More of Colonel Gaddafi's dirty secrets are coming out: In 2007, Libya tried to recruit members of the Jewish Libyan diaspora to form a political party of Libyan Jews in the Israeli parliament, said Meir Kahlon, chairman of the World Organization of Libyan Jews. Kahlon refused - "We are one people", he said:
Jerusalem, 4 March (AKI):
Kahlon said that between 2005 and 2007, he and two other members of his group made trips to Amman, Jordan to meet a representative of Muammar Gaddafi's government to discuss the issue of compensation for assets left behind during the Jewish emigration from Libya.
"He said that they could not give us money directly because we live in Israel, but they were willing to give us money if we were to form a Libyan political party,” said Kahlon.
“He didn’t say how much, and I can’t tell you the name of the official, but the offer was on the table.”
Members of the World Organization of Libyan Jews in 2005 met an official from Libya's foreign ministry, according to the Jerusalem Post report. The meeting was arranged by an Israeli-Arab politician and raised hope that it could lead to compensation for Libyan Jews.
At the third meeting in 2007 the Libyan official told said that if a "Libyan political party” was formed, it might have been possible to bypass sanctions against Israel and pay compensation.
“I told him, in Israel, while we have many different political parties...we are one people,” Kahlon said said in the Jerusalem Post report. “I said to him that under no circumstances shall we form a Libyan party.”
Gaddafi may have been seeking a presence inside the the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, to support his project of forming Isratine,” a joing Israeli-Palestinian state, as a means of solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Kahlon told the Jerusalem Post that the meetings stopped after an international sanctions against Libya were lifted, allowing the North African country to emerge from diplomatic isolation.
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