independent and was governed by with King Idris. In 1969 a coup made by Muammar Gaddafi caused the defeat. Gaddafi established an anti-Western dictatorship. So, in 1970, British and American bases were closed. Gaddafi used oil from Libya to improve the living conditions of the population and to assist Palestinian guerrillas in their fight against the Israelis. In 1979 Libya fight in Uganda topreserve the government of Idi Amin in this country, and in 1981 fight into Chad, but his army left the country in that year. Libya had occupied the Aozou Strip, however, In 1990 the International Court of Justice submitted the case and allowed the full recuperation of territory by Chad. In 1992 the UN Security Council accused Libya of supporting state terrorism and prohibited air flights and arms sales if they not were turned over to United States the suspects in the Lockerbie and another airplane bombing to the U.S., Britain, and France. Therefore, In Apr. 1999, Libya handed over the suspects of Lockerbie to the UN. This, lifted its sanctions. More late, in December 2003, Gaddafi renounced the production and use of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons after negotiations with the United States and Great Britain, with to unannounced international inspections. However, in 2004, Libya acknowledged that it had produced chemical weapons., that made the United States lifted most sanctions. However, Libya continued to be recognized as a terrorist until 2011, when war broke out between the Libyans and Gaddafi, culminating in the murder of Gaddafi. In September, 2008, Italy and Libya signed a memorandum by which Italy would pay $5 billion during 20 years to compensate Libya for its dominion over this country for 30 years.

Demography

Genetics and population

Most of the people of Libya are Arabs according to the census conducted in the 2.000s. However, a genetic analysis made in recent years has confirmed that over 90% of the Arabs Libya are, in fact, of Berbers descends. Thus, the Arab culture was adopted by his ancestors, through the submission of this people, as happened in most of northern Africa. This indicates that most Libyans (North Africans in the general) are more racially linked with the Mediterranean peoples of southern Europe that with the peoples of the Arabian Peninsula. On the other hand, in terms of the Libyan population, of more than 6000.000 people that are in this country, more than a million of them are immigrants. People who still own Berber culture are approximately, between 10% and 23% of the population. If they reach the 17% the country's population, Berbers could reach one million people. However, it is very difficult to know the number of people with exactly that have this culture, as the Tuareg, many of whom live in Libya, are nomadic and therefore are not included completely in any census. The Libyan population has grown sharply since after 1969. Thus, they were only 523.176 people in 1911, 2 millions in 1968, and 5,000,000 in since 1969. That population growth is due in large part to King Idris and Gaddafi granted citizenship to many immigrants Tunisians, Egyptians and other immigrants. Many of inmigrants workers came to Libya since 1969, from Tunisia (construction workers and labourers), Egypt (teachers and labourers), Palestine (teachers), Yugoslavia and Bulgaria (doctors and nurses). More late, since in the 1990s, after Libya's inter to Pan-African unity and get a common currency, come one million workers, mainly from other neighbouring African countries like Sudan, Niger, Chad and Mali. Most people live in Libya, Tripoli, the capital of the country. The Berber languages is still spoken by some pastoral groups in the south, such as the Tuareg.

Language

Main article: Demographics of Libya

The official language of Libya is Standard Arabic. However, the prevalent spoken language is Libyan Arabic. This language is spoken by about 6 million Libyans, besides other Arabic dialects (partly spoken by immigrant workers, partly by native populations), viz. Egyptian Arabic, Moroccan Arabic, Sudanese Arabic, Tunisian Arabic, Ta'izzi-Adeni Arabic, South Levantine Arabic and Hassaniyya Arabic, amounting to a total number of first-language Arabic speakers of about 95% of total population.

SIL Ethnologue indigenous minority languages in Libya:

• Berber languages: ca. 305,000 speakers
  • Nafusi: 184,000 (2006)
  • Tamahaq: 47,000 (2006)
  • Ghadamès: 30,000 (2006)
  • Sawknah: 5,600 (2006)
  • Awjilah: 3,000 (2000)
• Domari: ca. 33,000 speakers (2006)
• Tedaga: 2,000

Non-Arabic languages spoken by temporary foreign workers include (with more than 10,000 speakers each): Punjabi, Urdu, Mandarin, Cantonese, Korean, Sinhala, Bengal, Tamil, Tagalog, French, Italian, Ukrainian, Serbian, English.

Culture

Cousine and Music

Main article: Culture of Libya

Libyan cuisine is heavily influenced by the traditions of the Mediterranean (especially Italian) and North Africa. Notable dishes Sharba Libiya or Libyan soup (thick highly-spiced soup).Bazeen is perhaps the most remarkable Libyan food. It is made of a mixture of mainly barley flour, with a little plain flour. Libyan Arabs, often player instruments as the zokra (a bagpipe), flute (made of bamboo), tambourine, oud (a fretless lute) and darbuka, a goblet drum held sideways and played with the fingers. The Bedouin poet-singers also had a great influence on the musical folklore of Libya, standing out the styles huda, the camel driver's song.

Religions

Like that most of North African and general Arabs, almost all Libyans are Sunni Muslim. So, the Berber culture in low and is only formed by to 5% of the population, of the that we speak in the next section.

So, there also a very little Christian groups, but there are some churches. A small Jewish community historically lived in Libya since antiquity. However, all the Jewish from country emigrated to Italy, Israel, or the United States, particularly after anti-Jewish riots in 1967 Six-Day War between Egypt and Israel.

Tribal groups

Libyan society is to a large extent structured along tribal lines, with more than 20 major tribal groups. The Libyan tribes are very important in Libyan society, affecting, among other things, the surname of its inhabitants. So each person's surname derives from the name of the Berber tribe of which came from their ancestors. Is estimated that in Libya, at least about, 140 tribal networks, many of which is subdivided into several clans and groups. However, these groups are not fully documented.

Some ancients tribes Berbers were: Adyrmachidae, Auschisae, Es'bet, Temeh’u, Teh’nu, Rebu, Kehek, KeyKesh, Imukehek, Meshwesh, Macetae, Macatutae, Nasamones, Nitriotae, and Tautamaei.

Currently, the major tribal groups of Libya by region they live are:

• Tripolitania: alawana-Souk El Joma'a, AL-Mahameed, Warfalla, Tarhona, Misurata tribes, Al-Jawary, Siyan Tribe, The Warshfana tribes, Zawia Groups, Ghryan Tribes, AL-Asabea, Al-Fwatir, Awlad Busayf, Zintan, Al-jbalya, Zwara, Alajelat, Al-Nawael tribe, Alalqa tribe, Al-Rijban, al Mashashi, Amaym.
• Cyrenaica: Al-Awagir, Magharba, Al-Abaydat, Drasa, Al-Barasa, Al-Fawakhir, Zuwayya, Majabra, Awama, Minfa, Taraki, alawana, Shwa'ir and in Kufra Zuwayya; Toubou.
• Sirte: Awlad-Suleiman, Qadhadhfa, Magharba, Al-Hosoon, Ferrjan
• Fezzan: Awlad Suleiman, Al-Riyyah, Magarha, Al-Zuwaid, Al-Hutman, Al-Hassawna; Toubou, Tuareg.
• Kufra: Zuwayya; Toubou.