A car exploded in the hotel parking lot, although it was unclear whether the cause was a bomb, a rocket-propelled grenade or some kind of missile. Since the 2011 uprising that ousted longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi the country has been awash in armed militias, including several Islamic extremist groups. A hotel staffer said the attack began when five masked gunmen wearing bulletproof vests stormed the hotel after security guards at the hotel's gate tried to stop them. Photo 
 
 An unidentified hotel employee told The Associated Press that guests, including British, Italian and Turkish visitors, had fled out the back as the attackers entered the lobby. By midday, however, security officials interviewed on Libyan television said that there were no hostages and that at least two of the attackers had been killed. Mr. Ruqai, 50, died this month in a New York hospital of complications from liver surgery as he was waiting to stand trial for a role in the Qaeda bombings of the American Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. Advertisement Continue reading the main story 
 
 Tripoli has come under the control of a coalition calling itself Libya Dawn, which includes moderate Islamist politicians, extremist Islamist fighters, the powerful militias from the city of Misurata and ethnic Berber groups in the West. It was “elements of the old regime,” Omar Khadrawi, a Tripoli security official, said on Libyan television, accusing Qaddafi loyalists of “tampering with the security situation that Tripoli is blessed with.” 
 
 In a statement, the Libya Dawn government in Tripoli called the attack an attempt to assassinate its prime minister, Omar al-Hassi, who resides in the hotel but evacuated safely as the attack began. In the chaos, three Libyan militant groups have pledged loyalty to the Islamic State — one based in Derna in the east, one based in the southern desert and the group based in the region around Tripoli that carried out the attack.
– More details are emerging in yesterday's deadly attack on a luxury hotel in Tripoli. Four or five gunmen are believed to have entered the Corinthia in the early morning, shouting "God is great" as they fired at guards and civilians. Ten people were killed, including American David Berry, an ex-Marine and contractor with security company Crucible, and four Europeans, the New York Times reports. The AP adds the "Islamic State in Tripoli Province," a Libyan affiliate of ISIS, has claimed responsibility for the assault, seen as retaliation for the death of alleged al-Qaeda leader Abu Anas al-Libi in US custody. Al-Libi, seized by US forces in Tripoli in 2003, died earlier this month of complications from liver surgery. Five guards were also killed in the chaos, which the Times calls the "deadliest attack on Western interests in Libya since the assault on the American diplomatic mission in Benghazi." A hotel employee tells the AP that British, Italian, and Turkish guests fled out a back entrance to a parking lot, where a car bomb exploded 100 yards away. No hostages were taken. Two of the assailants were killed after an hours-long standoff with police loyal to the Tripoli government; one is believed to have killed himself with a grenade or suicide vest. "The operation is not the last one on the lands of Tripoli," a post on jihadi forums today reads. "Let the enemies of God, the crusaders, and their allies await what would harm them."