SAIF AL-ISLAM GADDAFI, SON OF MUAMMAR GADDAFI ASSASSINATED

Written by Michael Thervil

SAIF AL-ISLAM GADDAFI, SON OF MUAMMAR GADDAFI ASSASSINATED | PHOTO BY SABRI ELMHEDWI/EPA

[Saif al-Islam Muammar Gaddafi assassinated] Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, Son of former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi who was killed in 2011 by American backed Libyan opposition forces has been assassinated on Tuesday at the age of 53.  Saif al-Islam Gaddafi born in 1972 and second born was assassinated when three men broke into his home in Zintan, Libya. An initial investigation by Libyan authorities found that the power to his home security cameras were intentionally cut. In self-defense, Saif al-Islam Gaddafi put up an intense struggle with the assassins he was shot and killed. Saif al-Islam Gaddafi has been residing in Zintan since 2011 as he was captured after the killing of his father and seeking to flee the country and released from imprisonment via general pardon in 2017.

During his father's administration, Saif al-Islam Gaddafi was once considered to be a progressive by many and sought to move away from Libya owning weapons of mass destruction. He also led talks that would directly compensate victims of the Pan AM flight 103 bombing which was carried out by Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi and Lamen Khalifa Fhimah, two Libyan Intelligence Officers under his father administration in 1988 which claimed the lives of 259 people and of those 259 people 190 of them were Americans.

Many people are holding the position that the reason why Saif al-Islam Gaddafi was assassinated was because he posed an imminent threat to the elites within Libya. Why there could be some truth to that, it should be noted that Saif al-Islam Gaddafi did campaign to be the next President of Libya in 2021 but his run for presidency was stonewalled by political elites on both sides of the aisle. In an interview with the New York Times during his run to possibly become the next President of Libya he stated the following:

“There’s no money, no security. There’s no life here. Go to the gas station – there’s no diesel. We export oil and gas to Italy – we’re lighting half of Italy – and we have blackouts here. It’s more than a failure. It’s a fiasco.”

The assassination of Saif al-Islam Gaddafi came 15 years after the murder of his father by the hands of Libyan opposition forces. Libya is currently a failed state where unpredictability, violence, socio-economic destitute, and unstable conditions are the order of the day.