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Kadhafi: Why did Saudi Arabia drag itself into this swamp?
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| Iraqis across their
sanctions-hit country stopped work for five minutes, and 3000 Egyptian
students demonstrated on Sunday in support of the Palestinian uprising
against Israel |
SYRTE,
Libya, March 3 (News Agencies) - Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi on Saturday
spelled out three conditions for peace with Israel and slammed a Saudi offer to
recognize Israel, as he marked the 25th anniversary of the Libyan Arab Republic,
news agencies reported.
The
flamboyant north African leader also called on his country's General People's
Congress, or parliament, to examine Libya's pullout from the 22-member Arab
League for its failure to fully support the Palestinians, reported Agence
France-Presse (AFP).
"The
recognition of Israel puts in concrete form an accomplished fact," Kadhafi
told a massive rally in the northern coastal city of Syrte where the parliament
was holding its annual meeting.
We
will recognize Israel on three conditions: the return of all Palestinian
refugees, the removal of weapons of mass destruction from the entire region,
particularly Israel, and holding free elections under the aegis of the United
Nations" Kadhafi said at the Ouagadougou amphitheater.
He
said the elections should be held in Israel and the Palestinian territories and
their outcome would determine which party would rule over Israel and the
Palestinian territories.
Kadhafi
said he was delivering on a promise he made to his people to sum up ideas
contained in his so-called "White Book" concerning the conflict in the
Middle East, which he first revealed in private to an Arab summit last year.
Kadhafi's
comments prompted the Arab League to announce an "urgent" visit to
Libya by Secretary General Amr Mussa for talks with the Libyan leader, Hisham
Yussef, a spokesman for the pan-Arab organization said.
Yussef
said in a statement to AFP in Cairo that Mussa will travel Sunday to Syrte for a
few hours to meet Kadhafi and discuss with him the latest "Arab
developments and initiatives for peace in the Middle East".
Diplomatic
sources at the Arab League told AFP Mussa will also discuss with Kadhafi his
request for the General People's Congress "to examine Libya's pullout from
the Arab League, which has become a masquerade."
Other
diplomats said Mussa would travel Wednesday to Libya for talks with Kadhafi
after a trip earlier in the week to Saudi Arabia for talks with Crown Prince
Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz.
Prince
Abdullah, Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler, proposed in mid-February Arab
recognition of Israel in return for complete Israeli pullout from Arab land
captured in 1967, and later said he would present the ideas to an Arab summit
due to convene March 27-28 in Beirut.
Kadhafi
strongly criticized the Saudi offer although he described Prince Abdullah as a
"friend".
"Why
did Saudi Arabia, the home of the hajj [annual Muslim pilgrimage] and the
[Muslim] holy sites, choose to drag itself into this swamp," Kadhafi said
of the decades long Middle East conflict.
"The
Israelis and the Americans have welcomed this proposal like a gift from heaven,
that paves the way for Saudi recognition of the Jewish state," the Libyan
leader said.
He
said the Saudi land-for-peace offer, which was welcomed in most Arab capitals,
in the United States and Europe, was not viable. "Who can guarantee that
Syria, Libya, Lebanon or the other Arab countries will recognize Israel once it
withdraws from the occupied territories?" he asked.
"Who
can guarantee the dismantling of the [anti-Israeli] resistance in Palestine and
the end of the operations by Hamas, since Abu Ammar [Palestinian leader Yasser
Arafat] cannot control the Palestinians?" Kadhafi said.
Some
four million Palestinian refugees who fled or lost their homes following the
creation of the state of Israel in 1948 are currently registered with the U.N.
Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA).
They
live in refugee camps in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, the West Bank and the Gaza
Strip, and their return to their homeland is one of the thorniest issues facing
the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
The
Libyan Jamahiriya, or republic of the masses, is purported to give power
directly to the people and was proclaimed on March 2, 1977, eight years after
Kadhafi overthrew the monarchy.
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