Libyan Foreign Minister Najla al-Mangoush, under fire for meeting with her Israeli counterpart, has been dismissed, according to senior sources in the government.
Reporting from Tripoli, Al Jazeera’s Malik Traina said sources close to Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah reported al-Mangoush’s dismissal after an earlier announcement of an investigation into her meeting with Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen last week in Rome.
Al-Mangoush has been the subject of much speculation since yesterday’s announcement by Cohen, which set off large protests across Libya, including rumours that she had left the country.
Libya’s Internal Security Service responded by denying reports that it had allowed or facilitated her departure and announcing that she was on the list of people barred from travelling.
Announcement angered Israelis
The political row broke out Sunday after Israel’s foreign ministry said the two countries’ top diplomats met the previous week in a meeting hosted by Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani.
“I spoke with the foreign minister about the great potential for the two countries from their relations,” Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said in a statement from Israel’s foreign ministry, adding that it was the first such diplomatic initiative between the two countries.
The news was not well-received in Israel, with commentators remarking that Cohen’s behaviour was a breach of acceptable diplomatic practice.
A diplomatic farce in Israel today:
Israel foreign minister Eli Cohen held a secret meeting with his Libyan counterpart in Rome last week. Today, he decided to make the meeting public. The Result: The Libyan foreign minister was fired, and an investigation was opened against her— Barak Ravid (@BarakRavid) August 27, 2023
Israel’s Channel 12 commented that Cohen’s announcement had seriously damaged Israel’s credibility.
Opposition politician Yair Lapid agreed, saying on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, that Cohen’s action had made countries doubt the suitability of Israel as a foreign relations partner.
“Countries of the world this morning are looking at the irresponsible leak of the meeting of the Israeli and Libyan foreign minister and asking themselves: Is it possible to manage foreign relations with this country? Is it possible to trust this country?” Lapid said in a statement.
Israel has normalised relations with some Arab countries in recent years as part of US-backed deals known as the Abraham Accords.
However, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s hardline government has come under intense criticism from Arab states because of surging violence in the occupied West Bank and for backing the expansion of Jewish settlements in the occupied territory.
The United States is said to be angry about the disclosure of the meeting – which it had encouraged – and had protested to Israel, the Israeli news outlet Walla reported.
US officials told Walla that the disclosure had put efforts to facilitate the normalisation of relations between Israel and more Arab countries, a foreign policy priority for the administration of President Joe Biden, harder.
“It has cut of the channel of negotiations with Libya and has made our efforts to promote normalisation with other countries much more difficult,” a US official said.
Reporting from West Jerusalem, Al Jazeera’s Harry Fawcett said: “[An Israeli] foreign ministry spokesman said that it was a coordinated meeting, it was not something accidental bumping into, it was a deliberate, direct session of talks with Italian foreign minister in attendance.”
He added that the Israeli foreign ministry also said there had been coordination between the two sides on the content of an announcement, but that the timing had not been agreed upon, surprising the Libyan side when Cohen made his statement.
The Libyan foreign ministry said al-Mangoush had “refused to meet with any party” representing Israel, and that the meeting was “a chance and unofficial encounter… which did not involve any discussion, agreement or consultation”. It also accused Israel of trying to “present this incident” as a “meeting or talks”.
The North African country does not recognise Israel nor does it have diplomatic relations with Tel Aviv. Under a 1957 Libyan law, dealing with Israel is punishable by up to nine years in prison.
Path to normalisation?
According to The Associated Press, an anonymous Libyan government official said the normalisation of relations between Libya and Israel was first discussed in a meeting with Dbeibah and CIA Director William Burns, who visited the Libyan capital in January.
According to the official, Burns proposed that Dbeibah’s government, which is recognised as Libya’s internationally backed government, join the group of four Arab countries that normalised relations with Israel under the US-brokered Abraham Accords in 2020.
The Libyan premier gave initial agreement but was concerned about public backlash in a country known for its support for the Palestinian cause, the official said.
On Monday, an Israeli official told the Reuters news agency that the meeting between al-Mangoush and Cohen was agreed in advance “at the highest levels” in Libya and lasted more than an hour.
Overnight protests
Dbeibeh had replaced al-Mangoush with Fathallah al-Zani, the current youth minister, as interim foreign minister.
Videos on social media showed demonstrations in front of the foreign ministry building in Tripoli on Sunday night, calling for al-Mangoush’s dismissal. Some protesters also called for Dbeibah’s resignation, setting fire to his residence in Tripoli.
Al Jazeera’s Malik Traina said: “Protesters in al-Zawiya were calling for the downfall of the entire government due to this meeting, and people were closing down roads and burning tyres in Tajoura and Soug al-Jumaa. We saw other protests in Misrata.”
Traina said both legislative bodies, the Tripoli-based High Council of State and the Tobruk-based House of Representatives (HoR), have condemned the meeting and called for an emergency session to discuss it, with the HoR describing the meeting as a “crime committed against the Libyan people”.
Earlier on Sunday evening, Libya’s Presidential Council asked the government for “clarifications”, according to Libya Al Ahrar TV, citing spokesperson Najwa Wheba.
The Presidential Council, which has some executive powers and sprang from the UN-backed political process, includes three members representing the three Libyan regions.
Their request said the meeting “does not reflect the foreign policy of the Libyan state, does not represent the Libyan national constants and is considered a violation of Libyan laws which criminalise normalisation with the ‘Zionist entity'”.
