LONDON – Libya’s opposition called for a cease-fire Friday after the United States said it’s withdrawing aircraft used to attack Moammar Gadhafi’s forces following adverse weather that prevented strikes and allowed Libyan loyalists to push back rebels.

Libya’s rebels would accept a cease-fire if their demands for freedoms are met, said Mustafa Abdel Jalil, head of the rebel National Transitional Council, at a news conference aired Friday from their stronghold of Benghazi. Any agreement would have to involve Gadhafi’s fighters pulling out of cities and their surrounding areas, he said.

Additional Photos

A Libyan rebel holds a rocket launcher Friday near the oil port of Brega. The rebels have been in retreat for three days as Col. Moammar Gadhafi’s troops regain the initiative. The Associated Press

The rebel move comes one day after Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said U.S. jets won’t be flying with NATO forces over Libya after today. Mullen said planes would be made available only if requested by NATO.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates told Congress the U.S. will “significantly ramp down our commitment” to Libya except for electronic warfare, aerial refueling and surveillance.

Rebels have been in retreat for three days as Gadhafi’s troops regain the initiative after almost two weeks of allied air strikes against them. This week’s recapture of the oil port Ras Lanuf by Gadhafi forces underscored the military weakness of his opponents. Intensive fighting continues around another oil port, Brega, which is under Libyan rebel control, Al Arabiya television reported.

“Seems to me, we are not doing everything necessary in order to achieve our policy goals and including relieving what is happening to the anti-Gadhafi forces,” Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said at the hearing in Congress with Mullen and Gates. “I hope we don’t learn a bitter lesson from it.”

Mullen said poor weather over the past three days in Libya meant pilots “can’t get on the targets; they can’t see the targets.”

“It’s quiet today but there are snipers present and yesterday night a number of mortar rounds were fired and there was indiscriminate shelling from tanks as well,” Reda Almountasser, a resident in the western city of Misrata, whose residents rose up against Gadhafi and have defied efforts by his forces to regain control, said in a telephone interview.

U.S. political and military leaders said they’re unwilling to start providing arms and training for rebels fighting against Gadhafi. Mullen said there are “plenty of countries who have the ability, the arms, the skill set to be able to do this.” Gates said the U.S. doesn’t know enough about the insurgent groups beyond a “handful” of leaders.

“The rebels need more heavy weapons,” said Jan Techau, director of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Brussels and a former analyst at the NATO Defense College. “They need simple stuff — not high-tech weaponry that requires extensive training and would be dangerous if it fell into terrorist hands.”

The conflict in Libya, which began as a wave of anti-government protests similar to those in Egypt and Tunisia, escalated into armed conflict as the country’s army split and some soldiers joined the rebels.

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