WASHINGTON’S
AL QAEDA ALLY NOW LEADING ISIS IN LIBYA
The revelations that US
ally ABDELHAKIM BELHADJ is now leading ISIS in LIBYA should come as no surprise
to those who have followed US policy in that country, and throughout the
region. It illustrates for the umpteenth time that WASHINGTON has provided aid
and comfort to precisely those forces it claims to be fighting around the
world.
ISLAM
– A CONVENIENT TOOL FOR AMERICA’S GEO -STRATEGIC POLICIES?
According to recent
reports, ABDELHAKIM BELHADJ has now firmly ensconced himself as the
organizational commander of the ISIS presence inside LIBYA. The information
comes from an unnamed US intelligence official who has confirmed that BELHADJ is
supporting and coordinating the efforts of the ISIS training centers in eastern
LIBYA around the city of DERNA, an area long known as a hotbed of jihadi
militancy.
Background
Information:
THE
BALKANIZATION OF LIBYA Part 1
DESTABILIZATION
OF NORTH AFRICAN - A CALCULATED MOVE?
THE
BALKANIZATION OF LIBYA Part 2
WALL
STREET COULD NOT ALLOW TRIPOLI TO BE DEBT-FREE, to continue accumulating
international financial possessions, and to be a creditor nation giving
international loans and investing funds in other countries, particularly in
AFRICA.
In 2008 GOLDMAN SACHS was given us$1.3 billion dollars by the LIBYAN investment authority. (Part 2 - BALKANIZATION of LIBYA)
THE
BALKANIZATION OF LIBYA Part 3
ISLAM
– A CONVENIENT TOOL FOR AMERICA’S GEO -STRATEGIC POLICIES?
BELHADJ
SERVED THE US CAUSE IN LIBYA
While it may not seem to
be a major story – AL QAEDA terrorist turns ISIS commander – the reality is
that since 2011 the US and its NATO allies have held up BELHADJ as a “freedom
fighter.” They portrayed him as a man who courageously led his fellow
freedom-lovers against the “tyrannical despot” GADDAFI whose security forces at
one time captured and imprisoned many members of the LIBYAN ISLAMIC FIGHTING
GROUP (LIFG), including BELHADJ.
BELHADJ served the US
cause in LIBYA so well that he can be seen receiving accolades from Sen. JOHN
MCCAIN who referred to BELHADJ and his followers as heroes. He was initially
rewarded after the fall of GADDAFI with the post of military commander of TRIPOLI,
though he was forced to give way to a more politically palatable “transitional
government” which has since evaporated in that chaotic, war-ravaged country.
BELHADJ’S history of
terrorist activity includes such “achievements” as collaboration with AL QAEDA in
AFGHANISTAN and IRAQ, and of course his convenient servitude to the US-NATO
sponsored rampage across LIBYA that, among other things, caused mass killings
of black LIBYANS and anyone suspected of being part of the Green Resistance
(those loyal to the LIBYAN ARAB JAMAHIRIYA led by GADDAFI). Although the
corporate media tried to make a martyr of BELHADJ for his alleged torture via
the CIA rendition program, the inescapable fact is that wherever he goes he
leaves a violent and bloody wake.
Background
Information:
THE POST-GADDAFI
LIBYA IS NOT REAL
While much of this
information is known, what is of paramount importance is placing this news in a
proper political context, one that illustrates clearly the fact that the US has
been, and continues to be, the major patron of extremist militants from LIBYA
to SYRIA and beyond, and that all talk of “moderate rebels” is merely rhetoric
designed to fool an unthinking public.
There is ample documented
evidence of BELHADJ’S association with AL QAEDA and his terrorist exploits the
world over. Various reports have highlighted his experiences fighting in AFGHANISTAN
and elsewhere, and he himself has boasted of killing US troops in IRAQ.
However, it was in Libya in 2011 where BELHADJ became the face of the “rebels”
seeking to topple GADDAFI and the legal government of LIBYA.
Background
Information:
REBEL GROUP
ASSASSINATION OF QADDAFI, A COINCIDENT, OR STAGED WITH THE ASSISTANCE OF
FOREIGN ENTITIES?
BELHADJ
A PARTICIPANT IN THE US-NATO WAR ON LIBYA
As the New York Times
reported:
The LIBYAN ISLAMIC
FIGHTING GROUP was formed in 1995 with the goal of ousting Colonel QADDAFI.
Driven into the mountains or exile by LIBYAN security forces, the group’s
members were among the first to join the fight against QADDAFI security forces…
Officially the fighting group does not exist any longer, but the former members
are fighting largely under the leadership of ABU ABDULLAH SADIK [aka ABDELHAKIM
BELHADJ].
Background
Information:
LIBYA - A DELIBERATELY
FAILED STATE?
So, not only was BELHADJ a
participant in the US-NATO war on LIBYA, he was one of its most powerful
leaders, heading a battle-hardened jihadist faction that constituted the
leading edge of the war against GADDAFI. Nowhere was this more clearly
demonstrated than when the LIBYAN ISLAMIC FIGHTING GROUP (LIFG) took the lead
in the attack on GADDAFI’S compound at BAB AL-AZIZIYA. In this regard, LIFG was
provided intelligence, and likely also tactical support, from US intelligence
and the US military.
This new information
about BELHADJ’S association with the suddenly globally relevant ISIS certainly
bolsters the argument that political analysts have made since 2011 – that the
US-NATO war on LIBYA was waged by terrorist groups overtly and tacitly
supported by US intelligence and the US military. Moreover, it dovetails with
other information that has surfaced in recent years, information that shines a
light on how the US exploited for its own geopolitical purposes one of the most
active terrorist hotbeds anywhere in the world.
Background
Information : DERNA
AN OFFSHOOT OF THE
ISLAMIC STATE ORGANIZATION HAS ALSO EMERGED IN LIBYA, SPECIFICALLY IN THE CITY
OF DERNA
According to the recent
reports, BELHADJ is directly involved with supporting the ISIS training centers
in DERNA. Of course DERNA should be well known to anyone who has followed LIBYA
since 2011, because that city, along with TOBRUK and BENGHAZI, were the centers
of anti-GADDAFI terrorist recruitment in the early days of the “uprising” all
through the fateful year of 2011. But DERNA was known long before that as a
locus of militant extremism.
In a major 2007 study
entitled “AL-QA’IDA’S Foreign Fighters in IRAQ: A First Look at the SINJAR Records”
conducted by the Combating Terrorism Center at the US Military Academy at West
Point, the authors noted that:
Almost 19 percent of the
fighters in the SINJAR Records came from LIBYA alone. Furthermore, LIBYA
contributed far more fighters per capita than any other nationality in the SINJAR
Records, including SAUDI ARABIA… The apparent surge in LIBYAN recruits
traveling to Iraq may be linked the LIBYAN ISLAMIC FIGHTING GROUP’S (LIFG)
increasingly cooperative relationship with AL-QA’IDA which culminated in the
LIFG officially joining AL-QA’IDA on November 3, 2007…The most common cities
that the fighters called home were DARNAH [DERNA], LIBYA and RIYADH, SAUDI
ARABIA, with 52 and 51 fighters respectively. DARNAH [DERNA] with a population
just over 80,000 compared to RIYADH’S 4.3 million, has far and away the largest
per capita number of fighters in the SINJAR records.
DERNA
- THE TERRORIST
And so, the US military
and intelligence community has known for nearly a decade (perhaps longer) that DERNA
has long been directly or indirectly controlled by jihadis of the LIFG variety,
and that that city had acted as a primary recruiting ground for terrorism
throughout the region. Naturally, such information is vital if we are to
understand the geopolitical and strategic significance of the notion of ISIS
training camps associated with the infamous BELHADJ on the ground in DERNA.
This leads us to three
interrelated, and equally important, conclusions. First, DERNA is once again
going to provide foot soldiers for a terror war to be waged both in LIBYA, and
in the region more broadly, with the obvious target being SYRIA. Second is the
fact that the training sites at DERNA will be supported and coordinated by a
known US asset. And third, that the US policy of supporting “moderate rebels”
is merely a public relations campaign designed to convince average AMERICANS
(and those in the WEST generally) that it is not supporting terrorism, despite
all the evidence to the contrary.
THE
MYTH OF ‘MODERATE REBELS’
The news about BELHADJ and
ISIS must not be seen in a vacuum. Rather, it should be still further proof
that the notion of “moderates” being supported by the US is an insult to the
intelligence of political observers and the public at large.
Background
Information:
US
CONCEPT OF TRAINING “MODERATE REBELS” IN SYRIA SEEMS SOMEWHAT LUDICROUS
For more than three years
now, WASHINGTON has trumpeted its stated policy of support to so-called
moderate rebels in SYRIA – a policy which has at various times folded such
diverse terror groups as the AL FAROOQ BRIGADES (of cannibalism fame) and HAZM
(“Determination”) into one large “moderate” tent. Unfortunately for US
propagandists and assorted warmongers however, these groups along with many
others have since voluntarily or forcibly been incorporated into JABHAT
AL-NUSRA and ISIS/ISIL.
Background
Information:
RUSSIA'S REVENGE FOR LIBYA
As mentioned numerous times, RUSSIA and CHINA
felt that they were left out of the equation regarding the LIBYAN operation
instigated by the USA, FRANCE and BRITAIN. CHINA and RUSSIA invested heavily in
LIBYA prior to the toppling of the LIBYAN regime, only to find out that they
were kept completely out of the picture regarding the true intentions the
Western coalition force had in mind with LIBYA once the regime was removed,
namely tap the oil reserves of LIBYA.
Subsequently RUSSIA and CHINA learned their
lesson and thus would not make the same mistake regarding SYRIA, permitting
LIBYAN style intervention by WESTERN and GULF STATES coalition forces. No
matter that SYRIA lacks oil reserves or other natural resources worth fighting
over, their veto was more of a symbolic gesture telling WESTERN and GULF STATES
coalition forces: that’s how far you can go this time around, but no further.
Note from the Editor: Above paragraph was
written by Geopolitical Analysis and Monitoring in June 2012 and included into
this analysis
Unlike in LIBYA,
RUSSIA and CHINA this time around will not tolerate to be left out of the
SYRIAN equation and energy game
Recently, there have been
many reports of mass defections of formerly FREE SYRIAN ARMY factions to ISIS,
bringing along with them their advanced US-supplied weaponry. Couple that with
the “poster boys” for WASHINGTON policy, the aforementioned HAZM group, now
having become part of JABHAT AL NUSRA, the AL QAEDA linked group in SYRIA. Of
course these are only a few of the many examples of groups that have become
affiliated with either the ISIS or Al QAEDA brand in SYRIA, including LIWAA
AL-FAROUQ, LIWAA AL-QUSAYR, and LIWAA AL-TURKOMEN to name just a few.
THE
ENEMY OF MY ENEMY IS MY FRIEND…UNTIL HE
What has become clear is
that the US and its allies, in their unending quest for regime change in SYRIA,
have been overtly supporting extremist elements that have now coalesced to form
a global terror threat in ISIS, NUSRA, and AL QAEDA.
But of course, this is
nothing new, as the BELHADJ episode in LIBYA demonstrates unequivocally. The
man who was once AL QAEDA, then became a “moderate” and “our man in TRIPOLI,”
has now become the leader of the ISIS threat in LIBYA. So too have “our
friends” become our enemies in SYRIA. None of this should surprise anyone.
Background
Information:
POROUS BORDERS
TURN LIBYA INTO RADICAL SANCTUARY
But perhaps JOHN MCCAIN
would like to answer some questions about his long-standing connections with BELHADJ
and the “moderates” in SYRIA. Would OBAMA like to explain why his “humanitarian
intervention” in LIBYA has become a humanitarian nightmare for that country,
and indeed the whole region? Would the CIA, which has been extensively involved
in all of these operations, like to come clean about just who they've been
supporting and what role they've played in fomenting this chaos?
It’s unlikely that any of
such questions will ever be asked by anyone in the corporate media. Just as it’s doubt-able that any answers will ever be furnished by those in Washington whose
decisions have created this catastrophe .
So, it is for those outside the corporate
propaganda matrix to demand answers, and to never let the establishment
suppress alternative opinions…or the truth.
Adapted by Geopolitical Analysis and Monitoring from the article originally written by Eric Draitser
