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Tripoli, Libya (CNN) -- Families fleeing one of Moammar Gadhafi's last bastions of support ahead of a Thursday night deadline said they no longer felt safe in the besieged city ahead of an anticipated showdown.

Libya's interim leaders gave residents in Bani Walid a 48-hour notice to leave as it dispatched hundreds of fighters to reinforce troops struggling to take the loyalist stronghold.

Fighters were regrouping on the outskirts of Bani Walid -- one of three cities firmly in the hands of Gadhafi loyalists -- after encountering stiff resistance during a weekend assault. The fighting began after weeks of negotiations to surrender the city broke down.

Residents were given the ultimatum late Tuesday, Abdulrahman Busin, a spokesman for the National Transitional Council, told CNN. The deadline warns civilians to leave the city before a planned offensive by NTC forces.

Forces also have been sent to reinforce troops outside Gadhafi's hometown of Sirte and Sabha, another stronghold in the western part of the country.

At a checkpoint about nine miles outside Bani Walid, families fleeing the city Wednesday complained about a shortage of water and food. They said they no longer felt safe in the city, which has been under siege by NTC forces for weeks.

The deadline came the same day that AFP reported that British Prime Minister David Cameron and French President Nicolas Sarkozy are expected to arrive in Tripoli on Thursday to meet with Libya's new leaders. CNN contacted Paris and London by phone, but they declined to comment on the report.
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Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was also expected to visit Tripoli this week.

Erdogan's anticipated visit follows one a day earlier by Jeffrey Feltman, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs.

Feltman is the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit Libya since Tripoli fell, State Department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters in Washington.

"I am encouraged by these individuals and these organizations' efforts," Feltman said following meetings with NTC head Mustafa Abdel Jalil and Mahmoud Jibril, chairman and head of international affairs of the NTC.

Feltman said the conversations centered on various areas. First, that the United States respects Libya's sovereignty and that the country's destiny must be chosen by its people. Also, the United States and NATO are committed to supporting the Libyan people as they chart their future, and that the United States seeks to create a broad relationship with Libya based on mutual respect and shared interests.

In New York, a draft Security Council resolution circulated Wednesday that would establish a United Nations Support Mission in Libya under the leadership of a special representative of the secretary-general for an initial period of three months.

According to the draft, the mission's mandate would be to help Libya extend state authority, protect human rights, support justice and take steps needed to get the nation back on its feet economically. A vote on the proposal is expected within a few days.

But even as Libya's new leaders plotted a course for the country, a man identifying himself as Gadhafi's spokesman warned of "a holy struggle for years."

"Do not think that the battle is over," a man identifying himself as Musa Ibrahim said in what was purported to be a live phone call to Syrian-based al-Rai TV.

Al-Rai, a privately owned station, has taken over for Libyan state media in filling the role of Gadhafi's mouthpiece.

On Wednesday, al-Rai read a statement purportedly from Gadhafi that called for a halt to the NTC assault and NATO bombing of his birthplace of Sirte.

"The terrorism and aggression of NATO in Sirte cannot be described and has no other similarity in the past or in the history of wars," the statement said.

"If Sirte is isolated from the world and this atrocity is committed against it, it is the world's duty to not be isolated from it. Therefore, you should take international responsibility and interfere immediately to stop this crime."

Gadhafi's whereabouts remain unknown, though some of his relatives have fled to neighboring Algeria and Niger.