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The headlines in the Cairo press screamed "Gaddafi's Assassination." It was not in glee on the part of the Egyptian printed media. It was in reflection on the end of the life of the Libyan dictator of 42 years who once waged war on Egypt only to be hit back by Egypt's airforce as ordered by Sadat.
Then there was this quiet satisfaction in the Egyptian street as it compared between how Gaddafi was pummelled then shot to death, and how Mubarak was being wheeled on his sick bed into open court in Cairo with his doctors and lawyers in tow.
Within this spectrum of emotions and soul searching, there was no mistaking Egypt's sigh of relief that Gaddafi's end meant a new beginning in neighboring Libya. There was no dancing in Egypt's streets, yet there was quiet humming of glee for the Libyan masses erupting in song and dance.
The editorials celebrated what promises to be a new beginning in Tripoli. The theme in the main editorial in the Egyptian Government newspaper Al-Ahram (established in Cairo by the Takla Christian Lebanese brothers 136 years ago), in its issue number 45609 summed up Egypt's mood.
"Yesterday, the curtain fell on the Gaddafi era, in order for a new age to begin. This beginning is not for Libya only, but for the entire Arab region, and perhaps for the world. It was an era marked by dictatorship, oppression, suppression of the freedoms and rights of the citizen, and murder. The Gaddafi period was characterized by disrespect for the people's destiny, by frittering away national wealth in order to feed personal ambitions and external whims. In this, the Libyans, the legitimate owners of that wealth, were permitted no say, no opinion, not even a whisper.
More than any other leader in this area , Gaddafi personified this dark period in Arab history. Since his assumption of power in 1969, he pushed his behavioral antics to grotesque limits... Those antics included his strange theories which he posted in his book "The Green Book" in which he developed a philosophy of governance all his own. Through that philosophy, he made the Libyan people his field of experimentation from populism (jamahiriya), to socialism (ishtirakia), to rule by "popular committees."
Gaddafi swung wildly from the concept of Arab unity, to divorcing that concept in preference for African unity. Throughout his reign, he tried to impose his views on his people and their neighbors. This he did through money, weapons, terror and intervention in their internal affairs. This led him to wars with Chad, Sudan, Egypt and Tunisia.
His mischief had an overreach beyond North Africa. He got involved in conflicts in Northern Ireland and in Latin America. Then abruptly, in later years, he tried reconciliation (after Lockerbie) with the West, by giving up his nuclear material and allowing western companies to pursue investments in Libya.
But the Arab Spring, armed and determined, flared up, ending his reign -a reign which was based on family and tribe, through he clothed it, once in nationalism, then in socialism.
No doubt, the post-Gaddafi world will be both different and better. It is our fervent hope that, in its new era, Libya shall open a new page based on democracy, respect for human rights, and responsiveness to the Libyan people's aspirations.
During the long Gaddafi period, these were all values which were nowhere to be found."
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