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Sunday, January 12, 2025
Former Libyan FM insists August 2023 meet with Israeli counterpart Eli Cohen was OK’d by Tripoli
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Former Libyan foreign minister Najla Mangoush insists that an August 2023 meeting she held with her Israeli counterpart at the time, Eli Cohen, had been greenlit by Tripoli.
Mangoush was fired and fled the country after Cohen announced that the two had met.
In her first comments since the debacle, Mangoush says that the conversation had taken place on the sidelines of a wider summit and that it was not an official meeting.
“It was a secret meeting,” she says on Al Jazeera’s Atheer podcast. “The meeting doesn’t mean normalization (with Israel).”
She says that Libya’s Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh had tasked her with holding the meeting.
Anti-government demonstrations erupted in Tripoli last week, following the broadcast of the podcast interview, with protesters accusing Dbeibeh of collaborating with Israel.
لقاء المنقوش على منصة أثير فجر الوضع في #ليبيا ????????
احتجاجات ليلية في عدة مدن ليبية بينها العاصمة #طرابلس و #الزاوية و #مصراتة و #بني_وليد
المحتجون ينادون باسقاط حكومة #الدبيبه المطبعة مع الكيان الصهيوني.#Libya #Tripoli #Zawia #Misurata pic.twitter.com/HxRNbHNgvA— Amr Fathalla ⴰⵎⵔ ⴼⵜⵃⴰⵍⵍⴰⵀ (@AmrFatihalla) January 6, 2025
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