After about three months of stalemate on Libya's "eastern front", interrupted only by the occasional clash between infantry units and some artillery duels, opposition military commanders launched an offensive to reclaim control of the town.

[20][21] 15 July By the next day, the rebels themselves confirmed that their attack had failed and that they had fallen back to their previous positions[22] where battles with loyalist forces continued on three fronts.

To the south of the town, where the rebels had made initial gains but suffered large numbers of casualties, Gaddafi forces had pushed back harder.

[24] 16 July During the morning before dawn on the third day of fighting, according to some reports, rebel forces managed to enter Brega's outskirts but encountered heavy government shelling and multiple land mines.

However, no independent media followed up on the story[27] and later rebel command stated opposition forces were still on the town's outskirts, moving slowly because of hundreds of land mines.

[32] A rebel spokesman claimed that opposition forces had captured the north-eastern part of the town and were engaging loyalist troops in the south-western section.

The rest of the rebel forces were still cleaning up mines and engaging pockets of resistance in Brega where an estimated 150-200 loyalist soldiers were still holed up in the industrial area.

[40] At the same time, Al Jazeera reported that opposition forces had still not entered Brega, despite managing to surround it, and were mainly positioned 10 kilometres east of the town, hampered by mines.

[45] On 1 August, rebel fighters claimed that they had been able, after two weeks of slow advance, to push through minefields to the edge of the suburbs of Brega and were within the sight of the city, some 5 to 7 kilometres away.

[46][47] On 2 August, opposition forces claimed that a small unit of 45 rebel fighters managed to enter the eastern residential district of Brega from which they, after a four-hour battle, retreated.

However, due to the extensive minefields on the approaches to Brega, the opposition force's advance was painfully slow and it would be three days before the rebels managed to reach the outskirts.

Commander Faraj Moftar claimed that up to this point the rebels were surrounding the town and using artillery in order to empty it of most of the resistance and hoped that they can march into the residential area in coming days.

A few hours later, in a telephone call with the Associated Press correspondent, rebel commander Mohammed al-Rijali announced from Ajdabiya that Brega had fallen under opposition control.

[61] Loyalist forces based in Sirte launched a SCUD missile towards rebel lines in the Brega/Ajdabiya area, but it overshot the target by 50 miles and landed harmlessly in the desert.

[72] Rebels managed to advance to the outskirts of the small coastal town of Bin Jawad, but were unable to progress further owing to heavy loyalist resistance in the area.