Qaddafivision comes to D.C.

Libyan leader General Muammar Qaddafi has some advice for U.S. foreign policy: forget a two state solution in Israel, re-trace the mis-steps of the Bush Administration in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, and talk to Osama Bin Laden. “I think Osama bin Laden is a person who can be given a chance…Maybe he wants peace.” The ...

By , International Crisis Group’s senior analyst for Colombia.
589255_090122_qaddafi5.jpg
589255_090122_qaddafi5.jpg

Libyan leader General Muammar Qaddafi has some advice for U.S. foreign policy: forget a two state solution in Israel, re-trace the mis-steps of the Bush Administration in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, and talk to Osama Bin Laden. "I think Osama bin Laden is a person who can be given a chance...Maybe he wants peace."

Libyan leader General Muammar Qaddafi has some advice for U.S. foreign policy: forget a two state solution in Israel, re-trace the mis-steps of the Bush Administration in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, and talk to Osama Bin Laden. “I think Osama bin Laden is a person who can be given a chance…Maybe he wants peace.”

The Leader, as he is affectionately (and mandatorily) referred to in Libya, spoke at Georgetown University via satellite last night. And the view from Qaddafi-cam looks a characteristic mix of suprisingly rational rhetoric with a healthy dose of crazy.

Qaddafi’s proposal for a one-state solution in Israel was also laid out in a New York Times op-ed today.(“We can call [the single state] Isratine“, he suggested at Georgetown.) He likewise offered a candid admission that petro-state Libya is suffering from the low oil prices.

In the war on terror, Qaddafi described a window of opportunity for Obama to reach out to a select few. Without explanation, he concluded that, though Ayman al-Zawahiri is a thug, Bin Laden might be more rational “Maybe we can have a dialogue with [bin Laden] and find out the reason that led him in this direction,” Qaddafi suggested.

Yeah, I’m sure Obama will take that under advisement.

As our photo essay so eloquently put it, The Leader has got his groove back. The only question is — does Obama want to dance?

Photo courtesy of Brown Lloyd James

Elizabeth Dickinson is International Crisis Group’s senior analyst for Colombia.

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