Libya's Chaos: Threat to the West

by Mohamed Chtatou • January 22, 2016 at 5:00 am

ISIS badly needs Libya for its operations in North Africa: to spread its paramilitary brigades, to organize its terrorist networks and, most importantly, to prepare its political pawns, after the chaos, to take over power.
"Over the last four years, Libya has become a key node in the expansion of Islamic radicalism across North Africa... and into Europe. If events in Libya continue on their current path, they will likely haunt the United States and its Western allies for a decade or more." -- Ethan Chorin, Foreign Policy.
ISIS taking control of North Africa, the soft underbelly of Europe, would amount to it getting ready to recapture, by terror and force, al-Andalus from the Catholic Christians of Spain.

The Skhirat Agreement (left), with its good intentions, is not enough to save Libya from Islamist militias such as Fajr Libya (right).

In 2011 when Libya's former ruler, Muammar Gaddafi, was murdered by the mob of militiamen, many people believed it was the beginning of a new, free, democratic country. Libya, however, did not become free or democratic. Instead, it became fractured, violent, tribal and divided. Rather than starting a new life, Libya was sliding slowly toward some sort of hell.

Over the years, as violence became a daily casual occurrence, Libya almost became synonymous in the news with disorder, and on its way to becoming yet another failed stated, like Somalia.

In spite of that, hope emerged anew with the attempt of the United Nations to negotiate a national agreement through UNMSIL (United Nations Support Mission in Libya).

In its Resolution 2144 (March 14, 2014), article 6, the UN Security Council tasked the UNMSIL to support Libyan government efforts to: