Libya “completely rejects” any notion of normalization with Israel and has launched an investigation into former foreign minister Najla El-Mangoush’s meeting with Israeli counterpart Eli Cohen in Rome last week, Libyan Prime Minister Abdulhamid al-Dbeibeh said over the weekend in his first public reaction to the incident.
Speaking in a government cabinet meeting, as per Libyan reports, Dbeibeh argued that the Rome meeting is a “serious matter” and has vowed to uncover “what happened in Rome, regardless of the circumstances, reasons, and methods, and regardless of good or bad intentions.
“Even if it was a side meeting, or in passing, it requires a harsh response to be a lesson on the nation’s sanctities,” Dbeibeh was quoted by Libyan media as saying, stressing his and his unity government’s “complete rejection” of normalization with Israel and “bias toward the Palestinian people and their just cause.”
Dbeibeh expresses pride at Libyans' hate of Israel
Dbeibeh praised Mangoush’s time in the Foreign Ministry, noting that she worked “with all sincerity for the issues of her homeland and defended it in every forum.”
The prime minister also lamented “parties” that attempted to take advantage of the diplomatic debacle with Israel to “create chaos or ask the army of another nation to attack Libya, in an unprecedented exercise of political insolence.”
Despite that, Dbeibeh expressed his pride at Libyans’ outrage over Mangoush’s meeting with Cohen, in which they took to the streets and burned tires in protest.
The Libyan people “clearly declared that the Palestinian issue runs in their veins.”