Libyan opposition forces have pushed further to isolate Tripoli, moving toward a western town that links the capital and Sirte -- Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's hometown and a stronghold for his military.
"The scouting teams of the revolutionaries reached the outskirts of Al-Heisha after expelling Gaddafi forces," the opposition military command said in a statement early on Wednesday.
Al-Heisha lies roughly 70km south of Misurata and 250km from Tripoli, near two key crossroads that link loyalist-held territory in the west with that in the oil-rich Sirte basin.
It was just the latest in a series of battlefield operations to isolate the capital.
In addition to gaining a foothold in Az-Zawiyah, opposition forces said they had taken two towns near Tripoli on key supply roads Gharyan, 80 km south of the capital and Surman, less than 16 km west of Az-Zawiyah.
"Gharyan is fully in the hands of the revolutionaries," an opposition spokesman, Abdulrahman, said by telephone. "Gaddafi has been isolated. He has been cut off from the outside world."
Government spokesman Moussa Ibrahim acknowledged in remarks broadcast on state television that opposition fighters were in Gharyan. "There are still armed gangs inside the city. We are able to drive them out," he said.
But while opposition forces controlled most of Az-Zawiyah, Gaddafi forces shelled the city, wounding several civilians.
Funerals were held for 23 others who opposition said were killed the previous day.
Nuri el-Bouaisi, an oil production engineer in the city, said opposition forces had cut off pipelines that transport gasoline and diesel fuel to Tripoli.
"We shut down all four pipelines to Tripoli," El-Bouaisi said, whose claim could not be verified.
Gaddafi forces on Sunday fired a scud missile near Brega on the main frontline in the east of the country; the first use of the weapon since the uprising against his rule began six months ago, according to a US military official said.
Although no one was hurt in the attack and the missiles are considered unreliable weapons, Richard Weitz, director of the Centre for Political and Military Analysis at the Hudson Institute, told Al Jazeera the use of scuds could signal Gaddafi's determination to fight.
PHOTO CAPTION
An opposition soldier patrols near the Libyan National Transitional Council in Benghazi August 16, 2011.
Al-Jazeera