Guardian UK-Libya's spectacular revolution's been disgraced by racism(rebels killing black Africans)

[stockholmer]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/30/libya-spectacular-revolution-disgraced-racism

"This is a bad time to be a black man in Libya," reported Alex Thomson on Channel 4 News on Sunday. http://youtu.be/EhshGX4x3rY Elsewhere, Kim Sengupta reported for the Independent http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/rebels-settle-scores-in-libyan-capital-2344671.html on the 30 bodies lying decomposing in Tripoli. The majority of them, allegedly mercenaries for Muammar Gaddafi, were black. They had been killed at a makeshift hospital, some on stretchers, some in an ambulance. "Libyan people don't like people with dark skins," a militiaman explained http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/libyans-dont-like-people-with-dark-skin-but-some-are-innocent-2345859.html in reference to the arrests of black men.

The basis of this is rumours, disseminated early in the rebellion, of African mercenaries being unleashed on the opposition. Amnesty International's Donatella Rivera was among researchers who examined this allegation and found no evidence for it. Peter Bouckaert of Human Rights Watch similarly had not "identified one mercenary" http://www.theage.com.au/world/africans-targeted-as-rebels-hunt-mercenaries-20110305-1bivv.html among the scores of men being arrested and falsely labelled by journalists as such.

Lurking behind this is racism. Libya is an African nation – however, the term "Africans" is used in Libya to reference the country's black minority. The Amnesty International researcher Diana Eltahawy http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2011/0829/In-Tripoli-African-mercenaries-at-risk says that the rebels taking control of Libya have tapped into "existing xenophobia". The New York Times refers to "racist overtones", http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/24/world/africa/24fog.html?_r=2&pagewanted=all but sometimes the racism is explicit.

A rebel slogan painted in Misrata during the fighting salutes "the brigade for purging slaves, black skin". A consequence of this racism has been mass arrests http://articles.latimes.com/2011/mar/24/world/la-fg-libya-prisoners-20110324 of black men, http://www.theage.com.au/world/africans-targeted-as-rebels-hunt-mercenaries-20110305-1bivv.html and gruesome killings http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iguwImnkLDagEFqL5wmghAzQYxsA?docId=96d60e2881b7421ba4c6214324af1170 – just some of the various atrocities http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jSpsLoDHEaqekqcHUHKBzA5YGaZQ?docId=CNG.c12c140bd2e4fc0a6a87ad853c05ac1c.3f1 that human rights organisations blame rebels for. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/13/world/africa/13libya.html The racialisation of this conflict does not end with hatred of "Africans". Graffiti by rebels http://www.npr.org/blogs/pictureshow/2011/04/17/135435354/gadhafi-graffiti-in-libya?ft=1&f=1009 frequently depicted Gaddafi as a demonic Jew.

snip
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http://mathaba.net/news/?x=628411

Widespread racist murders in Libya at the hands of rebel forces revealed




They are called “Gaddafi loyalists”, “Sub-Saharan mercenaries” and other phrases all pointing to the unfortunate reality that every single black person is now considered by the rebels to be a mercenary hired by Gaddafi. The Libyan rebels and those carrying water for them in the Western media are now attempting to conceal the fact that they are now committing crimes against humanity in the active targeting of innocent black Libyans.

Some call the attacks “reprisals” or “revenge” but in reality they are hateful murders carried out by the al Qaeda-affiliated, Western backed and trained rebels. These killings are irrefutably tied to the wildly racist and wholly unfounded claims that Gaddafi hired Sub-Saharan African mercenaries to murder his own people during the uprising. Unfortunately for the painfully ignorant rebels and their Western compatriots, this is simply not true and has never been verified in any way.

As I covered in my article about the “waves of disinformation” emanating out of Libya, http://pub.mathaba.net/2011/08/29/2011/08/23/even-the-mainstream-media-are-now-admitting-%e2%80%9cwaves-of-disinformation%e2%80%9d-in-libya/ even the New York Times now is forced to admit that there is no substantiation for the claims whatsoever. The rebels have alleged that they captured these so-called mercenaries but quite conveniently they have never been able to show a single international journalist these captured fighters.

snip

The British news organization the Independent http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/rebels-settle-scores-in-libyan-capital-2344671.html has published an article today that revealed some of the instances of this tragic race-based violence in Libya. One man named Ahmed Bin Sabri told the Independent as he pulled back a tent flap, “Come and see. These are blacks, Africans, hired by Gaddafi, mercenaries.” Speaking of the dead bodies put on display by Bin Sabri, the Independent aptly points out, “Why had an injured man receiving treatment been executed?” Bin Sabri merely shrugged in response and the Independent writes, “It was seemingly incomprehensible to him that anything wrong had been done.”

snip


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I posted on this very subject on DU back in March, and was basically ignored.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=125x310885

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x741241

[malaise]

1. Duh!!

Thanks NATO

[dipsydoodle]

2. We knew this was coming

and it will get worse - sadly.

[sudopod]

3. Why do you love $TODAYS_VILLAIN? nt

[Starry Messenger]

4. A few folks have tried to post about this tragedy.

We were told to shut up because "Bishop Tutu!!11"

[StarsInHerHair]

5. see also my very recent posts, I put an article link that has a TON of footnotes

[stockholmer]

10. I tried to find, could you please post the link (I did find an article you replied to that had a

tonne of very disturbing replies (not from you). So many have bought into the false propaganda that life in Libya was an utter hellhole, that he was so much worse than Mubarak, etc etc.

I have been to both places, and their is NO comparison. Yes, Ghaddafi was an authoritarian, but for the average Libya, they benefited to a large degree from his use of a large portion of the oil revenues.

Libya was ranked 57th in the world by the UN on the global development scale (ahead of not just all of Africa, but also Russia, Brazil, Ukraine, etc etc.) They also had access to universal health care, had a robust pension plan in many industries, married families received a house and child care, there was (especially compared to most of the middle east) a vibrant secular life, women's rights were far from perfect, but leaps beyond so so many countries. Ghaddafi also invested billions in upgrading Libya's infrastructure, including the amazing 'Great Man-Made River' that supplied the country with huge amounts of much-needed water.

He was surely not the best one could hope for, but hardly the despicable tyrant that the West has painting him as ever since NATO decided he had to go, and that they would take his countries oil from him and the Libyan people.

Look into Ghaddafi's deal for a massive oil pipeline directly to Italy. He was partners in this with Russia, Italy, and China. This pipeline would have completely undercut the Turkish/NATO countries' Nabucco pipeline, thus cutting out such giants as BP. The attacks on Berlusconi in Italy were started as soon as he sided against the Anglo-Americans by independent judicial prosecutors with NATO ties. This was then played out into the arena of war with the present invasion of Libya.

[StarsInHerHair]

12. I read it 1st on Washingtonsblog.com then there's a link to the guest author's site

http://andrewgavinmarshall.com/2011/08/26/lies-war-and-empire-nato%E2%80%99s-%E2%80%9Chumanitarian-imperialism%E2%80%9D-in-libya/

[stockholmer]

23. thanks

:hi:

[amborin]

17. good article here:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/tempers-flare-in-tripoli-as-liquidity-crisis-hits-before-eid-2346604.html

some of the comments following the article are excellent; the West salivates at the prospects....

[amborin]

6. K&R

[Xithras]

7. Gaddafi stripped them of citizenship in 2006

He decided that blacks aren't "real Libyans", even though there are tens of thousands of them in Libya and they've been there for centuries.

The Toubou in southern Libya actually supported the revolution, but it looks like they're not going to see any benefit from it.

[inna]

21. Absolutely false.

[Xithras]

24. Wow, what a convincing set of facts.

I post something, and you tell me I'm wrong without offering a single word to support your argument.

Is the UN Human Rights Commissioner wrong? Page 7, sections 32 & 33. http://lib.ohchr.org/HRBodies/UPR/Documents/Session9/LY/A_HRC_WG.6_9_LBY_3_Libya.pdf

The only thing I got wrong was the date. It happened in 2007, not 2006.

The Libyans have been ethnically cleansing their black population for years. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

[izquierdista]

8. Racism is the wrong word

Call it "tribalism". Tribes in Libya are fixating their revenge on people from tribes that populated Qaddafi's mercenaries. Not a good time to be a sub-Saharan African in Libya.

[pampango]

9. UK Guardian: The murder of black men...speaks of a society deeply divided for decades by Gaddafi.

The murder of black men in the aftermath of the rebellion speaks of a society deeply divided for decades by Muammar Gaddafi

How did it come to this? A spectacular revolution, speaking the language of democracy and showing tremendous courage in the face of brutal repression, has been disgraced. Racism did not begin with the rebellion – Gaddafi's regime exploited 2 million migrant workers while discriminating against them – but it has suffused the rebels' hatred of the violently authoritarian regime they have just replaced.

But the trouble was that the movement was almost emerging from nowhere. Unlike in Egypt, where a decade of activism and labour insurgency had cultivated networks of activists and trade unionists capable of outfoxing the dictatorship, Libya was not permitted a minimal space for civil society opposition. As a result, there was no institutional structure able to express this movement, no independent trade union movement, and certainly little in the way of an organised left. Into this space stepped those who had the greatest resources – the former regime notables, businessmen and professionals, as well as exiles. It was they who formed the National Transitional Council (NTC).

[stockholmer]

11. you left out one key group in the make-up of the National Transitional Council - al Qaeda

US and NATO use and support of al-Qaeda in the Libya coup d' etat

Abdel Hakim Belhaj (aka Abdul al-Hasadi), Tripoli's newly installed military governor (also a key official within Libya's National Transitional Council), is linked to Al Qaeda, reports Liberátion (Leftist French newspaper).

http://www.liberation.fr/monde/01012356209-abdelhakim-belhaj-le-retour-d-al-qaeda

http://translate.google.se/translate?js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&sl=fr&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.liberation.fr%2Fmonde%2F01012356209-abdelhakim-belhaj-le-retour-d-al-qaeda

Belhaj is the former head of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (an affiliate group of Al Qaeda). In 2003, Belhaj was arrested in Malaysia in 2003, later being interrogated by CIA in 2004 in Thailand. He was set free in Libya in 2008.


It's important to note Belhaj is supported by NATO, as Le Parisien and MSN France report:


http://news.fr.msn.com/m6-actualite/monde/libye-calme-relatif-%c3%a0-tripoli-avanc%c3%a9es-dans-louest-statu-quo-dans-lest-2

10 h 20. Un islamiste à la tête du commandement militaire de la rébellion à Tripoli. Abdelhakim Belhadj a été le chef militaire qui a préparé, avec l'aide de l'Otan, la prise du QG de Kadhafi, à Bab Al-Azizya. Al-Jazeera lui a consacré un long entretien en direct du QG à l'issue des combats. Ancien dirigeant du Groupe islamique des combattants libyens (GICL), lié à Al-Qaida, Abdelhakim Belhadj, a été arrêté en 2004 par les Américains en Asie et livré par la suite à la Libye, selon la presse arabe. Il aurait bénéficié de l'amnistie de centaines d'islamistes libyens en mars 2010 ordonnée par Saif Al-Islam, fils préféré de Kadhafi.



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Karel Abderrahim, a researcher at the Institute of International and Strategic Relations (Institut de relations internationales et stratégiques, a French think tank) said in an interview to La Croix, a Catholic French newspaper, that he is skeptical about the dissolution of Al Qaeda-Libyan Islamic Fighting Group:

http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&prev=_t&hl=pt-BR&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&sl=fr&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.la-croix.com%2FActualite%2FS-informer%2FMonde%2FKader-Abderrahim-chercheur-a-l-Iris-Je-ne-vois-pas-qui-pourrait-federer-la-Libye-_EG_-2011-08-24-702836

Further background:

http://www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/libyan-fighting-factions-to-unite-under-single-military-command-1.380955?localLinksEnabled=false

http://www.roadstoiraq.com/2011/08/27/al-qaeda-in-libya-started-to-act-killing-friends-and-foes
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Libyan rebel commander admits his fighters have al-Qaeda links

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/8407047/Libyan-rebel-commander-admits-his-fighters-have-al-Qaeda-links.html

"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.

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"....................


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flashback 2 years (including Young Turks video) more US support of terrorist groups

Saudis and CIA back Khalid Sheikh Mohammad’s Jundullah in Pakistan and Iran?

http://pakalert.wordpress.com/2009/02/07/saudis-and-cia-back-khalid-sheikh-mohammads-jundullah-in-pakistan-and-iran
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flashhback to 2007 (BBC)

Libyan Islamists 'join al-Qaeda'

Zawahri called for North African leaders to be overthrown
A Libyan Islamist group has joined al-Qaeda, according to an audio message on the internet attributed to the radical network's second-in-command.
Ayman al-Zawahri purportedly said the Fighting Islamic Group in Libya was becoming part of al-Qaeda.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7076604.stm

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flashback to 2002 (Guardian UK) French intelligence experts revealed how western intelligence agencies bankrolled a Libyan Al-Qaeda cell (and how the UK flat-out lied)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2002/nov/10/uk.davidshayler

MI6 'halted bid to arrest bin Laden'Startling revelations by French intelligence experts back David Shayler's alleged 'fantasy' about Gadaffi plot

British intelligence paid large sums of money to an al-Qaeda cell in Libya in a doomed attempt to assassinate Colonel Gadaffi in 1996 and thwarted early attempts to bring Osama bin Laden to justice.

The latest claims of MI6 involvement with Libya's fearsome Islamic Fighting Group, which is connected to one of bin Laden's trusted lieutenants, will be embarrassing to the Government, which described similar claims by renegade MI5 officer David Shayler as 'pure fantasy'

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Ties things up rather neatly, going back to at least 1996................... all on here supporting the NATO invasion need to wake up and stop taking so much of the US corporatist mainstream news as either truthful or comprehensive in its reporting.

[StarsInHerHair]

13. yeah, this looks like a COUNTER revolution

[stockholmer]

22. perfect choice of words

[Romulox]

19. Count on this poster to offer a hastily constructed (if not comically shoddy) defense:

Namely, Ghaddafi failed to provide an institutional structure for the rebels to express their murderous rage!

Therefore, it's only natural that the "rebels" be genocidal racists! Ghaddafi made them that way! :rofl:

[malletgirl02]

14. The Guardian

Back when the NATO operations first began. My old boss before he retired said that blacks were being killed in Libya. I tried to find an article backing up what he said, but it was not until you posted the Guardian link that I was able to find a solid news source of the violence. There were very few news sources reporting on this.I apologize for overlooking your posts back in March I don't remember seeing them.

[EFerrari]

15. The story has been largely confined to the black press here,

Open Season: Hunting Black People in Libya
http://blackstarnews.com/news/135/ARTICLE/7609/2011-08-30.html

but it's starting to leak out into the corporate MSM.

In Tripoli, African 'mercenaries' at risk
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2011/0829/In-Tripoli-African-mercenaries-at-risk

'We are afraid . . . people might think we are mercenaries'
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2011/0831/1224303238641.html

[Recovered Repug]

16. No worries.

NATO is there to protect civilians.

[inna]

18. KR

I, also, have been aware of these utterly disturbing reports for months.

The picture that emerges is nothing short of chilling.

Thank you for your posts.

[Romulox]

20. The UN approved all of this, so it's nice and legal-like.

Right? :shrug: