The Economist
Sept 10 2011
An unlikely refuge for Muammar Qaddafi
Come and be an Israeli!
The colonel has sympathisers in an unexpected place
Sep 10th 2011 | NETANYA | from the print edition
IF HE needs a refuge, Colonel Muammar Qaddafi might consider the
Israeli town of Netanya. An Israeli family of Libyan origin has
recently surfaced saying they are the colonel’s relatives and that he
should think of making aliyah (the Jewish voyage of return) and claim
Israeli citizenship as any Jew may do under Israeli law. Gita Boaron
told Israeli television she shares a great-grandmother with the
colonel. `She fled her Jewish husband for a Muslim sheikh,’ she says.
`Her daughter was the colonel’s mother, making him Jewish under
rabbinic law.’
Some jokers suggest that Mrs Boaron’s family want a share of the gold
the colonel is said to be carrying. But others say there may be a more
solid claim. `Jews from Tripoli remember he attended a Jewish wedding
in the 1960s, long before he became leader,’ says Pedazur Benattia,
founder of Or Shalom, a centre that promotes Libyan-Jewish culture in
Israel.
In Netanya, a resort north of Tel Aviv, where many of the 100,000-odd
Israeli Jews of Libyan origin have settled, a square has been called
Qaddafi Plaza in anticipation of his arrival. `Whatever he’s done,
Israel’s his home,’ says Rachel, a widow sipping her macchiato,
Libya’s beverage of choice, and nibbling abambara, a Libyan-Jewish
pastry in one of the square’s Libyan-owned cafés. `After all, he’s a
Jew.’ With his curls, she says, he would fit into many a Libyan
synagogue.
The colonel’s popularity is odd since he chased non-Muslims, Italian
Catholics and Jews alike out of Libya and took their property. But
Israel’s Libyan Jews say he has sought to atone for his youthful Arab
radicalism. In the New York Times in 2009 the Great Leader noted that
`Jews and Muslims are cousins descended from Abraham. The Jewish
people,’ he added understandingly, `want and deserve their homeland.’
Other family members are said to have kept up the tradition. Israeli
tabloids make much of reports that Saif al-Islam, the colonel’s son
and oft-presumed heir, used to date Orly Weinermann, a sometime
scantily clad Israeli soap-opera actress. Quite a few of the colonel’s
Libyan foes believe such gossip. Graffiti with Stars of David
superimposed on swastikas have spattered the walls of Benghazi, the
rebels’ eastern base. `Qaddafi Mossad agent,’ reads one of the
banners.
http://www.economist.com/node/21528675