Libyan assembly votes to follow Islamic law

[dipsydoodle]

Source: Reuters

(Reuters) - Libya's General National Council assembly (GNC) voted on Wednesday to make Islamic Sharia law the base for all legislation and for all state institutions, a decision that may impact banking, criminal and financial law.

"Islamic law is the source of legislation in Libya," the GNC said in a statement after the vote. "All state institutions need to comply with this."

The immediate scope of the decision was not clear, but a special committee would review all existing laws to guarantee they comply with Sharia.

Read more: http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/12/04/uk-libya-law-idUKBRE9B30J620131204

[Crowman1979]

1. Another military intervention gone horribly wrong.

[Ash_F]

11. Wrong for who?

Whatever Happened To Libyan Oil?
http://www.ibtimes.com/whatever-happened-libyan-oil-western-oil-giants-crude-sweet-china-russia-may-get-biggest-taste

[Pterodactyl]

25. Yeah, probably should've had congressional approval for that one.

[Swede Atlanta]

2. This is anther example of why meddling in the Middle East or in Islamic countries is folly....

Gadaffi had given up his military programs in exchange for a thaw in relations with the outside world.

He was a horrible, ruthless dictator who committed unconscionable acts against his own people. But he was largely a secular ruler (much like Saddam Hussein).

The Libyan people will have simply exchanged a secular dictatorship for a religious one where clerics and morality police will rule the country. Even Gadaffi was simply an exchange of a regal dictatorship under King Idris to the Gadaffi regime.

Why are Muslim countries surprised when the West sees little hope for tolerant, moderate democracies in this part of the world.

I wish it was different and I had some hope for them.

[Jesus Malverde]

3. Unfortunately this is Hillary Clintons legacy as Secretary of State

Exhilaration, jubilation and raw power defined the moment.

A socialist country that guaranteed minority and rights for woman, free education anywhere in the world, and served as a banker to african development has taken a step towards the middle ages. When a secular state gets infected with religious poison the result is not peace, justice and goodwill. It's arbitrary arrests, unjust trials, injustice and MURDER.

[MisterP]

7. I doubt Libya's gonna go with a *medieval* canon code--too liberal

[Jesus Malverde]

8. Woosh over my head, Had to read that twice...good one...nt

[Comrade Grumpy]

4. Snork. n/t

[Jesus Malverde]

5. No snorking!

The destruction of Libya is not snorkable. WTF is snork anyway!

Have you seen Anthony Bourdains visit after the revolution? Quit watching him after that, what a tool.

[ConcernedCanuk]

6. Urban Dictionary

.
.
.

snork

Verb: to drink something and have it come out your nose because you're laughing so hard.


to unintentionally snort loudly while laughing. Also used as an exclamation after someone snorks, to emphasize the fact and increase their embarrassment.

She laughed so hard she snorked.

After he snorted, I pointed at him, yelled "SNORK!" and laughed.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=snork

CC

[Comrade Grumpy]

13. Who knew? I was just going for something between snark and snort.

[UnseenUndergrad]

9. At the risk of being flamed

May I just ask people to calm down and actually wait on what this entails? I can see a switch to Islamic, interest free banking but I doubt that the hard-line sunni interpretations of Sharia that people use as a bogeyman, will be mandated, especially as hard as the government is hitting Ansar-al-Sharia and how little even the Cyrenicans like them.

And Yes, I AM a Libyan Revolution/Civil War fanboy, was two and a half years ago and am now... not to say that there haven't been problems disarming everyone, though.

[pampango]

10. "The immediate scope of the General National Congress's decision was not clear, but

a special committee would review all existing laws to guarantee they comply with Islamic law.

The Muslim Brotherhood's Justice and Construction party is one of the most well-organized forces in Libya and promotes Islamic law. But the secular-leaning National Front Alliance formed after the revolt calls for a more liberal position.

Unlike codified Western law, sharia is more loosely defined moral and legal guidelines based on the Koran, the sayings of Prophet Mohammad and Muslim traditions.

One reform may be a shift to more Islamic finance regulation, based on religious principles which avoid interest and pure speculation, which has grown with many sharia-compliant investment funds in the Gulf.

http://www.voanews.com/content/reu-libyan-assembly-votes-to-follow-islamic-law/1803281.html

The battle between fundamentalists and secularists goes on in every society, including our own. It is better addressed democratically than by repressive rule.

[Jesus Malverde]

12. Do you think this bodes well for women?

The disaster that is Libya is a NATO project. Remember the reasons. Rape gangs, Viagra. Enslaving a formerly progressive socialist secular country under sharia is NOT ok.

Women have enjoyed equal rights in Libya since the 1960's.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_Libya

That the USA has participated in the de-emancipation of these women makes me angry.

[UnseenUndergrad]

14. Look...

I have been hearing little but paranoid dreck about post-revolution Libya for the last 2 years. When NATO got involved, the paranoia hit a fever pitch, with a near-Stalinist defense of Gaddafi emerging.

And from that Link... yes, many good things were acheived during 40 some years of oppressive autocracy and I sincerely hope that those advances will be maintained and fought for in democratic Libya... but branding all muslim jurisprudence as barbaric and vial and all secularism as justifying the most brutal tyrannies, does nothing to make those advances stick. it just makes people twitchy.

[Jesus Malverde]

17. Those advances are long gone, my friend.

[UnseenUndergrad]

18. Question

Do you have proof of that? Or are you just going to keep idealizing the old days and not actually give the new days a chance to materialize before you cast aspersions?

Although I did find this.

http://www.libyaherald.com/2013/07/23/opinion-constitutional-assembly-electoral-law-blow-to-inclusivity-in-post-revolution-libya-lwpp/#axzz2mYQcOzhX

It appears troublesome not just to women, but to cultural minorities, especially the Berbers. That is, however, what civil society and the democratic process are about: hashing things out in peace. And if the Berbers get pissed off, you better watch out.

We can either discuss these changes rationally, perhaps watching for any populist backlash, or we can go off half-jacked and keep calling the revolution and wider Arab Spring the vanguard of some vast Western plot. I prefer the first way.

[Marrah_G]

15. How will this impact women's lives?

It generally doesn't work out very well for them.

[jessie04]

16. I like it.

Who are we to judge ?

[Jesus Malverde]

19. Point of order?

In my monte python voice...

Is this the Hanafite, Shafi'i, Ẓāhirī, Malikite, Hanbalite, Ghurabiyya Shia, Fathi, Fafizia, Nizari, Zayadi, or Kaysani interpretation of Sharia?

[UnseenUndergrad]

20. Hmmm

I'd think (well, hope) something nice and light, as to

A) Not displease their western NATO backers too much

B) not to upset the Berber Kharijites too much

and

C) to cheese of Ansar nice and proper.

[Igel]

21. People like to romanticize revolution.

They are in love with hope. Most revolutions end badly or come to nothing, even if they appear to "succeed." What provoked the revolution is often so pervasive and the prior order so much a result of the environment it existed in that you can rage against the machine all you want, but when the bulldozer runs you over it's not something it even notices.

Of the "machine" isn't the government, but something that the revolutionaries are an integral part of, before, during, and after the revolution.


That said, a number of countries have this kind of stipulation in their Constitution. It doesn't mean squat. It's not the text of the law, it's the interpretation of the law. The words mean, in many societies, no more and no less than what a few oligarchs called "judges" decide they mean. Consider it a "living law," where the effect changes and evolves over time in rather unpredictable ways. Today it means nothing; tomorrow it means your hand is cut off.

[UnseenUndergrad]

22. If I may.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/12/04/1260092/-Heck-of-a-job-Obama-Clinton-Power-Rice

A wide range of opinions, hopes, fears and info are here, compared to the rather paltry response on DU...

Which is strange, given that Joshcryer spent so much time documenting every little move of the civil war.

[seveneyes]

23. Was it a good act to replace the previous secular dictator with these Islamist?

Were agreements broken or was this in the plan?

[UnseenUndergrad]

24. From what I've read

Due to various post war limitations on who could hold office (barring Gaddafi Era officals to an almost nutty degree), the GNC has gotten more and more... lunk-headed over the past few months, sometimes becoming more islamist than originally constructed when the runner up in an election was the replacement for a departing or dead member.

This particular announcement seems to be a way for that part of GNC to shore up their powerbase now that the Cyrenicans are bootign islamists out of the big cities in the East.