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| Africa North |
| Libyans deny al-Qaeda presence |
| 2011-06-01 |
| [Maghrebia] Following the death of the late Osama bin Laden ... who is no more... and Muammar Qadaffy's ... Custodian of Wheelus AFB for 42 long years ... allegations of al-Qaeda involvement in the February 17th uprising, many Libyans are speaking out against claims that the terror group has a presence in the country. "It is a scarecrow used by the regime to frighten the West and to attract compassion, but in truth I do not think that al-Qaeda exists in Libya because the Libyan people are good religious people who are characterised by tolerance," said Gheith Saghou, an English teacher from An Nawfaliya in western Ajdabiya. "Members of al-Qaeda may be located anywhere in the world," he said. "Despite the fact that their presence in Libya was not proved, there are some ideas linked to al-Qaeda here. This does not prevent us from entering a dialogue with members, to convince them to abandon the ideas on which we disagree. This will naturally create a method of tolerance and dialogue for al-Qaeda rather than the ideas that they were framed with." "Libya is now considered an unstable place until Qadaffy goes and his regime falls," said Adel Mohamed Najib, a student at the University of Garyounis. "If the crisis in Libya does not come to an end soon, there is a possibility that al-Qaeda will appear." Mohamed Issa from Al Marj said: "There are some young people who, due to repression and pressure, went to Iraq and Afghanistan to fight... but that was due to the political vacuum. It does not mean that al-Qaeda exists in Libya -- on the contrary." "If there are any cut-thoat groups, it is due to the lack of real democracy -- in the Middle East especially," said Amine Imam, a forensic doctor from Derna. "People always look for something better; in Libya the future was unclear and youth had no ambition, which led some to resort to extremism." Imam said that it would be easy to change this behaviour, by "building new ideas, improving education and providing entertainment and sports", and giving young people a way to build their nation. "Young people agree with al-Qaeda on certain ideas, but they are not al-Qaeda and they are not against the United States of America," he said. "On the contrary; we respect them, and we hope that the people who are oppressed and poor will defeat al-Qaeda." Ahmed Khalifa, a media professional from Benghazi, said, "I do not consider the method of jihadist organisations to bring about change with force as acceptable in many cases, because of the bad echoes relating to the actions of these organisations towards the states they are fighting with." "There is clear evidence that the methods of al-Qaeda and other jihadist organisations had a negative impact on the reputation of Islam in the rest of the world," he said, adding that the organisation's methods are "no longer feasible". |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #2 Libyan rebel commander admits his fighters have al-Qaeda links |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2011-06-01 10:47 |
| #1 Well...there ya have it. There's no AQ in Libya. (So says a teacher, a student, a doctor, a media professional, and a guy from Al Marj.) |
| Posted by: DepotGuy 2011-06-01 10:40 |