Saif Al-Islam Qaddafi’s death and Libya

Saif Al-Islam Qaddafi’s assassination in Zintan last week has sent tremors through Libya’s political arena with the force of an overdue reckoning. Gunmen who disabled cameras, moved with precision and vanished without a trace carried out a killing that was anything but impulsive. The hallmarks point to actors with deep familiarity with Zintan’s terrain, its militia economy and the rhythms of its informal powerbrokers.

Analysts and ordinary Libyans alike have floated one name more than others: Saddam Haftar. For now, no public evidence ties him directly to the operation; however, the speculation reflects political logic rather than conspiracy. His faction gains strategically from a “cleaner” political field. It fragments a loyalist base by removing a wildcard who threatened the order and “coherence” of eastern Libya, currently held hostage by the warlord Khalifa Haftar and his clan. Historically, clan Haftar has always operated on the assumption that political uncertainty invites challengers; fewer challengers mean fewer variables to manage.

Alternatively, western militia networks had at least as much motive.

Western Libya’s war economy thrives on fragmentation, not consolidation. A figure like Qaddafi — who did not need a large national vote to matter, only a concentrated one — was a threat to revenue streams built on smuggling, taxation of territory and transactional alliances. Internal polling from Libya’s 2021 electoral cycle suggested he commanded double-digit support in pockets of the south and center. Even a constituency of 10 percent to 15 percent can disrupt coalition calculations, block deals or force runoffs that revive unresolved grievances. Removing him helps keep the board uneven, which is precisely what empowers militia entrepreneurs.

At the same time, powerbrokers in Tripoli also benefit from his absence.

Removing a symbolic actor creates space for new competition, new mistrust and new forms of militia mobilization.

Hafed Al-Ghwell

His candidacy was a magnet for nostalgia votes and a gravitational anomaly that distorted policy negotiations. He symbolized a third pole at a time when many factions preferred the contest to be binary: east versus west, Haftar versus Abdul Hamid Dbeibah, the stability narrative versus the legitimacy narrative. Qaddafi complicated that. Eliminating him reduces uncertainty for those who see elections as a battleground in which the number of viable candidates must be tightly controlled. Libya’s political elite has repeatedly shown it prefers predictable adversaries over unpredictable spoilers.

Unfortunately, Zintan’s position now becomes even more precarious. For more than a decade, the town served as Qaddafi’s reluctant jailer, then guardian, and eventually political custodian. Keeping him alive was both a bargaining chip and a symbol of autonomy. His death now exposes Zintan to a storm of accusations. Even factions entirely uninvolved may face retaliatory impulses from loyalist networks that interpret the assassination as a tribal insult layered atop political injury.
Libyan conflict zones have repeatedly demonstrated that perception can mobilize armed groups faster than proof. A cycle of preemptive mobilization is entirely possible; militias often move not because they seek confrontation but because standing still appears dangerous.

Meanwhile, the Qadhadhfa tribe gains a martyr at a moment when resentment toward the post-2011 order is already acute.
Since 2011, tribe members have repeatedly shown proof of disproportionate displacement and asset confiscation in areas historically tied to Qaddafi’s power base. Many of these grievances were political but others were transactional: access to salaries, state contracts and local security posts declined dramatically. Losing their most recognizable figure risks tipping parts of the loyalist constituency from political withdrawal into active sabotage.

Libya has experienced similar shifts before. Targeted attacks on oil pipelines, municipal buildings and desert-to-coast supply routes increased sharply in 2014 and again in 2017 when marginalized groups felt excluded from national bargains. Loyalist spoilers may now follow that same pattern.

National implications deepen the uncertainty.

Libya’s governance structure remains fractured across two governments, numerous prime ministers and dozens of armed groups with shifting allegiances. Removing a high-profile figure does not necessarily simplify the space; it only creates room for fresh actors with fewer constraints and weaker reputational barriers.

Some in the country’s west will claim Libya is safer without a Qaddafi in the race. Others in the east will insist his removal smooths the path toward elections. Both claims ignore the uncomfortable reality that every assassination since 2011 has generated more fragmentation, not less. After all, institutions with shallow roots cannot absorb political shocks indefinitely.

Prior to his assassination, Qaddafi’s political career was always built on contradictions. His early attempts to present himself as a reformer who could reconcile Libya with Western capitals ended abruptly in 2011, when he chose repression over reform. Yet his imprisonment in Zintan, elderly captors later sympathetic to him, and his reemergence in 2021 created an odd blend of victimhood and culpability. Supporters saw him as a vessel for a stolen national future; detractors viewed him as the last thread tying Libya to a regime that had overstayed its era. Neither narrative was entirely accurate but both were powerful.

His electoral prospects were limited. He had negligible traction in Tripoli, almost none in Misrata and only narrow pockets of support in the east. The south was his strongest base, but even decisive victories there would have reproduced Libya’s fragmentation rather than resolved it. Geography continued to trap him. Moving between Sabha and Zintan symbolized a country in which regional loyalties trump national prospects. He represented a possibility, not a realistic path to national leadership.

Yet possibilities matter in political systems built on uncertainty. His presence kept alive a question many actors preferred buried: whether Qaddafi-era identity remained a political force capable of shaping outcomes. His death does not answer that question; it reshapes it. Loyalist sentiment does not evaporate with the death of a figurehead. It mutates. Some will adopt a more radical posture, others will seek new candidates and many will channel grievance into obstruction.

Libya now faces a familiar pattern. Removing a symbolic actor creates space for new competition, new mistrust and new forms of militia mobilization. Stability becomes harder, not easier. Elections become more contested, not less. Security becomes more reactive, not more coherent. Every major killing since 2011 has echoed the same warning: unresolved grievances do not disappear, they wait.

One final question remains, perhaps the only one that cuts through speculation. Saif Al-Islam Qaddafi is gone but the Qaddafi legacy remains — fragmented, inconsistent and emotionally charged. Some will argue that his death closes the book on that era. Many others will claim it proves the era never ended. What comes next for Libya will reveal which interpretation holds true. Does this assassination mark the end of the Qaddafi legacy or does it prove that the legacy has survived long enough to draw blood again?

• Hafed Al-Ghwell is senior fellow and program director at the Stimson Center in Washington and senior fellow at the Center for Conflict and Humanitarian Studies. X: @HafedAlGhwell