Libyan leader calls for jihad on Swiss

GENEVA | After two centuries of neutrality, Switzerland found itself in a bizarre and unprecedented situation last weekend, facing a would-be “holy war” announced by Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi.

The Swiss government declined to comment on Col. Gadhafi’s latest salvo in a simmering diplomatic saga stemming from the Geneva police’s 2008 arrest and brief detainment of his son, Hannibal, and his wife for purportedly beating up their servants.

Although Col. Gadhafi’s jihad declaration late Thursday was widely viewed as a stunt by a leader given to outlandish behavior, the danger was difficult to dismiss in an era of Islamic-Western foment over issues ranging from headdress bans in Europe to faraway Middle East disputes, Iran’s nuclear program and Nordic newspapers’ caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad.

Analysts urged caution and Swiss citizens and politicians expressed alarm that a nation which managed to steer clear of direct involvement in the world wars and other bloody European conflicts was being dragged into an increasingly messy — if still nonviolent — conflict with an unpredictable government.

“You never know with crazies,” nationalist lawmaker Oskar Freysinger said. “I can imagine that this won’t be taken very seriously. But nevertheless, it’s the head of a state making a declaration of war against Switzerland.”

There was no sign of a security alert, however, or heightened official vigilance.

Col. Gadhafi called for the “holy war” ostensibly because of a recent Swiss referendum that banned the construction of new mosque minarets in the country. He also urged Muslims everywhere to boycott Swiss products and to bar the country’s planes and ships from the airports or seaports of Muslim nations.

Many here saw the proclamation as another act of revenge. Hannibal Gadhafi was released after two days, but Tripoli retaliated by recalling diplomats from Switzerland, taking its money out of Swiss vaults, interrupting oil shipments to the neutral country and preventing two Swiss businessmen from leaving Libya.

One Swiss businessman, 69-year-old construction executive Rachid Hamdani, was released last week after 19 months of detention. But 54-year-old Max Goeldi, an employee of the engineering firm ABB, remains in Libya.

Spain and Italy have mediated discussions between the two governments since Libya’s escalation of the dispute on Feb. 15 when it barred citizens from 25 European countries from visiting Libya in retaliation for a Swiss travel restrictions on Col. Gadhafi, his family and his ministers.

Col. Gadhafi, whose symbols of power include a host of young female bodyguards, lacks credibility in the Muslim world and has no religious authority to declare a jihad, Muslim leaders in Europe said.

But a Swiss sociologist who has written extensively on Libya said Col. Gadhafi’s call was serious because he proclaimed it on the holiday marking Muhammad’s birthday, which guarantees maximum exposure, and because it may inspire radicals.

“In the Islamic world, as everywhere else, there are foolish people,” sociologist Jean Ziegler said. “Such language is dangerous in today’s world, when people see the Muslim world against the West and the West against Muslims.”

Those who see a clash of civilizations need look no further than last November, when Swiss voters overwhelmingly approved a constitutional ban on building new minarets, putting the Alpine country at the forefront of a European backlash against a growing and sometimes insular Muslim population across the continent.

Muslims compose about 6 percent of Switzerland’s 7.5 million people, but most are refugees from the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s, with only a small minority hailing from traditionally Islamic countries in North Africa. In stark contrast to the more-devout immigrant populations in Britain and elsewhere, only about one in 10 Muslims in Switzerland actively practices the religion, the government says.

Story Continues →