Al Arabiya show reveals Qaddafi plot to assassinate Mubarak and Hassan II

Libyan intelligence planned to assassinate Former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak during the African summit in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa, in 1989, according to Atif Abu Bakr, former head of the political department in the Palestinian movement Fatah - the Revolutionary Council, who is appearing in the “Political Memoirs” program today on Al Arabiya News Channel.

However, Abu Bakr told Al Arabiya News Channel that the plot was canceled at the last minute. Abu Bakr revealed that the Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi sought, with the help of the Palestinian leader Sabri al-Banna, known as “Abu Nidal”, to send someone within Qaddafi’s team to the summit, in order to assassinate President Mubarak. However, after sending the undercover man with Qaddafi’s team to the summit, they later received information that the Egyptian reaction will be violent, and could lead to “the invasion of Libya”. This is what urged late Libyan president to cancel the plan, Atif Abu Bakr says.

Abu Bakr revealed that “Qaddafi plotted many operations against the former Egyptian regime”, noting that these operations were carried out under the pretext of rejecting the “Camp David” agreement. Abu Nidal is said to have considered the Egyptian regime to be “a Zionist tool in Egypt”. He then worked for this regime in the period between 1997 and 1999.

Hosni Mubarak was not the only Arab president that Qaddafi and Abu Nidal allegedly wanted to assassinate. The two men planned to assassinate late Moroccan King Hassan II, according to the interview.

They wanted the Syrian regime to take the fall for this assassination, but the Syrians did not respond to their request. This is what prompted Abu Nidal and the Libyan intelligence to send weapons to Morocco in 1987, using Libyan aircrafts, according to the interview. According to Abu Bakr, the plan was coordinated with the knowledge of a Moroccan opposition member. However, the operation was also canceled for fear of violent reaction from Rabat. According to Abu Bakr it was also cancelled because of the political agreement between the two regimes at the time.

The full interview will run Friday in Political Memoirs, a weekly Al Arabiya program presented by Taher Barake that hosts prominent former politicians from the Arab world.