Gilad Atzmon

It is astonishing to find that the British press that is so quick to tell us about the ‘true’ nature and motivations behind each mass protest in the Arab world, is somehow intellectually lame in its attempt to grasp their own huge scale riots at home. Until now, I have failed to see even a single worthy analytical attempt to understand the full meaning or significance of the current violent events taking place on the streets of cities all over the UK. British papers have been outlining the events as being driven by, associated with, and defined by hooliganism. They talk to the victims, and sometime even manage to interview some protagonists and perpetrators.

But, amongst such shallow, sensationalist coverage, we are still missing the most important information. What is the demography of the riots? Who is leading it? Does it have any leaders? Is there an ideology behind it all? Why do they loot, what do they loot, and from whom do they loot? And most importantly, what is the meaning of it all?

The events we saw in the past week in London, Birmingham, Liverpool, Bristol and Manchester were possible signs of disintegration within British society. Some sectors within the society were clearly saying “we have had enough of it.” The truth is that these people we see rioting on our streets have been drifting away for quite some time, and no one has shown any concern, and now they are clearly not interested anymore in obedience to any notions of law and order. They do not see any great value in it. And the reason for that may be simple -- there is simply not much in it for them.

What we see in Britain is not a political protest. It is not a battle with any coherent call for justice. Neither is it an outburst of mere racial hatred. It is none of those things -- and yet, considered in its entirety, it comprises and manifests all of those factors at once. It is actually a rejection of the entire system. It is a clear manifestation and forceful expression of generations who have lost all hope in a society that does not convey any prospect of a future for them -- what we now see in British cities is young people who are putting the current system on trial. It is a spontaneous eruption of a demand for recognition.

For the obvious reasons not many in Britain are willing to listen to the desperate and urgent message voiced by the deprived. But I think that we must try to understand what is going on here.

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Peter Symonds

The sacking of the entire Benghazi-based Libyan opposition cabinet this week has exposed the anti-democratic, faction-riven character of the regime that the US and its European allies are seeking to impose on Libya. The self-proclaimed Transitional National Council (TNC)—facing a military stalemate in efforts to oust Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi due to its lack of popular support—is being consumed by violent internal conflicts.

TNC President Abdul Mustafa Jalil ordered the dismissal of the TNC’s executive committee on Monday, after the unexplained murder of the organisation’s military chief, General Abdel Fatah Younis, on July 28. Only Mahmoud Jibril, the TNC’s so-called prime minister, was kept on to form the next cabinet. In a further sign of disarray, Jalil insisted that members of various autonomous militias operating broadly under the TNC’s banner had to integrate into its armed forces as individuals rather than units.

Jalil was acting under demands for justice from Younis’s family members and the powerful Obeidi tribe, and under pressure from the February 17 Coalition, a secular grouping of Libyan judges and lawyers, critical of the growing influence of Islamists within the TNC. As it announced the sackings, a TNC spokesman declared that the cabinet was responsible for “improper administrative procedures” that led to Younis’s death.

No official explanation has been given for the arrest and killing of Younis, which has been the subject of bitter recriminations. He was Gaddafi’s interior minister before defecting to the Benghazi opposition, along with the Special Forces troops under his command.

Those close to Younis have accused an Islamist militia of killing him, to avenge the general’s savage repression of an Islamist uprising in the mid-1990s and to block his efforts to bring TNC military units under his unified command. Various Islamist organisations—including those derived from the Muslim Brotherhood and the Al Qaeda-aligned Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG)—are prominent in the TNC’s loosely-organised military umbrella group, known as the Union of Revolutionary Forces.

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