Gaddafi - revolt of a revolutionary

M M Zuhair

The fall of Gaddafi appears imminent though avoidable if Tripoli and his tribe stand with him. He has however dated his own departure convincingly, from the way the Libyan leader handled the uprising. Even if he happens to survive, he will very likely end up spending the rest of his life at the Hague, facing serious accusations of violation of international humanitarian laws before tribunals, which are yet to bring to justice big time violators like Bush and Blair

Gaddafi’s journey

* Born - June 7, 1942

* Place of birth - Sirt, Libya

* Joined Army at age of 14

* Organized anti-Israeli demo in 1956

* Overthrew Libyan King Idris on September 1, 1969

* Founded World Islamic Call Society

* Reagan called him ‘Mad Dog of Middle East’

* US bombed Libya in 1986

* Accused of Pan Am Flight bombing over

Lockerbie in 1988

* Ruled Libya for 42 years

The entry of Saiful Islam, Libyan leader’s second son into Libya’s big time business during the last two and a half decades, is certain to be exposed as Muammer Gaddafi’s gabardine. Following the US Air Force raid on Gaddafi’s Tripoli residence on April 15, 1986, which killed Hanna, the four year old adopted sister, Saiful had his way in converting his father a fiercely ‘anti-colonial-neo-colonial revolutionary’ to an unhappy apologist for the West.

Thirty-eight years old Saiful Islam the eldest son of Gaddafi’s second wife Saifa Farkash is neither a revolutionary nor a known playboy. Engineer by profession, with a MBA from Vienna and a Ph.D from the London School of Economics, Saiful was once described by London Thomas of the New York Times as the ‘Western-friendly face of Libya’. He was also credited by New York Times as the symbol of Libya’s hopes for reform and openness.

National Libyan TV

But in his speech over the national Libyan TV on February 20, the third day after the massive pro-reform uprisings in Bengazi, the second largest city of Libya a thousand miles East of Tripoli Saiful Gaddafi’s message threatening to crush the uprisings was abundantly clear. There was no mention of any reforms or hopes of any change. He even alleged, perhaps based on his understanding of Libya’s new found relationships with the West that the US and Europeans will prevent the emergence of a new Islamic emirate in Libya.

He also alleged that ‘bread will become as expensive as gold’ if the Libyans went ahead the Tunisian or Egyptian way, forcing Western Companies in Libya to quit, foreigners to leave and oil to stop.

Muammar Gaddafi himself came on the National TV later on Tuesday February 22, nearly 24 hours after the fall of Bengazi and five days after the beginning of the uprisings. He made a defiant speech pledging to ‘die in Libya as a martyr’.

Gaddafi residence

He never admitted any role in the ongoing massacre but referred to the US invasion of Iraq. He said, ‘they’ destroyed many cities like Falujah, killed hundreds and ‘they’ alleged that it was legitimate to use excessive force to rid Iraq of terrorism and the Al Qaeda. He also referred to endless Israeli killings in Gaza. Gaddafi, who will be 70 years in June this year, made his televised address from his two storeyed simple house within a well-protected army compound, which was attacked in the US raid of 1986 allegedly targeting the Libyan leader by shelling from the air. The house remains to this day in its bullet riddled state. Visitors to Libya are shown the Gaddafi residence as a symbol of US attempt to assassinate the country’s leader.

The US alleged that Gaddafi’s men were responsible for the 1986 explosion in a Berlin night club, that killed three and injured nearly 200, mostly US military service men in Germany, an allegation that Libya denies.

Even as Gaddafi made his one-hour speech, violence was spreading to all cities of Libya, including the capital Tripoli. The indiscriminate display of heavy fire power on the streets of Libya against unarmed civilians killing by that Tuesday, over 400 and by Thursday over 700 Libyans will no doubt remain to haunt the Libyan leader for the rest of his life.

Born in a simple Bedouvin family in Sirt, Libya on June 7, 1942, Muammer Gaddafi grew up to join the Libyan Army as a junior military officer. When only 14 and still to join the Army, Gaddafi actively organized an anti-Israel demonstration during the Suez Canal crisis of 1956.

On September 1, 1969, he led a small group of junior Army officers and overthrew the Libyan King Idris, who was away in Turkey for medical treatment.

Since then Gaddafi has ruled this country of (then) four million and now 6.5 million for nearly 42 years, becoming the longest non-royal ruler in history.

Two years in power, the Libyan leader founded the World Islamic Call Society and supported Islamic movements mostly in Africa.

Gaddafi earned the wrath of the West by his outspoken support for Palestine and Islamic revivalist movements everywhere.

Islamic movements

He saw six centuries of Western colonialism as having continuously repressed third world aspirations, sometimes incidentally but often institutionally. He never hesitated to give voice, to the oppressed often reminding his audience that the only world power to drop nuclear bombs - Hiroshima and Nagasaki was the US; opposed the Vietnam war and became the only Arab ruler to support Persian Iran in its 1980 - 1988 war imposed by Saddam Hussain of Arab Iraq.

Gaddafi was soon household name, throughout the Muslim World and in most of Asia, for his outspoken criticism of the West, though Gaddafi was often misreported by most Western media. Nevertheless Gaddafi admirers grew in number worldwide.

International issues

People in Asia are aware how most sections of the Western mainstream media attempted to malign even a non-controversial Muslim leader like former Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamed of Malaysia, when Mahathir stepped down from power.

Gaddafi’s uncompromising stand on sensitive international issues and on what Gaddafi saw as Israeli refusal to compromise on genuine statehood for Palestine, earned him the widely publicized title, “Mad Dog of the Middle-East”, conferred by then US President Ronald Reagan. The Libyan leaders supportive role for liberation movements in West Africa, Sierra Leone, Mali, Liberia etc and encouraging assistance to Muslims to build mosques and print school texts were misinterpreted and misrepresented to the world, labelling Gaddafi as a financier of international terrorism.

US bombing raids

By 1982, the US banned American travel to Libya and the transfer of US technology for the Libyan oil industry.

The 1986 US bombing raids ordered by President Reagan left nearly a hundred dead in Tripoli and Benghazi with extensive damage to buildings believed to be used by Gaddafi.

But worldwide condemnation of the US bombing raids coupled with mass scale protests throughout Asia and Africa surprised many Libyan critics in the West.

Britain accused Libya in 1987 of supplying arms to the Provisional Irish Republican Army fighting Britain, though there was no mention of from where the arms originated.

Meanwhile, sections of the Western media joined in defaming the Libyan leader with allegations of an elite women’s division providing Gaddafi with exclusive security. It is of course true that the Libyan leader’s establishment had a Women’s Unit, which together with the Men’s Unit, handled the security clearance of the spouses of Ambassadors’ and visitors calling on the country’s leader. Knowing the sensitivities of the Muslim world on the moral conduct of its leaders, stories of Ukrainian blondes accompanying Gaddafi were planted, though no supportive evidence such as videos or photographs were forthcoming.

False allegations

The Daily Telegraph for instance was compelled to apologize for publishing two false allegations following libel suits filed by Gaddafi’s son Saiful Islam.

The PanAm Flight 103 which exploded in flight over Lockerbie a town in Scotland, on December 21, 1988 killing all 259 on board and 11 on the ground initially blamed on Syria was later blamed on Libya. Implicating Iran was also reportedly considered alleging a revenge attack for shooting down Iran Flight 655 in July 1988 by the US killing over 290 civilians including 66 children on board.

In his 1994 film, ‘The Maltese Double Cross’, Allan Francovich implicates rouge CIA agents in a plot that involved the agents turning a blind eye to a drug running operation in return for providing intelligence, leading to planting the bomb, overlooked as a consignment of drugs by the agents.

PanAm 103: The Lockerbie Cover up is a book by William C Chasey (November 1995), a US citizen, who alleges US intelligence involvement in covering up the real perpetrators and implicating Libya, a charge the US denies.

The Time magazine had reported another version of this theory, that two American intelligence officers, who were named in the report, had found out about the drug operation and were on their way to Washington to raise their concerns with their supervisors.

Lockerbie victims

That apart, in the aftermath of the Libyan uprisings, Libya’s Justice Minister Musthafa Jaleel, who this week quit his post, has reportedly told a Swedish tabloid, Expressen that Gaddafi had ordered the Lockerbie bombing. In a 2008 August interview to the BBC Saiful Islam says that compensation was paid to the Lockerbie victims without any admission of guilt, to escape the adverse sanctions on his country.

Saiful Islam over a period of nearly two decades worked behind the scenes succeeding in changing the course of his country from one of supporting liberation movements and Islamic causes worldwide to abandoning these causes, under pressure from the West. That Muammar Gaddafi, the revolutionary, succumbed to the revolutionary change is now history.

US and European investments in Libyan oil industry began to flow back to a country once described by the West as a pariah state. Eighty percent of Libyan oil began to flow out to Europe with Libya becoming the third largest exporter of oil next to Norway and Russia.

According to analysts, arms exports to Libya and other Middle East countries from EU member countries soared bringing back to Europe, the Libyan oil money, leaving the vast majority of Libyans in a despicable state.

Sanctions against Libya were lifted in September 2003, with Libya, the hitherto alleged human riots violator, becoming a member of the UN’s Human Rights Council, bringing home the point that friendship with the West can be revoltingly rewarding while enmity could be revealingly reviling. There can be no apology, however for a revolutionary in revolt with his people!

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