Another Case of Cohen Craziness

So Qaddafi always thought this could happen, even 42 years into his rule. He feared someone might slice away the myths — Arab nationalist, African unifier, all-powerful non-president — and leave him, disrobed, a little man in a vast vault with nowhere left to go. In the twisted mind of the despot now derided here as “the man with the big hair,” his own demise was the tousle-coiffed specter that would not go away.

Strange, then, that the United States and Europe never thought this could happen — not to Qaddafi, or Mubarak, or Ben Ali, or any of the other murderous plunderers, some now gone, others slaughtering their own people, here in Libya, or in Syria, or Yemen. Policy was based on the mistaken belief that these leaders would last forever.

They were paranoid about their fates. We were convinced of their permanence.

Of course it was not just a conviction about their inevitability that drove U.S. policy toward these dictators. It was a cynical decision to place counterterrorism and security at the top of the agenda and human rights — in this case Arab rights — at the bottom. It was about Big Oil interests. And, to some degree, it was about the perception of what served the security of America’s closest regional ally, Israel.

I just looked through decades of Roger Cohen's columns, and he seems to have missed that Qaddafi might be in danger one day as well. How could he have missed it? Strange, then, that he never thought this could happen!

Equally strange is that he is not predicting that the same thing could happen to Mahmoud Abbas, or the Saudi royals, or Turkey's leadership, or Iran's. No, Cohen can blame the US for bowing to Zionist perceptions in their blindness, but his brilliance - where he can confidently predict what the US and Europe are too stupid and shortsighted to see - is still being obscured.

Come on, Roger - tell us who's next!

And why didn't you sound the alarm in, say, 2008? Wasn't it all so obvious to pundits who don't have the Zionist and counter-terrorist smoke in their eyes?
Elder of Ziyon

Battle for Libya: Uprising in Nalut

#
07:55am
Russia is not planning to respond to Libya's plea that it call an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council to discuss what Moscow has described as Western aggression, a foreign ministry official told Itar-TASS news agency.

Vladimir Putin, Russia's prime minister, has criticised the Western countries enforcing a no-fly zone over Libya and said they have gone beyond the limits of a Security Council resolution designed to protect civilians.
#
Timestamp:
07:40am
Al Jazeera's Anita McNaught went to the town of Nalut, in the Nefusa mountain range of western Libya, to meet the people testing their new sense of freedom - and the risks that come with it.

The report below includes scenes and images never seen before of the uprising in Nalut:

#
Timestamp:
06:30am
With the conflict raging on in Libya, education is suffering, especially in the rebel-held areas.

Al Jazeera's Omar Al Saleh has this report from Benghazi, where some students and teachers are finding themselves on the frontline in the battle against government forces:


#
Timestamp:
05:34am

Revolutionary graffiti can be seen emblazoned on walls across the rebel-held cities in eastern Libya.

File 24976
Graffiti seen on March 31 in Adjabiya, the gateway to the east and about 150km south of Benghazi [Reuters]
#
Timestamp:
05:16am

Libya's tribes urged Gaddafi to cede power as rebels backed by NATO air strikes said they forced the missiles out of range of the port city of Misurata.

File 24936
Rebels participate in military training camp in Zintan in the region of Nalut [AFP]
#
Timestamp:
03:34am

Hundreds of migrant workers and Misurata residents have boarded the Red Star to escape the war-torn city in western Libya. The ship achored out at sea because of heavy shelling. The migrants mainly from Niger and Chad came under fire in their makeshift camp near the port.
#
Timestamp:
03:24am

Pro-Gaddafi forces blasted the western rebel-held town of Zintan with rockets on Wednesday, leaving at least three people wounded. A local hospital was also damaged in the attack, according to eyewitnesses.

At least 20 Grad rockets struck Zintan, with three of them crashing near the hospital. The town located southwest of the Libyan capital, Tripoli, has been pounded by Gaddafi forces since Sunday.
#
Timestamp:
01:52am

Libya's opposition Transitional National Council hailed a move by the US to ease sanctions to open a stream of funding to forces seeking to topple Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. The council said:

The people of Libya are brave and defiant but we need access to oil revenues so that we can feed, protect and defend our families.

These funds are crucial to establishing a stable and secure future nation, and we welcome the US decision to ease sanctions on our exports.

#
Timestamp:
11:18pm

Many Gaddafi aides want to defect but fear is preventing them from abandoning the Libyan leader, the US envoy to Tripoli said on Wednesday.

Referring to Libyan government ministers "and other technocrats" in Gaddafi's inner circle, Ambassador Gene Cretz said in Washington:

They would like to break, but they're, number one, afraid - afraid for their lives. And they're also afraid for their families.

Cretz said Gaddafi's hardcore supporters "probably believe that their last stand has to be with him because they probably don't have a future".

Americans are Conditioned to Fear Revolution

from Truthout
Is It Fear of Uprisings or Altruistic Punishment?
Antonia Darder, Truthout: "As the uprisings are spreading around the world and in the United States, there are many who feel fear, reticence and intense skittishness about what is transpiring. Yet, this anxiety, rather than surprising, is well cultivated by the contemporary hegemonic forces that govern our lives. What is most important for us to understand is that we, as a people, are most conditioned to fear when populations reclaim their social agency and collective power and rise up against the unjust policies of the state."
Read the Article

Qaddafi Forces Said to Withdraw From Misrata, but Meaning Is Unclear
Nancy A. Youssef, McClatchy Newspapers: "Forces loyal to Libyan leader Col. Moammar Gadhafi began withdrawing from the besieged western city of Misrata on Saturday, Gadhafi officials said, the first shift away from what has been an escalating urban war for control of Libya's third-largest city... Yet rather than celebrate what a rebel spokesman in Misrata called a victory for the rebels, leaders and analysts alike asked what Gadhafi's motives were behind the decision to withdraw. Moreover, several news agencies in Misrata reported that shelling and fighting continued Saturday after the announced withdrawal."
Read the Article

Two NATO Missiles May Have Struck Qaddafi's Bunker

Two NATO missiles seem to have struck a little close to home for Col. Muammar Gaddafi, rupturing what appears to be an underground bunker in Tripoli. Reporters were taken to an unpaved plot next to the Libyan leader's Bab Aziziyeh compound and shown two craters that revealed what appeared to be an underground bunker network. Libyan officials said the lot served as a parking lot. NATO strikes seemed to meet with success on the other side of the country as well, where a rebel commander said airstrikes destroyed more than two dozen trucks and cars carrying Gaddafi's forces near the city of Ajdabiya. In Misrata, good news seemed to be on the horizon as a senior government official said the military is pulling back from the rebel-held city that has been under siege by Gaddafi's forces for nearly two months. However, the official, Deputy Foreign Minister Khaled Kaim, said government troops would be making way for tribesmen who would take up the fight against the rebels, which would make it harder for NATO planes and drones to distinguish rebels from pro-Gaddafi forces. He did not say when government troops would withdraw.

Read it at the Associated Press

Libya: Making Something out of Nothing

The 18th century English Orientalist Sir William Jones, writing from British colonial India, once argued that "a system of liberty, forced upon a people invincibly attached to opposite habits, would in truth be a system of tyranny".

A state of nature

What's remarkable is how little this attitude has changed over the past two centuries. Still today, similarly hollow apologies for depriving entire groups of people of democracy and liberty persist, even as the privileged few continue to insist on these rights for themselves while benefiting from the repression of others.

It matters little that Libyans are crying out for freedom and democracy; for an end to four decades of brutality, suffocation, and indignity; and for the world to take their aspirations seriously – Libyans are emotional, primitive Arabs who do not understand democracy.

After all, Libya lacks political institutions which means it could descend into years of bloody civil war. And Libya is full of Muslims so Islamic extremists could take control of a new government and further destabilise the Arab world.

Besides, the West has a notorious history of imperialism in the region, not to mention an inconsistent record when it comes to humanitarian intervention, so Libyans should have been less selfish and dealt with the regime's threats to go door-to-door and cleanse the "cockroaches" on their own.

Do Libyans even realise where they're headed? Have they forgotten about Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq? Gaddafi is admittedly unpleasant, even brutal, but he has held the country together and kept extremists at bay for decades.

Surely that must be worth something: the lack of basic human rights or even a constitution; the highest levels of unemployment in North Africa and a grossly inadequate infrastructure; the pocketing of tens, perhaps hundreds of billions of dollars by one family at the expense of an entire nation; even the occasional hanging of university students in public squares or the dragging of bodies through streets – a less than subtle warning to those who dare challenge the status quo.

As the benevolent dictator's daughter Aisha once lamented, the people are never satisfied.

Shifting guilt

It's convenient to credit autocrats with maintaining stability and suppressing what are no doubt the extremist inclinations of their populations – it helps us to assuage our own guilt for profiting from our relationships with such regimes.

Of course, we often overlook the tiny fact that Gaddafi was hardly a champion of stability in the region or a bulwark against extremist elements; quite the contrary, he was for decades regarded as an instigator of mischief and a supporter of terrorism, not to mention an individual who has never had any qualms about massacring his own people.

Despite this he was tolerated, even dismissed as a buffoon and a punchline for years by much of the international community, particularly after his rapprochement with the West beginning over a decade ago.

The Libyan people, in the mean time, continued to suffer quietly while the rest of the world enjoyed a good laugh at Gaddafi's expense, followed him to his tent in pursuit of lucrative contracts, and sold him the arms he is now turning against his citizenry.

Besides praising the regime for supposedly containing the Islamist threat, it's quite remarkable to hear pundits who know so little about Libyan society raise the spectre of instability arising from "tribal divisions" – tensions many have naively credited the Gaddafi regime with keeping in check – even while Libyans throughout the country and the world have been scratching their heads in confusion at these concerns, and trying to assure the international community that they are united and committed to democratic change.

Indeed, the Gaddafi clan seems to relish educating the world about Libya's uncivilised, tribal society with its competing factions poised perpetually on the brink of civil strife.

The unity question

Yet anyone who's had the misfortune of watching hours of Jamahiriyya state television knows that the regime, perhaps owing to its Sirtian roots and to the acute inferiority complex of its quirky leader, has deliberately sought to impose this primitive, tribal image on wider Libyan society for decades, regardless of the fact that it does not reflect the predominantly modern, urban character of the majority of its citizens today. It may come as a surprise but, unlike their leader, most Libyans who travel abroad do not pitch tents in the middle of city streets.

What's more, many observers have demonstrated a curious tendency to overlook clear indications that the Libyan national identity is in reality quite strong, and that the current struggle, nurtured by a deep sense of collective suffering over the past 41 years, has only intensified this sense of national unity, at least among the overwhelming majority of citizens who make up Gaddafi's opposition.

Critics also point to the general lack of institutions in Libya, the absence of political parties and organised opposition groups and the supposed absence of leaders to help facilitate the transition to a new government.

Such concerns, while not unjustified, are often overblown. By most accounts pro-democracy Libyans, both at home and abroad, have largely rallied around the Libyan Interim Transitional National Council formed under the leadership of the widely respected former justice minister, Mustafa Abduljalil, and composed of professionals and representatives hailing from every corner of Libya, in an apparent show of unity that would be the envy of every American general from Iraq to Afghanistan.

Moreover, Libyans are reasonably savvy people who are well acquainted with history – they are fully aware of the considerable challenges confronting them, and quite attuned to the fact that the world is watching and carefully appraising their actions.

Yet despite these promising signs, recognition of the Transitional Council by most of the international community has been slow to materialise (only France, Qatar and now Italy have thrown their hats in the ring).

Moreover, there has been little talk of the considerable potential of Libyan society – with its relatively educated, urban and galvanised population which boasts one of the highest literacy rates in the Arab world – to develop democratic institutions and fill the oft-invoked "political vacuum".

Many of these institutions, however imperfect, existed before the current regime dismantled them, and they can exist once again.

Where credit is due

We have already glimpsed hopeful signs for Libya's future in Benghazi and other liberated cities, where residents and their transitional leaders have done a superb job of maintaining order, and ensuring that public services and the operations of day to day life run as smoothly as possible – miraculously all without the Colonel's apparently indispensable guiding hand.

Unfortunately, most commentators have chosen to ignore such achievements, preferring instead to provoke fears about al-Qaeda and a post-Gaddafi civil war.

That something will be challenging – in this case building a democratic government where only an autocrat has stood – does not mean that it should not be encouraged and supported.

While both Libyans and the international community should remain prudent and realistic about the obstacles involved, the focus must not be on nay-saying and incitement of fears that are largely baseless and often have their origins with the Gaddafi regime.

Rather, it should be on providing support for the Libyan people as they struggle to rid themselves of an illegitimate, repressive regime, work to form a transitional government, draft a constitution, hold free and transparent elections, build stable government institutions, resurrect civil society, fight corruption, repair their economy and rebuild their country.

Make no mistake: Libyans are not naive about their future and the formidable task of state-building that lies ahead of them.

They recognise that there is much work to be done, and that the challenges are enormous and complex, first and foremost among them finding a way out of the current stalemate.

But Libyans are not the first people to be faced with such a task, and they are by all accounts committed to unity, and to working together to rebuild their country.

They display few signs of the divisiveness and extremism that the Gaddafi clan has been claiming they suffer from, and that many Western observers are in turn parroting – why not give them a little more credit?

Najla Abdurrahman, a Libyan-American writer and activist, is a doctoral student in Columbia University's Department of Middle Eastern, South, Asian, and African Studies.

The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial policy.

Qaddafi Accepts African Union Peace Plan

He's not the most trustworthy guy, but this is still cause for hope: Libya's Col. Muammar Gaddafi agreed Sunday to a "road map" for peace with rebels presented by the African Union, whose top leaders paid him a visit in Tripoli. The agreement calls for an immediate ceasefire, for cooperating with humanitarian aid, and for starting a dialogue with the rebels. It does not, however, make any mention of Gaddafi leaving office. NATO allowed African Union planes to enter the no-fly zone over Libya, but said it would not accept any agreement that didn't include transferring Gaddafi out of power. Rebel leaders are skeptical of the plot, though, since Gaddafi has long been a champion of the African Union and Libya holds a spot on its 15-member board. He also has wide support among the AU nations. The AU delegation plans to meet with rebels on Monday, and has called on NATO to suspend airstrikes to "give the cease-fire a chance."

POTUS Bets On Both Sides in Libya

If I recall correctly, we went into Libya — or, at any rate, over Libya — to stop the brutal Qaddafi dictatorship killing the Libyan people. And thanks to our efforts a whole new mass movement of freedom-loving democrats now has the opportunity to kill the Libyan people. As the Los Angeles Times reported from Benghazi, these democrats are roaming the city “rousting Libyan blacks and immigrants from sub-Saharan Africa from their homes and holding them for interrogation as suspected mercenaries or government spies.” According to the New York Times, “Members of the NATO alliance have sternly warned the rebels in Libya not to attack civilians as they push against the regime of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.” We dropped bombs on Qaddafi’s crowd for attacking civilians, and we’re prepared to do the same to you! “The coalition has told the rebels that the fog of war will not shield them from possible bombardment by NATO planes and missiles, just as the regime’s forces have been punished.”

So, having agreed to be the Libyan Liberation Movement Air Force, we’re also happy to serve as the Qaddafi Last-Stand Air Force. Say what you like about Barack Obama, but it’s rare to find a leader so impeccably multilateralist he’s willing to participate in both sides of a war. It doesn’t exactly do much for holding it under budget, but it does ensure that for once we’ve got a sporting chance of coming out on the winning side. If a coalition plane bombing Qaddafi’s forces runs into a coalition plane bombing the rebel forces, are they allowed to open fire on each other? Or would that exceed the U.N. resolution?

Read it all.

Labels: Barack Obama, Libyan civil war, Libyan regime change, Muammar Gaddafi

posted by Carl in Jerusalem

Why Should US Execute Qaddafi?

A few years ago, in the context of Hezbollah’s war with Israel, I penned a piece re-examining the issue of assassination in American policy. The fact is that in many circumstances assassination is not illegal under international law. The moratorium on assassination is more a matter of choice. Certainly, fear that assassinating foreign leaders might open a Pandora’s Box of retribution is valid, although rogue leaders will try to assassinate Americans anyway. Still, targeted assassinations are not a policy to be embarked upon lightly or for any reason but to prevent (further) war.

When foreign leaders are, like Qaddafi, unelected and unstable dictators and military commanders, they are valid targets. Qaddafi certainly does not deserve immunity which is what, in effect, Obama now promises him. When terrorist leaders spark conflict, they should be held personally accountable. Qaddafi may be willing to fight to the last conscript, but he may be less enthusiastic about risking his own skin.

There is also the question of deterrence. While it’s conventional wisdom in certain circles that Israel lost the 2006 war, I quibble: By trusting in the international community, Israel lost the peace and allowed Hezbollah to rearm. This past fall, however, when I was in Hezbollah-controlled southern Lebanon and southern Beirut, locals were talking about Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s visit to Lebanon. Ahmadinejad was his bombastic self, but what Lebanese were gossiping about was that Hassan Nasrallah did not take the stage with his patron. Whereas before 2006, the Hezbollah secretary-general appeared in public often, post-2006 he is simply too scared. It’s time to make Qaddafi fear for his life as well. By doing so, we might avoid far greater bloodshed both in Libya now and down the road. The point is not aggression, but deterring war and ultimately saving lives.

If only we had gotten both Ahmadinejad and Nasrallah during that trip.

Labels: Hassan Nasrallah, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Muammar Gaddafi, targeted killings

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 5:55 AM

Al Qaeda Joins Libya Rebels to Fight Qaddafi

Libyan rebel commander admits his fighters have al-Qaeda links Abdel-Hakim al-Hasidi, the Libyan rebel leader, has said jihadists who fought against allied troops in Iraq are on the front lines of the battle against Muammar Gaddafi's regime.
By Praveen Swami, Nick Squires and Duncan Gardham 5:00PM GMT 25 Mar 2011

In an interview with the Italian newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore, Mr al-Hasidi admitted that he had recruited "around 25" men from the Derna area in eastern Libya to fight against coalition troops in Iraq. Some of them, he said, are "today are on the front lines in Adjabiya".

Mr al-Hasidi insisted his fighters "are patriots and good Muslims, not terrorists," but added that the "members of al-Qaeda are also good Muslims and are fighting against the invader".

His revelations came even as Idriss Deby Itno, Chad's president, said al-Qaeda had managed to pillage military arsenals in the Libyan rebel zone and acquired arms, "including surface-to-air missiles, which were then smuggled into their sanctuaries".

Mr al-Hasidi admitted he had earlier fought against "the foreign invasion" in Afghanistan, before being "captured in 2002 in Peshwar, in Pakistan". He was later handed over to the US, and then held in Libya before being released in 2008.

US and British government sources said Mr al-Hasidi was a member of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, or LIFG, which killed dozens of Libyan troops in guerrilla attacks around Derna and Benghazi in 1995 and 1996

POTUS Obfuscates in Libya

Libya is yet another Obama-era replay of the 1990s. Just as Bill Clinton had his confused humanitarian intervention, Obama now has his. The Libyan War is Kosovo II: a military action from the air with no congressional authorization; little engagement from the president; tenuous public support; contention among the allies over means, ends, and rationales; and de facto proxy forces on the ground who won’t meet our civilized standards of warfare.

Yet we prevailed all the same against Slobodan Milosevic, who, like Qaddafi, was a miserable tin-pot dictator with a tin-pot military extremely vulnerable to us. Otto von Bismarck’s putdown of the British army — if it invaded Germany, he’d have it arrested — applies with much more force to Qaddafi’s ramshackle force that has proven adept only at facing down even more ramshackle rebels.
Rich Lowry, NRO

The Aborted Qaddaffi Amnesty Deal

As both rebels and Muammar Gaddafi deny that a deal for his exit was proffered, a key insider reveals to The Daily Beast's Fadel Lamen the details of the Libyan dictator's offer—and the opposition's next move. According to the insider, Gaddafi sent a letter, in the care of a former cabinet minster, offering to call a meeting of the General People's Congress where he would submit his resignation. A formal process would give then appearance of a democratic turnover. In exchange, Gaddafi would require that the congress declare immunity for him and his family. But the interim Transitional Council, overseen by Mustafa Abdel Jalil, the closest thing the Libyan people have as an alternative to Gaddafi, rejected the idea as a "farce."
Daily Beast

Battles continue in Libya

As Libyan state television broadcast an appearance by leader Muammar Gaddafi before crowds in Tripoli's Green Square, pro-government supporters also rallied in the capital. Meanwhile, pictures have emerged of fighting in the Libyan town of Misurata.

Opposition fighters also say they have repelled an attack by government forces, including tanks and artillery. At least 18 people were killed.

Al Jazeera Charles Stratford reports on the fighting seen across the country.

UNW's Hillel Neuer Asks U.N. Rights Chief: "Why Were You Silent on Qadda...

Reversal: UN Ousts Qaddafi from Human Rights Council UN Watch

Nine months after shamefully electing the Qaddafi regime to its Human Rights Council, the UN today reversed itself and suspended Libya's membership. Click here for details.

From the moment the Libyan regime declared its candidacy last year, UN Watch initiated the opposition to Qaddafi sitting as a world judge of human rights. Click here for chronology of UN Watch's tireless campaign.

In September, when the Libyan regime took its seat, UN Watch launched a campaign demanding Libya’s suspension from the Geneva-based Council, becoming the first voice to do so. We were supported by 27 human rights groups, a number that surpassed 80 in our renewed NGO appeal of nine days ago.

Silence of the ghouls:

UN Watch Asks Rights Chief: "Why Were You Silent on Qaddafi's Crimes?

Around the globe, the Qaddafis were kings. No longer. The head of the London School of Economics has just resigned over his ties to the Qaddafi regime. Rock stars Beyonce, Nelly Furtado and Mariah Carey are expressing remorse for paid peformances at Qaddafi family parties. Former Egyptian minister of culture Gaber Asfour renounced his 2010 “Qaddafi International Award for Literature.”

Yet at the U.N., no one is willing to take the slightest responsibility for the world body's tight embrace of the Qaddafi regime. In the plenary of the UN Human Rights Council yesterday, UN Watch’s Hillel Neuer urged U.N. rights chief Navi Pillay to begin the soul-searching. She refused to respond. Click here for video. The text follows below.

Madame High Commissioner,

We thank you for your report, and applaud its emphasis on the core principle of accountability. We commend your recent leadership on human rights in Libya. As you stated, “the people of Libya had long been victims of the serious excesses of the Libyan leadership.”

In this regard, given that accountability begins at home, we wish to ask whether your office has begun to reflect upon how, in recent years, the United Nations and its human rights system could have shown greater solidarity with Libya’s victims. We offer five specific questions:

1. Given that your responsibility is to mainstream human rights throughout the U.N. system, we ask: When the Qaddafi regime was chosen to serve on the Security Council for 2008 and 2009; when its representative was chosen as President of the General Assembly in 2009; when Col. Qaddafi’s daughter Ayesha was designated in 2009 a U.N. Goodwill Ambassador — why did you not speak out?

2. According to a study of all your published statements from September 2008 through June 2010, you never once mentioned human rights in Libya. Why?

3. Your report refers to your office’s strong support for the Durban process, for which you served as Secretary-General of its 2009 World Conference on Racism. When a representative of the Libyan regime was chosen to chair that conference’s two-year planning committee, and to chair the main committee, why did you not speak out?

4. When the Qaddafi regime was elected as a member of this council last year, why did you not speak out?

5. Your report refers to the council’s Advisory Committee. In 2008, ignoring the appeal of UN Watch and 25 human rights groups, the council elected Jean Ziegler, the co-founder of the Muammar Qaddafi Human Rights Prize—a propaganda tool for the regime—to this body. Last year he was made the committee’s vice-president. Why did you not speak out?

And will you now call on the recipients of this prize—former Cuban President Fidel Castro in 1998, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez in 2004, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega in 2009, and Turkish PM Erdogan in 2010—to renounce this prize, and to apologize to all the human rights victims—past and present—of Col. Muammar Qaddafi?

Big Oil Weakens Terror Victim Bill

The New York Times — Top executives of American oil companies met privately over the last year with Libya’s leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, as they lined up contracts allowing them to tap into the country’s oil reserves. Now the Libyan government and the American oil industry are working Capitol Hill, with help from the Bush administration, in an effort to bypass a law allowing victims of state-sponsored terrorism to collect court judgments by seizing foreign assets in the United States or money from those governments held by American companies doing business with them.