
U.S.-backed anti-government forces in Libya are being led by al-Qaeda fighters according to an interview with a Libyan rebel figure in Il Sole 24 Ore, an Italian newspaper. So, after ten years of trying to "disarm and dismantle" al -Qaeda in Afghanistan, the U.S. might be facilitating its rise in Libya.
Abdel-Hakim al-Hasidi admitted earlier today that he personally recruited 250 Libyans to fight against coalition troops in Iraq. Some of these same fighters are, according to al-Hasidi, “today on the front lines in Adjabiya” fighting against Moammar Gaddafi’s forces. al-Hasidi also made positive comments about al-Qaeda during the interview as the Telegraph reports:
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".
Not only did al-Hasidi battle U.S troops in Iraq, he has also fought against "the foreign invasion" in Afghanistan.
Ironically, Gaddafi has claimed for weeks that the rebel movement was linked to al-Qaeda, yet the international community saw these assertions as typical propagandist maneuvering by the Libyan dictator.
It is hard to say how much the U.S. knows about this and, for that matter, if they care – they may simply be focused on the short-term goal of getting rid of Gaddafi.
A similar obsessive tunnel vision was employed to support the anti-communist mujahideen in Afghanistan in the 1980s – a group President Reagan later referred to as “freedom fighters”. This short-sighted strategy came back to haunt the U.S. on 9/11.
Back on March 9 I made mention of this frightening parallel during an interview with RT News (which can be found here). During the discussion I was quoted as saying:
“If we intervene, theoretically we are going to be intervening on the side of the Islamists once again. There we go… Afghanistan again… We need to stay out of this,” Michael Hughes concluded.
Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter's national security adviser, was asked recently if he regretted supporting Islamic extremists during the Soviet “jihad”, considering it eventually led to the rise of the Taliban movement. He replied:
"What is most important to the history of the world? The Taliban or the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some stirred-up Muslims or the liberation of central Europe and the end of the cold war?"
About a month ago we said the worst case that could possibly emerge from a post-Gaddafi power vacuum would be a failed state akin to Somalia that could easily become a terrorist incubator. Gaddafi adeptly crushed Libya's Islamic extremist opposition years ago. But these fighters then joined the global jihad and honed their skills abroad:
Libyan jihadists are considered some of the most extreme on earth. The September 2007 seizure of a large batch of al-Qaeda files in the Iraqi city of Sinjar indicated that a proportionally higher percentage of Libyans were engaged in the fighting in Iraq than their counterparts from other countries, including Saudi Arabia.
And 85 percent of Libyans listed their occupation as suicide bomber, compared to only 50 percent of Saudis, indicating that the Libyans tended to be more radical than their Saudi brethren.
These al-Qaeda-led rebels were in danger of losing Benghazi, their eastern stronghold, before U.S.-led coalition airstrikes were launched against Libya on March 19. Since then, the rebels not only maintained control of Benghazi but today seized Ajdabiya and Brega in the West.
However, Libyan opposition leaders claimed today they no longer need outside assistance and can win the next battle on their own.
Suggested Links
- Scenes from the Libyan War: Gaddafi and rebels locked in a stalemate (photos)
- Scenes from the Libyan Civil War: Rebels of Ras Lanuf (Photos)
- U.S.-led coalition tomahawks Libya (photos / video)
- Kucinich says Obama should be impeached for ordering attack on Libya
- Scenes from the Tunisian Revolution (photos)

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