That didn’t take long

Melanie Phillips's blog

24 October 2011 4:31 PM

Freedom to submit to religious oppression --
the western achievement in Libya

Well that didn’t take long, did it?

From the moment the British, French and Americans went to war in Libya to depose Col Gaddafy in order to ‘liberate’ the Libyans from a tyrannical and oppressive regime, I warned that Messrs Cameron, Sarkozy and Obama were all too likely to bring to power something that would be even worse – an Islamist regime that would not only even more oppressively enslave the Libyans but would also be hostile to the west.After the killing of Gaddafy, President Barack Obama rushed to congratulate Libya.

‘After four decades of brutal dictatorship and eight months of deadly conflict, the Libyan people can now celebrate their freedom and the beginning of a new era of promise,’ he said.

Is that so.

Yesterday the leader of Libya’s transitional government, Mustafa Abdul-Jalil – who has reportedly so impressed western leaders by his, er, statesmanship, declared his country’s liberation -- and in the next breath declared the imposition of sharia law. The Daily Telegraph reported this morning:

‘Mustafa Abdul-Jalil, the chairman of the National Transitional Council and de fact president, had already declared that Libyan laws in future would have Sharia, the Islamic code, as its “basic source”. ‘But that formulation can be interpreted in many ways - it was also the basis of Egypt's largely secular constitution under President Hosni Mubarak, and remains so after his fall. ‘Mr Abdul-Jalil went further, specifically liftingimmediately, by decree, one law from Col. Gaddafi’s era that he said was in conflict with Sharia - that banning polygamy.‘In a blow to those who hoped to see Libya's economy integrate further into the western world, he announced that in future bank regulations would ban the charging of interest, in line with Sharia. “Interest creates disease and hatred among people,” he said.

... Mr Abdul-Jalil’s decision - made in advance of the introduction of any democratic process - will please the Islamists who have played a strong role in opposition to Col Gaddafi’s rule and in the uprising but worry the many young liberal Libyans who, while usually observant Muslims, take their political cues from the West.’

Well, just fancy that.

The gruesome way in which Gaddafy appears to have been killed by a rebel lynch-mob, and the discovery that dozens of Gaddafy loyalists appear to have been massacred, suggest that
human rights are not exactly going to be a hallmark of the brave new Libyan dawn.
In the light of all this, the comments by British and American politicians who have now bestowed upon the Libyan people the freedom to submit to the cruelties of sharia, leave one unsure whether to laugh or cry.The US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton delivered the following pricelessly preposterous piety:

“I think that the new Libya needs to start with accountability, the rule of law, a sense of unity and reconciliation in order to build an inclusive democracy.”

Don’t you just love it – an ‘inclusive democracy’ under sharia, which recognises no secular rule whatsoever and flogs, stones or kills those who do not consent to submit!
The British government was scarcely any less ludicrous. Andrew Mitchell, the International Development Secretary said of the killing of Gaddafy:

“It was clearly a very confusing moment and I would have preferred that he had faced justice either in a Libyan court or in the International Criminal Court in the Hague, but it is difficult for us in Britain to put ourselves into the position of the soldiers and those who were involved in the capture of Gaddafi...”

Yes, difficult indeed to put ourselves in the position of a bloodthirsty lynch-mob. When is the Foreign Secretary William Hague going to condemn these killings as ‘disproportionate’, I wonder?And the new Defence Secretary Philip Hammond pursed his lips and wagged his
finger reprovingly.

“It’s certainly not the way we do things, it’s not the way we would have liked it to have happened,” he said. “The fledgling Libyan government will understand that its reputation in the international community is a little bit stained by what happened.”

I’m sure the Libyan Islamists will be mortified. Alas, Mr Hammond – it is the government of which you are a member which will be more than a little bit stained by what is likely to be a fanatically oppressive and anti-western Libyan regime – and which the UK has helped bring into being.