Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, who has died aged 53, was shot dead by four masked assailants at his home in Zintan, Libya, on . For many years he was considered the heir apparent to his father, Muammar Gaddafi, Libya’s long-time dictator, and remained a potential force in the country’s fractured and violent politics even after his father’s death.
He had been issued with an arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court in 2011 and was convicted in absentia by a Libyan court in 2015 over war crimes committed during the 2011 revolution. During the uprising, Gaddafi had publicly vowed that the regime would fight “until the last man standing, even the last woman standing.”
Since his capture while attempting to flee Libya after his father’s death later that year, he had largely remained in the western Libyan city of Zintan, initially as a prisoner, where the assassination took place. The circumstances surrounding his death suggest a deliberate operation, with security cameras disabled and his guards withdrawn shortly before the attack, according to reports.
In 2021, Gaddafi announced his candidacy in presidential elections, backed by the Gaddafist or “green” Popular Front for the Liberation of Libya. His rivals feared he might win, but the elections ultimately did not take place. His potential return to Libyan politics was viewed with concern by those invested in the current political landscape.
In a rare interview with the New York Times in 2021, as he contemplated his run, Gaddafi described the state of Libya as a “fiasco,” claiming that post-war leaders had “raped the country” and left it without money, security, or opportunity.
Saif al-Islam’s career can be divided into three phases. Initially, he was a wealthy, well-educated figure – including a controversial period at the London School of Economics – who presented himself as a reformer and engaged with Western governments. He was known for a jet-setting lifestyle and, at one point, kept tigers as pets. He acted as an interlocutor with figures like Peter Mandelson, then a British cabinet minister, and pursued humanitarian initiatives both domestically and internationally.
The second phase began in February 2011, when he abandoned his reformist stance to support his father’s violent suppression of the revolt. This period culminated in the civil war and the eventual overthrow of the Gaddafi regime.
The third phase began after his capture as he attempted to escape the country. He faced a death sentence, later commuted in 2017, and subsequently began planning a political comeback. He described his return as a gradual process, “like a striptease.”
Born in Tripoli in 1972, Saif al-Islam was the eldest of Muammar Gaddafi’s seven children from his second marriage to Safia Farkash. He received his early education at a school for the Tripoli elite, where his father’s “Green Book” – a treatise outlining his political philosophy – was a central part of the curriculum. He earned a degree in engineering and architecture from Al-Fateh University in Tripoli, an MBA from the Imadec business school in Vienna, and a PhD from the London School of Economics in 2002.
The awarding of his doctorate from the LSE later became a source of controversy following revelations about the financial support provided by a charity founded by Saif. While the LSE did not revoke his degree, the then-director, Howard Davies, resigned in 2011 amid the scandal. Only £300,000 of the pledged £1.5 million donation was ever paid.
Saif al-Islam played a key role in improving relations between Libya and the West, including negotiations over compensation for the victims of the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, and his father’s decision to abandon Libya’s weapons of mass destruction program in 2003.
His efforts at rapprochement with the West would later become entangled in accusations of corruption leveled against former French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who was convicted in 2025 of criminal conspiracy after allegations – repeatedly promoted by Saif himself – that he had received €50 million from Libya to fund his 2007 election campaign.
During the NATO bombing campaign in 2011, Saif addressed a rally in Tripoli, issuing chilling warnings to rebel strongholds, promising retribution. This marked a stark contrast to his earlier image as a potential reformer.
Following his father’s death and his own capture, Saif al-Islam was released in 2017 by the Abu Bakr al-Siddiq battalion, the militia controlling Zintan, following an amnesty announced by Khalifa Haftar, the commander controlling eastern Libya.
In 2021, Saif denied reports of marriage and having a son, but in 2012, Israeli model Orly Weinerman claimed to have had a six-year affair with him and appealed to Tony Blair for help in saving him from his impending war crimes trial.
The perpetrators of his assassination remain unknown. However, both the Haftar family and the UN-recognised Government of National Unity (GNU) led by Prime Minister Abdulhamid al-Dabaiba may have had reasons to fear his potential return to Libyan politics, given his likely appeal to those disillusioned with the current state of affairs.
Saif al-Islam Gaddafi is survived by his mother and siblings Saadi, Hannibal, and Aisha, and by a half-brother, Muhammad. Three other brothers, Saif al-Arab, Mutassim, and Khamis, predeceased him.
