Gadhafi said the strikes were a confrontation between the Libyan people and "the new Nazis."
"You have proven to the world that you are not civilized, that you are terrorists -- animals attacking a safe nation that did nothing against you," Gadhafi said in a televised speech.
Throughout the address, an image of a golden fist crushing a model plane that said "USA" filled the screen.
At the same time Gadhafi spoke, his regime was shelling the city of Misrata on Sunday morning using tanks, artillery and cannons, a witness said.
They are destroying the city," said the witness, who is not being identified for safety reasons. He said rebels were fighting back.
Sounds of heavy gunfire could be heard during a telephone conversation with the man. There was no immediate word on casualties.
International military coalition targeted air defense positions near the capital for a second day Sunday.
Some Libyans welcomed the American, French and British military forces.
Others remained fearful of Gadhafi.
Libyans are "afraid to come out because when they do, he attacked them very, very severely," a woman in Tripoli said Sunday. "This is putting terror in all neighborhoods."
The multinational military forces launched the attacks Saturday, convinced that Gadhafi was not adhering to a cease-fire mandated by the United Nations.
American and British ships and submarines fired more than 110 Tomahawk cruise missiles and hit about 20 Libyan defense targets in western portions of the country, U.S. Vice Adm. William Gortney said at a Pentagon briefing.
Nineteen U.S. warplanes, including stealth bombers and fighter jets, conducted strike operations in Libya on Sunday morning, officials said.
Tomahawk cruise missiles are unmanned and fly close to the ground, steering around natural and man-made obstacles to hit a target programmed into them before launch.
A senior U.S. military official, who was not authorized to speak on the record, said the cruise missiles landed near the city of Misrata and the capital, Tripoli.
Scores of missiles were fired in the pre-dawn darkness, and the exact results of the mission were not immediately clear. The United States is expected to conduct a damage assessment of the sites.
The salvo, in an operation dubbed "Odyssey Dawn," was meant "to deny the Libyan regime from using force against its own people," Gortney said.
British Defense Secretary Liam Fox said the Royal Air Force deployed Tornado GR4 fast jets, which flew 3,000 miles from the United Kingdom and back -- making the venture the longest-range bombing mission conducted by the force since the Falklands conflict in 1982.
British Prime Minister David Cameron said the international mission "is necessary, it is legal, and it is right."
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