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Libya's Liberation Front is organizing in the Sahel according to Franklin Lamb, with commentary by Dennis South
By Dr. Franklin Lamb (Dr. Franklin Lamb Reports directly from the front in the Sahel. He is with the Libyan Liberation Front. Months ago, Dr. Lamb was shot in the leg by a Libyan traitor. Dr. Lamb also put his own life on the line by hiding a black-African in his hotel room, to protect him from the racist rats.)
Yet, when standing along its edge, the Sahel does have the appearance of a sort of dividing shoreline between the endless sands of the Sahara and the Savanna grasses to the south. Parts of Mali, Algeria, Niger, Chad, and Sudan, all along the Libyan border fall within this supposed no man's land. Today the Sahel is providing protection, weapons gathering and storage facilities, sites for training camps, and hideouts as well as a generally formidable base for those working to organize the growing Libyan Liberation Front (LLF). The aim of the LLF is to liberate Libya from what it considers NATO installed colonial puppets. The Sahel region is only one of multiple locations which are becoming active as the Libyan counter revolution, led by members of the Gadahfi and Wafalla tribes, make preparations for the next phase of resistance.
When I entered an office conference room in Niger recently to meet with some recent evacuees from Libya who I was advised were preparing to launch a "people's struggle employing the Maoist tactic of 1000 cuts" against the current group claiming to represent Libya," two facts struck me. One was how many were present and did not appear to be scruffy, intensely zealous or desperate but who were obviously rested, calm, organized and methodical in their demeanor. My colleague, a member of the Gadhafi tribe from Sirte explained "More than 800 organizers have arrived from Libya just to Niger and more come every day". An officer in uniform added, "It is not like your western media presents the situation, of desperate Gadhafi loyalists frantically handing out bundles of cash and gold bars to buy their safety from the NATO death squads now swarming around the northern areas of our motherland. Our brothers have controlled the borderless routes in this region for thousands of years and they know how not to be detected even by NATO satellites and drones." The other subject I thought about as I sat in an initial meeting was what a difference three decades can make. As I sat there I recalled my visit with former Fatah youth leader Salah Tamari, who did good work at the Israeli prison camp at Ansar, south Lebanon during the 1982 aggression, as the elected negotiator for his fellow inmates. Tamari insisted on joining some of them at a new PLO base at Tabessa, Algeria.
This was shortly after the PLO leadership, wrongly in my judgment, agreed to evacuate Lebanon in August of 1982 rather than wage a Stalingrad defense (admittedly minus the nonexistent expected Red Army) and the PLO leadership apparently credited Reagan administration promises of " an American guaranteed Palestinian state within a year. You can take that to the bank" in the words of US envoy Philip Habib. Seemingly ever trustful of Ronald Reagan for some reason, PLO leader Arafat kept Habib's written promise in his shirt pocket to show doubters, including his Deputy, Khalil al Wazir (Abu Jihad) and the womenfolk among others in Shatila Camp who had some grave misgivings about their protectors leaving them.
At Tabessa, somewhere in the vast Algerian desert, the formerly proud PLO defenders were essentially idle and caged inside their camp and apart from some physical training sessions appeared to spend their days drinking coffee and smoking and worrying about their loved ones in Lebanon as news of the September 1982 Israeli-organized massacre at Sabra-Shatila fell on Tabessa Camp like a huge bomb and many fighters rejected Tamari's orders and left for Shatila. This is not the case with Libyan evacuees in Niger. They have the latest model satellite phones, laptops and better equipment than most of the rich news outlets showed up with at Tripoli's media hotels over the past nine months.
This observer's "how did you all get here and where did you secure all this new electronic equipment so fast?" question was answered with a mute smile and wink from a hijabed young lady who I last saw in August handing out press releases at Tripoli's Rixos Hotel for Libyan spokesman Dr. Musa Ibrahim late last August. On that particular day, Musa was telling the media as he stood next to Deputy Foreign Minister Khalid Kaim, a friend to many Americans and human rights activists, that Tripoli would not fall to NATO rebels and "we have 6,500 well trained soldiers who are waiting for them." As it turned out, the commander of the 6,500 was owned by NATO and he instructed his men not to oppose the entering rebel forces. Tripoli fell the next day and the day after Khalid was arrested and is still inside one of dozens of rebel jails petitioning his unresponsive captors for family visits while an international, American organized, legal team is negotiating to visit him. The LLF has military and political projects in the works. One of the latter is to compete for every vote in next summer's promised election. One staffer I met with has the job of studying the elections in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere in the region for possible applications to Libya. Another LLF committee is putting together a Nationalist campaign message plus specific campaign planks for their candidates to run on and putting together lists of recommendations of specific candidates. Nothing is firmly decided yet, but one Libyan professor told me "for sure Women's rights will be a major plank. "Women are horrified by what NTC Chairman Jalil said while seeking support from Al Qaeda supporters who threaten to control Libya, about polygamy being the future in Libya and the fact that women will no longer be given the home when divorced. Libya has been very progressive with women's rights as with Palestinian rights." Aisha Gadhafi, the only daughter of Muammar who is now living next door in Algeria with family members including her two month old baby, was a major force behind the 2010 enactment by the Peoples Congresses of more rights for women. She has been asked to write a pamphlet on the need to retain women's rights which will be distributed if the 2012 elections actually materialize. While their beloved country lay in substantial NATO bombed ruin, the pro-Gadhafi LLF has some major pluses on its side. One is the tribes who during last summer were starting to stand up against NATO just as Tripoli fell before they launched their efforts which included a new Constitution. The LLF believes the tribes can be crucial in getting out the vote. Perhaps even a more powerful arrow in the LLF's quiver as it launches its counter revolution are the 35 years of political experience of the hundreds of Libyan People's Committees long established in every village in Libya along with the Secretariats of the People's Conferences. While currently inactive (outlawed by NATO--truth be told) they are quickly regrouping and are expected to be able to dominate any forthcoming election. Sometimes the subjects of ridicule by some under informed self-styled Libya "experts," the People's Congresses (PCs), based on the Green Book series written by "Baba" Gadhafi, are actually quite democratic and a study of their work makes clear that they have increasingly functioned not as mere rubber stamps for ideas that floated from over the walls of Bab al Azziza barracks. A secretary general of one of the Congresses, now working in Niger, repeated what one western delegation was told during a fascinating late June three hour briefing at the Tripoli HQ of the national People's Conference (Congress) Secretariat. Participants were shown attendance and voting records as well of each item voted on for the past decade and the minutes of the most recent People's Congress debates. They illustrate the similarities between the People's Congresses and the New England Town Meeting in terms of the local population making decisions that affect their community and an open agenda where complaints and new proposals can be made and discussed. Libyan leaders, including Muammar Gadhafi lost plenty of votes on items they favored or proposed. In the last few years the Guide declined to take public positions on the items to be voted on in the PCs because he preferred not to influence or interfere with what he called "the decisions of the masses." This observer particularly enjoyed his 4 years term representing Ward 2A in the Brookline, Massachusetts Town Meeting while in college in Boston, sometimes sitting next my neighbors Kitty and Michael Dukakis. While we both won a seat in the election, I received 42 votes more than Mike but he rose politically while it could be said that I sank, following my joining Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), the ACLU and the Black Panthers all in one semester as an undergraduate at Boston University, following an inspiring meeting with Professor Noam Chomsky and Professor Howard Zinn in Chomski's office at MIT. The Town Meeting debates were interesting and productive and "Mustafa", the National Secretary of the Libyan People's Congress, who studied at George Washington University in WDC and wrote a graduate thesis on New England Town Meetings, claimed his country patterned their People's Congresses on them. Unfortunately, "Mustafa" is also now incarcerated by the NTC according to mutual friends.
Who LLF candidates will be if an election is actually held is unknown but some are suggesting Dr. Abu Zeid Dorda, now recovering from his "suicide attempt" (the former Libyan UN Ambassador was thrown out of a second floor window during interrogations last month by NATO agents but he survived in front of witnesses so is now recovering in prison medical ward). Contrary to media stories, Saif al Islam is not about to surrender to the International Criminal Court and, like Musa Ibrahim, is well. Both are being urged to lay low for now, rest, and try to heal a bit from NATO's killing of family members and many close friends.
Many legal and political analysts think the ICC will not proceed with any trials relating to Libya for reasons of the ICC's convoluted rules and structure and uncertainly of securing convictions of the "right" suspects. Whatever happens on this subject, if a case goes forward, researchers are preparing to fill the ICC courtroom with documentation of NATO crimes during its 9 month, 23,000 sorties and 10,000 bombing attacks on the five million population country. Some International Criminal Court observers are encouraged by the ICC Prosecutor's Office pledge this week and as reported: "to investigate and prosecute any crimes committed both by rebel and pro-Gadhafi forces including any committed by NATO."
As one victim of NATO crimes, who on June 20, 2011 lost four of his family members including three infant children, as five NATO American MK-83 bombs were dropped and two missiles fired on the family compound in a failed assassination attempt against his father, a former aide to Colonel Gadhafi, wrote this observer yesterday from his secret sanctuary, "This is good news if it is true.". As NATO moves its focus and drones to the Seral, it is possible that its nine months of carnage against this gentle country and people will not in the end achieve its goals and that the Libyan people will defeat NATO's neo-colonial project both by armed resistance and at the ballot box. A rejuvenated national resistance has begun on Libya's borders. Franklin Lamb is doing research in Libya. He is reachable c\o fplamb@gmail.com Dennis South Comments: The LLF would best be able to decided what route to take in Libya, of course. I just wonder about the route of elections. What does Al-Qaeda care about elections? What do the rats care about elections? What does the TNC's European and American masters care about elections? They don't even hold honest elections in their own countries. They use various tricks, including the computer-sabotage of voting machines, to steal elections from candidates that do not support the corporate agenda. Elections? What international body will be respected by the rats and Al-Qaeda? How can any elections be held, when the rats will, no doubt, simply kill any "suspected" pro-Jamahiriya Libyan? I understand, of course, that the rationale of the LLF entering candidates is so that it would not appear to be "un-democratic." But, the LLF had better listen to this: The masters of the TNC, i.e., Europe and America, are not going to stand for fair elections. They are going to do everything to assure that rats are elected. They did everything to assure that the rats were imposed on Libya, including killing 90,000 Libyans, destroying all of the Libyan infrastructure, destroying Sirte, killing 30,000 blacks in Tawerga, raping women, dropping bombs for 8 months, non-stop. So now, are we to really believe that elections in Libya will be fair? I wonder what "elections" Mao held. The Libyan people have to make their own decisions. But the Chinese won their liberation by physically pushing Chiang Kai-Shek out of China and to the Island of Taiwan. The Vietnamese won their liberation by pushing the U.S. out of Vietnam, militarily. It is always extremely difficult to sit on the sidelines, in a comfortable chair, "running off at the mouth" about what the Libyan people should do. But I cannot help but register my opinion, based on the reality that we have seen for 8 months. Elections were already called for, many months ago, by the representatives of the Jamahiriya. Those calls for elections were ignored by the rats and by the northern countries, because elections are not the point for them. The only point for them is force. That's it. They control through force of arms, and nothing else. God forgive me if I am wrong for issuing these cautions. But, Europe and the United States are headed by gangsters. Their governments are not legitimate governments at all. Their governments are criminal enterprises, led by thugs. It is up to the LLF, of course. But, what happens if the LLF loses elections, based on fraud? President George Bush "won" an election based on pure fraud, and it is now common knowledge. If the U.S. government will perpetrate a fraud on 365,000,000 U.S. citizens, then what does the LLF think that the U.S. cares about 5 million or 6 million Libyans? Nothing. It's time to dream, and it's time to make the dream come true, especially through the youth. There will be no safety for Libya until North Africa unites, despite tribal, philosophical, religious, racial, ethic, differences. North African unity trumps so-called "elections" in a place where devils exist. I hope that Saharan unity is being discussed, within the LLF, as a political and military option. The northern countries play hard. The northern countries do not give a shit about democracy. That has to be understood. Perhaps the only place on earth that cared about democracy was the Libyan Jamahiriya. Long range goal? Unity. Short range goal? Unity. Total unity. There is no choice, and the formations need to begin now, and be maintained and strengthened to completion. I assume that they are beginning now. The northern countries are making it clear what they are about. The notion of the "sovereignty" of North African countries has to be replaced by the notion of the sovereignty of the North African Union. The rule should be: If you jump on one, you jump on all. If you jump on Libya, you jump on Egypt, and Egypt will fight with Libya. We all know how Muammar lambasted the Arabs for their back-stabbing disunity. But Muammar has not stopped hoping for that unity. This unity has to soon begin to be talked bout "in the streets" of North Africa; under the tents of North Africa. This must be the talk now: North African Unity and independence. Rely on each other; on Africa; on the socialist countries of South America. It is time--now!  |
"Sahel" in Arabic means "coast" or "shoreline". Unless one was present 5000 years ago when, according to anthropologists, our planet's first cultivation of crops began in this then plush, but now semiarid, region where temperatures reach 125 degrees F, and only camels and an assortment of creatures can sniff out water sources, it seems an odd geographical name place for this up 450 miles wide swatch of baked sand that runs from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea.
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