Libyan rebel fighters pushed further west Friday, driving in haphazard armed convoys as they sought to advance their struggle against loyalists of Moammar Gadhafi.

Dozens of armed opposition forces could be seen heading along the main coastal road out of Uqayla, a desert hamlet about 280 kilometers from the main rebel headquarters in Benghazi , Libya 's second city.

An AFP reporter 20 kilometers west of Uqayla saw 60 to 70 well-armed rebels speeding along the highway after praying on the roadside, shouting that they were going to Raslanuf, where pro-Gadhafi forces are entrenched on high ground.

"The plan is to edge slowly, slowly towards them to pressure them to back off. We don't want to fight, we want to pressure them psychologically," Colonel Bashir Abdulkadir said.

"But if we have to kill them to win this battle, we will," he said.

The rebel commander acknowledged his fighters weren't organized. "We are a popular revolt," he said by way of explanation. Asked how he could hope to win without being organized, he replied: "God will give us victory."

A doctor who led about 30 rebels in prayer Friday, the Muslim day of rest, said in his sermon: "We must be organized. You're very disorganized, like in prayer when we stand row by row."

"We didn't come here for killing. We came here to say no to tyranny," he said.

Further east, Captain Shoaib al-Akaki, another defector from the military, expressed concern about internecine fighting.

"We're trying to minimise losses on both sides. You know in Libya , we're all relatives. We're a country of tribes. We all have relatives in Sirte," he said, referring to the coastal town between Benghazi and Tripoli where Gadhafi was born.

He said that about 20 cars and trucks filled with relief supplies had been sent back from Uqayla east to Brega, where rebels were killed and wounded in a counter-offensive by Gadhafi's forces Wednesday.

A patchwork coalition of rebels controls eastern Libya and some towns in the west following a revolt that started Feb. 15, but Gadhafi retains control in the capital Tripoli .

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