It was in 1986, sometime around the end of March and the beginning of April… There was an intense global media operation, particularly in the Arab media about the dictatorship, immorality and cruel executions of Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi. There were stories and footage on the Arab media, which was to affect the Libyan public, about the seraglio Gaddafi established with young girls as well as sensational publications about his high living.
Generally, collaborative campaigns of the media to such an extent are not genuine signs of how bad the person being targeted really is, rather it is mostly a reference of preparations of an operation targeting that person or one that is planned to be conducted using his name. The source and the perpetrator of the operation is another issue. At this point, everyone may think of the U.S., the usual suspect. However, someone else who can pull out that much money may carry out an operation in their own right as well.
In those days, the bad relations between Gaddafi and the Arab states were not a secret. His lunacy, extraordinary acts and pursuit of substituting the African Union with the Arab Union had started to annoy the Arab world. In those days, the news about various terror incidents in the U.S. and Europe in which allegedly Gaddafi was involved was also a part of the campaign, and on that occasion, an impression was formed that both the Arab countries and Western countries were in an alliance to overthrow Gaddafi.
This displeasure toward Gaddafi caused the desire to overthrow him to be put into practice. However, overthrowing Gaddafi through an inside coup was a more reasonable solution when compared to launching a war, whose ending was unpredictable, against him.
Rumor has it that a junta within the army with which a detailed agreement was already made about how to overthrow Gaddafi was preconditioned. The Libyan public had already been prepped to welcome such a coup because of the image created about Gaddafi by the Arab media. There seemed to remain no one that would mourn for Gaddafi in the Arab world. Now let’s remember what happened at that exact time.
On 5 April 1986, Gaddafi was held responsible for an assault that targeted a nightclub called La Belle, which was frequented by American soldiers in Berlin, despite the lack of any direct evidence showing Gaddafi was personally involved. The crime and its punishment were directed at Gaddafi. Reagan, who was angered by the attack, used the expression “the rabid dog of the Middle East” for Gaddafi. Reagan started to shoot Libyan targets on 16 April, claiming that Gaddafi was taking revenge for American assaults against Libyan ships in the past and that he was responding to the attacks in kind.
Those who had a good grasp of the incident very well understood that this attack targeting Gaddafi which was trying to present him as the U.S.’s number one enemy was, in fact, a kiss of life to take the place of the imminent coup that would topple him even if there had been no American intervention.
Gaddafi’s house in Tripoli was also among the targets shot, and Hanna Gaddafi, Gaddafi’s adopted baby, died as a result of this attack. And this would be enough to render Gaddafi innocent due to an unjust suffering.
What happened after this attack is very well known. Gaddafi was reborn as the hero that took on the U.S. in the eyes of the Arab world and the Libyan public in no time. And he remained in power until 2011 with ups and downs.
Although the quarrel between the U.S. and Russia has revealed an expectation for a war that may break out at any moment, after less than 24 hours, since we said that all seemed to be a movie no different from what we were previously watching, we heard that American warplanes launched an offensive on Syrian targets. We have apparently witnessed a situation in which the U.S. was at the end of its tether and it being time for it to take the situation in hand with a suitable operation. Only the chemical weapons storage and its production sites were targeted in the operation that was describes as a “one-time” thing by the U.S. defense minister.
Of course, it's not even a matter of discussion to target the chemical weapons storage sites due to the mortal harm they have caused the Syrian public. As we have pointed out before, hundreds of thousands of Syrians were already being slaughtered by non-chemical weapons, and they are still being killed.
The U.S. doesn’t feel discomfort for these massacres at all. Not in the least. It is involved in these massacres and killed tens of thousands of Syrian civilians.
There are many signs that the use of chemical weapons that was considered as a basis for the U.S. attack is entirely a media campaign.
To avoid any misunderstanding, Assad is an extremely cruel, brutal murderer. And it is beyond dispute that he has conducted a massacre in Eastern Ghouta. However, he does not need to add a chemical weapon massacre to the rest of these massacres, but the U.S., which recently decided to launch an attack on Assad one way or the other, does. There is always the possibility that Assad might use those chemical weapons against Israel some day…
Assad’s existence there poses a risk for Israel even if was guaranteed that chemical weapons would never be used against Israel. Weapons may be passed into other hands. This is a civil war and a state of chaos that has been going on for seven years. Who knows? Although it is very unlikely, one day, Assad may lose his mind and want to use these chemical weapons against Israel. Thus, these chemical weapons must be destroyed just in case. Apart from this, it is very clear that Assad is not on bad terms with the U.S. at all.
We are watching the same movie once again. Assad, who is being attacked by the U.S., is being vitalized with this assault. Just like in many places in the past. Just like how Gaddafi was rescued from a coup through being attacked.
This is the operation method of the U.S. Its friendship and hostility are both ambiguous.
