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t least nine people have died after thousands of migrants crossed from Morocco into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta in one of the largest surges in recent years, prompting local authorities to declare a humanitarian emergency and request military assistance.

Authorities in Ceuta said between 1,500 and 2,000 migrants had entered the enclave over the past 10 days, with hundreds more arriving on Thursday alone. Regional President Juan Jesús Vivas described the situation as an “absolute humanitarian and social emergency” and urged Spain’s central government to deploy troops to help restore control at the border.

Spain’s Interior Ministry rejected calls to declare a national emergency, saying such measures do not apply to migration crises, but announced that 60 soldiers would be deployed to reinforce border security.

Video footage showed groups of migrants entering the territory by sea, many using inflatable flotation devices to swim around border barriers from the Moroccan coast. Others crossed by land after scaling border fences, according to Spanish media reports.

Some migrants were heard shouting “Viva España!” as they entered the enclave.

Zakaria Zarroqui, a migrant rights activist, told Reuters the latest influx resembled the mass crossing in May 2021, when about 10,000 Moroccan and sub-Saharan migrants entered Ceuta within days.

“The situation remains out of control as we speak,” Zarroqui said, adding that people continued gathering in the Moroccan border town of Fnideq in an attempt to reach the Spanish territory.

Ceuta and Melilla

Ceuta, together with the nearby Spanish enclave of Melilla, forms the European Union’s only land border with Africa and has long been a focal point for migrants seeking to reach Europe.

The surge follows a recent ruling by Spain’s Supreme Court that migrants intercepted at sea while attempting to reach Ceuta or Melilla cannot automatically be returned to Morocco.

“It has been a slow trickle since the Supreme Court’s ruling, but today has been an explosion,” a spokesperson for Spain’s Guardia Civil told Reuters.

Spain’s Interior Ministry said it was working closely with Moroccan authorities to respond to the increase in irregular crossings, accusing human smuggling networks of exploiting the court ruling to encourage migrants to attempt the journey.

Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska is expected to visit Ceuta on Friday to assess the situation and coordinate the government’s response.

(Source: Aljazeera English)

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orocco, considered a relatively stable country in North Africa, has been witnessing street protests. The protests that took place in 11 Moroccan cities on September 27, 2025, attracted attention as the largest anti-government demonstrations in recent years. The Gen Z212 Youth Movement initiated the protests, particularly through social media platforms such as Discord. This led crowds dissatisfied with current policies to take to the streets throughout Morocco, especially in Rabat.

Reasons for the protests

Several factors appear to have contributed to the rapid spread of protests across Morocco’s major cities. Among the developments that sparked the protests are the failure to heal the wounds of the 2023 earthquake, which claimed approximately 3,000 lives, and the deaths of eight women during childbirth at a state hospital in Agadir in early September of this year. Despite the serious problems with public services, the billions of dollars spent on the 2030 World Cup have clearly contributed to a wave of public anger.

Morocco, which is set to host the 2030 World Cup with Spain and Portugal, has constructed three stadiums and renovated six pitches thus far, spending $400 million on one of these renovation projects alone. During the protests, slogans such as “Stadiums are here, where are the hospitals?” and “Health first, we don’t want the World Cup” were prominent. The protests are driven by issues such as unemployment, limited educational opportunities, poor healthcare services, and the diversion of extensive public spending towards projects that prioritize spectacle over services and infrastructure.

The “Gen Z212” movement, which is at the center of the protests, exhibits an organizational structure without a predetermined leader and mobilizes through social media and digital platforms. This style of mobilization highlights young people’s distrust of traditional political channels. Rather than relying on political parties, unions, and civil society organizations, the movement presents itself as a new organizational model operating through digital environments.

The protests stem from inadequate healthcare services and ostentatious public spending. However, they also reflect general dissatisfaction with state institutions. Youth unemployment, regional inequalities, a lack of transparency in public spending, and a failure to prioritize public services while investing heavily in infrastructure are also motivations for the protesters. During the demonstrations, protesters gathered in front of the parliament building in Rabat, chanting slogans such as “Freedom, honor, social justice” and demanding improvements in economic and social conditions.

Slogans such as “the people want an end to corruption,” “enough corruption, you have disgraced the country,” and “we want health and education” revealed the public’s discontent with socioeconomic inequality. Demonstrators in Rabat targeted the government and former Prime Minister Abdelilah Benkirane, calling for an end to corruption and demanding Prime Minister Aziz Ahnuş’s resignation.

The state’s response to the demonstrations

The state’s response to the demonstrations has been extensive. The protests began on September 27-28 and quickly spread to several cities. Thousands of young people took to the streets in cities such as Rabat, Casablanca, Agadir, and Marrakesh. While the protests were relatively peaceful in the beginning, they turned violent in subsequent days, resulting in clashes with security forces. For instance, two people were killed when police opened fire in the village of Leqliaa. The state used arrests, heavy deployment of security forces, mass detentions, and increased control over the media to control the events.

The Moroccan Interior Ministry stated that approximately 400 people had been arrested. The statement reported that 243 security personnel and 23 civilians were injured during the protests and that 142 security vehicles and 20 private vehicles were burned or severely damaged. Numerous official institutions, bank branches, and shops were reportedly looted and vandalized in Ait Amira, Inezgane Ait Mellul, Agadir-Ida-Outanane, Tiznit, and Vecde. The ministry claimed that protesters had used cutting tools, Molotov cocktails, and stones, and that the protests had escalated significantly.

The effects of governance

These protests in Morocco are the first mass demonstrations to occur across the country since the Arab Spring 14 years ago. Inspired by the protests that began in Tunisia, Egypt, and other Arab countries, Moroccan youth organized demonstrations demanding an end to the ongoing corruption and injustice of the parliamentary monarchy. Regional inequalities between rural and urban areas, income inequality, unemployment, and inadequate access to or delivery of basic services have brought about a deepening social crisis in Morocco over the years.

Morocco is a constitutional monarchy governed by King Mohammed VI. Regarded as the guarantor of the constitution, he is the most powerful person in the country as the head of state and government. He also has strong religious legitimacy as the “Commander of the Faithful” (head of the believers). Moroccan kings can exert powerful religious influence over the people because they claim their lineage goes back to Hassan and consequently to the Prophet Muhammad. The Moroccan king also holds authority over the army, security, foreign policy, and strategic economic decisions. He appoints the prime minister and approves or dismisses the government elected by parliament. The king ensures that decisions likely to provoke a public reaction are made by the government, ministers, and prime minister, thereby deflecting public anger toward them.

An example of this can be seen in the December 22, 2020 agreement to normalize relations between Morocco and Israel. The agreement was signed on Morocco’s behalf by then-Prime Minister Saadeddin Osmani. Although the Moroccan king made the decision to normalize relations, the agreement was signed by Osmani, who led the government on behalf of the Justice and Development Party, which is known for its “Islamist” leanings. This caused the public reaction to the decision to be directed at the government. Osmani was subsequently replaced by billionaire businessman Aziz Ahnuş.

The accumulated social, political, and economic discontent

Rather than viewing the Gen Z212 protests as merely a youth movement, it is more meaningful to see them as a reflection of the accumulated social, political, and economic discontent within Moroccan society toward the decay of the monarchical regime. The unequal distribution of growth across social segments in Morocco and the prioritization of ostentatious spending by the king and a small elite group around him also form the basis for the discontent expressed in these actions. The king’s — and consequently the government’s — focus on major infrastructure, tourism, and sports investments has reinforced the perception that the regime prioritizes its external image.

Conversely, the lack of improvement in areas directly affecting people’s daily lives, such as health, education, and employment, has contributed to growing disappointment, particularly among the country’s youth. The protests spread not only to major cities but also to less developed regions such as Beni Mellal, Ouarzazate, and Taza, revealing that dissatisfaction with politics and politicians has become widespread. Consequently, the Gen Z212 protests should be seen as a mass expression of the Moroccan people’s dissatisfaction with the monarchy and its loyal politicians.

(Orignally published in Turkish by Kriter)

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nited Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday urged Morocco to uphold the rule of law and ensure accountability following a week of escalating youth-led protests that have left at least three people dead and hundreds injured, marking one of the country’s most significant outbreaks of unrest in over a decade.

Guterres’ appeal came amid mounting tension in Moroccan cities, where demonstrators — mostly young people — have rallied for six consecutive nights against what they describe as widespread corruption, inequality, and government mismanagement of public resources.

“The Secretary-General deplores the violence during recent demonstrations in Morocco, reportedly resulting in three people killed and several hundred injured,” said UN spokesperson Farhan Haq at a press briefing in New York.

“He calls for protests to take place in a peaceful manner, respecting life, property, and the rule of law, and for a prompt and impartial investigation with a view to ensuring accountability,” Haq said.

Guterres also welcomed Moroccan Prime Minister Aziz Akhannouch’s pledge to engage in dialogue with the protesters, many of whom belong to a loosely organized online movement called GenZ 212 — a reference to Morocco’s international dialing code and the generation driving the movement.

Protests over inequality and corruption

The protests, which erupted late last week, were initially sparked by grievances over chronic underfunding in public education and health care — two sectors where many Moroccans say decades of neglect have deepened inequality.

Demonstrators have also expressed anger over the government’s lavish spending on preparations for the 2030 FIFA World Cup, which Morocco is set to co-host with Spain and Portugal. Protesters have accused authorities of diverting billions toward stadium projects while hospitals and schools crumble.

Videos shared widely on social media show crowds chanting: “Stadiums are here, but where are the hospitals?” and “We want dignity, not mega-projects.”

In several cities, including Rabat, Casablanca, Tangier, and Agadir, thousands of mostly young demonstrators have filled public squares. While many protests remained peaceful, clashes with police have broken out in some areas, particularly in Leqliaa, a small town outside Agadir, where security forces reportedly opened fire on protesters Wednesday, killing three people.

Morocco’s Interior Ministry said the three were shot during an alleged attempt by demonstrators to seize police weapons. However, the Moroccan Association for Human Rights (AMDH) and several eyewitnesses dispute that account, saying the shootings occurred as security forces used live ammunition to disperse crowds.

Human rights groups have demanded an independent investigation into the deaths, accusing authorities of using excessive force and mass arrests to suppress dissent.

Casualties and arrests

The Interior Ministry said at least 354 people have been injured in the unrest, including 326 members of the security forces. Authorities also reported significant property damage — including 271 police vehicles, 175 private cars, and several banks, shops, and municipal buildings across 23 provinces.

The AMDH said that more than 1,000 people have been detained nationwide, though most were released within hours. Others reportedly remain in custody pending investigation on charges of “public disorder” and “property destruction.”

“The government must immediately stop using force against demonstrators and release all those detained for peacefully expressing their opinions,” said AMDH president Souad Benmoussa in a statement Thursday. “The state’s response risks deepening the rift between Moroccan youth and those in power.”

Government seeks calm

In a televised address, Prime Minister Akhannouch acknowledged public frustration and pledged to “listen to the concerns of Morocco’s youth.”

“The government is open to dialogue with all segments of society,” he said. “We must work together to ensure stability while addressing the legitimate expectations of our young people.”

Despite his appeal, protests appeared likely to continue through the weekend. GenZ 212 — which organizes through TikTok, Instagram, and the gaming platform Discord — posted a statement rejecting violence but vowed to persist with “peaceful and creative” demonstrations.

“We have no quarrel with the police, only with corruption and injustice,” the group said in a post on X (formerly Twitter). “We will not be silenced.”

Analysts say the protests reflect deeper social and economic frustrations in a country struggling with high youth unemployment, soaring living costs, and a sense of political stagnation. Nearly 30% of Moroccans under 30 are unemployed, according to official statistics, while inflation has eroded household incomes.

The discontent has been building for months, fueled by viral videos documenting poor conditions in hospitals and overcrowded classrooms. The World Bank recently warned that Morocco’s “youth employment crisis” could threaten social cohesion if left unaddressed.

Morocco last faced major unrest in 2011, during the Arab Spring, when protesters demanded constitutional reforms and an end to corruption. The monarchy weathered that wave of demonstrations with limited reforms, but the current movement appears to be driven by a younger, digitally organized generation less tied to traditional political groups.

It goes without saying that nothing is going well between Morocco and Algeria. Everyone is convinced that relations between the two major Maghreb countries have reached a point of no return, and observers are on the lookout for the slightest incident on the ground that could trigger a dramatic acceleration in tension and give rise to a dramatic exodus to Europe much more consistent than the current one.

In the very recent past, experts predicted that the possibility of an armed conflict was improbable, as the two heads of state risked losing more than just a war but instead control over their respective institutions. Now, nobody would bet a single penny on what might happen in the near or distant future.

The facts are there. Algeria, the most over-armed country in North Africa, continues to buy its weapons from abroad; from the Russians, of course, but for some time now it has been taking care to diversify its equipment. And Morocco is still counting on its long-standing ally, the United States, to equip and modernize its army – and with a bonus: following its normalization with Israel, the kingdom has signed several agreements with the latter to manufacture weapons on Moroccan soil.

In this frenetic arms race, anything can happen, otherwise, what is the point of depriving the Moroccan and Algerian populations of these vital financial resources that could be put to good use in preparing for war?

If we want to differentiate between the two countries, we can roughly say that Morocco is a monarchy with a liberal economy, and Algeria is a republic that has long been considered “socialist.” Otherwise, there aren’t many major differences between the two neighbors. The inhabitants speak the same vernacular (Darija) and use Berber languages that are very similar and have the same matrix. Similarly, classical Arabic is the official language in both countries, and French is the idiom of the elite.

Betrayal?

As for the economy, while Algeria’s resources are infinitely greater than Morocco’s, the kingdom has know-how in several key sectors that it has always drawn on to maintain its close relations with the West.

The black spot is in the tumultuous Morocco-Algerian relations. There are several factors, a huge abscess, a mess of mutual reproaches, desires for revenge, and a good dose of hatred that has become structural.

Without looking back too far, we can say that the tension that the Maghreb is experiencing today is not new and not the result of spontaneous generation. Relations between the two countries bear a heavy historical burden.
Some Algerian historians go back as far as the 19th century to look for the source of this legendary enmity between the two enemy brothers that geographical proximity and a semblance of shared history could have reconciled.

According to them, it all started with a “betrayal” that took place after the battle of Isly on August 14, 1844, which pitted the army of the Alawite Sultan Abderrahmane Ben Hicham against that of the French General Thomas Robert Bugeaud. The defeat of the sultan’s mehalla (army) sealed the end of the Moroccan protection enjoyed by Emir Abdelkader, the leader of the Algerian resistance, and above all outlawed him throughout the territory of the Cherifian Empire, which had served as his refuge.

Though “betrayal,” according to some studious Algerians, is the term used to describe this inglorious event, Moroccan counterparts describe it as the inevitable consequence of the catastrophic defeat of the sultan’s mehalla (army) at Isly. Without this painful outlawing, Morocco risked a repeat of the French naval bombardments that destroyed part of the ports of Mogador (Essaouira) and Tangiers.

Algeria’s support for the Polisario

The other major criticism leveled by Morocco targets Algeria’s massive political, diplomatic, and even military support for the Sahrawi independence fighters of the Polisario Front from the outset of the war in Western Sahara in the mid-1970s.

In fact, it was during this war that we came very close to a full-scale conflict between the two Maghreb powers. There were two specific dates. The first was the first battle of Amgala, in January 1976, which saw a direct military engagement by Algeria inside the territory of Western Sahara.

This military confrontation, the first since the Sands War, ended in a Moroccan victory. But a few weeks later, in February of the same year, another armed clash pitted the Moroccans against Polisario Front fighters, supported militarily by the Algerian army. It ended in victory for the Sahrawi independence fighters. It is thought that without the restraint of Hassan II and Houari Boumediene, the consequences of these two bitter and cruel battles would have given rise to a major conflict in the region.

The last time Morocco reproached Algeria was in 1994. That year, French terrorists of Algerian and Moroccan origin targeted places they considered symbolic of the kingdom’s image. These included a Jewish cemetery and, above all, the Atlas Asni hotel in Marrakech, where they murdered two Spanish tourists. Morocco accused the Algerian intelligence services of being behind this attack and closed the very long land border between the two countries. Since then, apart from a brief interlude, the border has remained closed.

This bitter enmity and mutual mistrust could have quietly gone on for several decades if things had not worsened recently.

Iran and the Western Sahara

A few years ago, no doubt under the influence of Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf countries, Morocco began accusing Iran of involvement in the Western Sahara conflict. Rabat believes that the Republic of Iran asked its Lebanese armed wing, Hezbollah, to provide active military support to the Polisario Front in the Sahrawi refugee camps at Tindouf. And Tindouf necessarily means Algeria. 

With all due respect to the Moroccans, this accusation has never been proven. Neither by Rabat nor by its American allies, even though they are vigilant when it comes to Iran and Hezbollah.

But this has not prevented Morocco from breaking off diplomatic relations with Teheran on several occasions.

To this must be added Morocco’s clumsy diplomatic initiative at the UN to support the hypothetical independence of Kabylia, a Berber-speaking region of Algeria. This is heresy for Algiers, which retorted violently to this initiative by pointing out that there is no UN process open to deal with this issue, whereas this is indeed the case for the Western Sahara conflict.

The normalization of diplomatic relations between Morocco and Israel, especially the military agreements, has also turned the region upside down and awakened Algerian diplomacy, which had been dormant for ages due to stagnation at the top of the state, led at the time by the aging President Abdelaziz Bouteflika. From the outset, Algiers has regarded the presence of the Jewish state in the Maghreb as a major threat to its national security, especially when Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid took advantage of his visit to Rabat to rebuke it.

That’s where we are today. An improvement in Morocco-Algerian relations is by no means on the agenda. On the other hand, the slightest armed incident between the two states could have incalculable consequences for the region.

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he elections in Turkey, the most important elections of 2023 worldwide, rolled on after the May 28 runoff, with Recep Tayyip Erdoğan getting 52.18 percent of the votes against his rival, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, and being re-elected.

On June 3, Erdoğan attended the swearing-in ceremony at the parliament and named the cabinet members right after the ceremony, the same evening. New faces have appeared in fifteen ministerial positions except for two ministries: the ministries of health and culture. The foreign, interior, defense, and finance ministries were among the most crucial cabinet posts with new incumbents. These four vital positions have been filled by well-known, experienced, and respected politicians and bureaucrats who have played critical roles in the country’s past two decades.

The replacement of the foreign minister, Mevlut Çavuşoğlu, with Dr. Hakan Fidan, who served as the head of the National Intelligence Organization (MIT), and the assignment of Prof. Ibrahim Kalin, who served as a presidential spokesperson and advisor to Erdoğan, as the new head of Turkish intelligence have attracted the attention of not only regional powers but also international players due to the duo’s importance for the country and President Erdoğan.

Despite some analysts considering the new assignments as indicators of change, this is not the case. In the past three years, Turkey has adopted a normalization policy merged with its financial aims of attracting foreign direct investment (FDI).

The past three years’ diplomatic and economic attempts have aimed at the deliberate preparation of Turkey’s transforming foreign policy and economy. This transformation has brought about a series of hardships for the country resulting from the fall of the Turkish currency as Turkey seeks to be a regional financial hub. However, the Turkish government plans to make Turkey a “center country” as suggested by Wallerstein’s world systems theory which argues that the world economic system serves to benefit some countries and exploit others.

Turkey’s recent achievements in the defense industry (fighter jets, drones, missiles, etc.), technology, and its indigenous car (TOGG) are among the vital indicators of this intention. Rather than being exploited, Turkey wants to decrease the value of the Turkish lira, and stabilize and improve its relations with regional powers as part of its normalization efforts.

What is more, the country’s proactive role in several conflicts has brought it to the fore as a regional and international spot for resolving conflicts. Since this strategy requires a stabilized region and good diplomatic ties, Ankara, witnessing the decreasing hegemonic power of the U.S., started mending its ties with its neighbors, particularly the Gulf countries, which could impact a wide range of areas and regions, including the Maghreb.

Turkey and the Maghreb

What can be expected next in Turkey’s relations with the Maghreb countries in light of Turkey’s new cabinet?

First, it is vital to remember the fact that the newly assigned foreign minister, Hakan Fidan, has been behind the scene of Ankara’s normalization efforts with regional powers. Egypt is among the countries with which Turkey has sought normalization, and Ankara and Cairo have already announced the assignment of their ambassadors after several years of cold diplomatic ties. The normalization between Ankara and Cairo is important since it can help resolve Libya’s more than decade-long conflict, along with the disputes in the Eastern Mediterranean. Turkey’s strengthening ties with Egypt would provide Ankara with an advantage against Greece, which signed an MoU with Cairo a year after Ankara signed one with Libya’s UN-backed government.

This can also provide an opportunity to find a solution for the Eastern Mediterranean gas and border rift. Regarding Libya, Turkey has been backing the UN-recognized government headed by Abdul Hamid Dbeibah while being in touch with several parties to the conflict. On the contrary, Egypt has been one of the closest allies of warlord Khalifa Haftar, the Tobruk-based parliament’s speaker and its PM-designate Fathi Bashagha. During Bashagha’s failed attempts to enter Tripoli, Turkey played a balancing role by stopping the clashes and mediating between the warring parties.

Following the visit of CIA Director William Burns to Libya in the middle of January in which he met with Dbeibah and Haftar, Fidan was quick to take action and meet Dbeibah, Menfi, Khalid al-Mishri, the Chairman of the High Council of State, and even Sudan’s army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan.

Hakan Fidan

Turkey’s foreign policy during Hakan Fidan’s tenure at the MIT was a conversion of his background activities into diplomatic steps, with Ankara’s grand strategy remaining the same: making Turkey a more independent, balanced, and proactive foreign approach, considering the decreasing hegemonic power of the U.S. in the Middle East.

Meanwhile, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries have been seen to be happy with Erdoğan’s re-election as they were among the first countries to congratulate him on his election victory. Considering the upcoming visits and meetings between Turkey, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar, Fidan could lead Ankara towards a solution of its long-standing issues.

With an operational intelligence service, proactive foreign policy efforts, and a qualified staff comprising among others the aforementioned ministers, Turkey only needs to eliminate its economic hardships. An improving Turkish economy would also help heal the wounds of the region and the world at large. As the U.S. is losing its hegemony across the region, Turkey, after recovering from an economic and diplomatic crisis, will seek to become a regional and global hub for trade, diplomacy, and politics as per its grand strategy.

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nti-migrant racism in North Africa was thought to be a taboo, but in reality it never was. Racism against African migrants, coupled with unabashed anti-Black xenophobia, is alive and kicking in North Africa. Tunisian President Kais Saied’s recent comments on February 21 about sub-Saharan migrants surely shocked many people. Saied labelled migrants as “hordes” and a “demographic threat” to his country. Even more, Saied called for “the need to put a rapid end to this immigration,” which, to his view, has become a source of “violence, crime and unacceptable acts.”

For a country like Tunisia, a generator of migrants fleeing to find a better life in Europe, Saied’s speech may seem out of place and contradictory. Doesn’t the European far right, which applauded Saied’s speech, say the same about Muslim migrants?

President Saied’s invective is neither unprecedented nor isolated in the larger geographical area, the Maghreb. From Morocco to Libya, passing through Mauritania, Algeria and, of course, Tunisia, hateful allegations are not only the prerogative of what some people there call the “little people” to whom we could add the “uncultured” or the “intolerant.” In the upper echelons, at the highest level of the Maghreb states, the same ideas circulate.

For this discourse is not new. Since the Maghreb became the exit door for migrants from Africa to reach the fabled El Dorado, Europe, this immense territory has been transformed into a huge waiting room for tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of sub-Saharan migrants unable to reach the European coast. A waiting room that has turned into an open-air prison over time. Especially since, to curb this migration flow, the European Union outsourced its borders and entrusted their guarding to the Maghreb states by rewarding them financially, diplomatically, or both.

A migrant mass

The direct consequence of this strong policy of containment has been the creation of a migrant mass that has settled permanently in the Maghreb and lives on the fringes of society, waiting for a passage to Europe. It has also caused inevitable impoverishment and generated the phenomenon of criminalization that no one questions, especially not the local population in contact with migrants.

It is important to understand that as long as migrants were only crossing the territory, they were tolerated. It was only when they were prevented from doing so that their presence began to pose a problem and the old demon of racism resurfaced.

Over the past twenty years, many serious and sometimes bloody incidents have taken place against migrants in North Africa, without being properly reported by the press. Police raids followed by robberies and humiliations, assaults, lynching organized by neighborhood lords or angry citizens, and even rapes have targeted this vulnerable population.

Racism is as old as the world and knows no borders. The Maghrebi expressions for Black people, “âzzi” (black), “kahlouche” (negro), “âbid” (slave), or “oussif” (slave, servant), which have been heard with force recently, are not new and are not a relic of colonialism. As far back as the 14th century, Ibn Khaldun, a historian of Arab descent born in Tunis, wrote that “the only peoples who accept slavery are the negroes, because of their lower degree of humanity, their place being closer to that of the animal.”

Legacy of French colonization

These expressions are therefore the fruit of a mentality that predates the French colonization of Algeria and Mauritania, the French protectorates of Tunisia and Morocco, and the Italian occupation of Libya. What has changed is the violence of words and actions.

In 2012, the Moroccan weekly Maroc Hebdo devoted an entire dossier to the “Black Peril,” attacking without embellishment those who “live by begging, engage in drug trafficking and prostitution” and “pose a human and security problem for the country.” On Moroccan social media, there are regular calls for the expulsion of African migrants, the closure of borders, and the banning of mixed marriages in order to preserve an improbable “purity of the Moroccan race.”

On the other side of the border, in Algeria, a hashtag on Twitter resurfaces from time to time (in Arabic), #NotoAfricansinAlgeria, which immediately sets the world on fire by calling for the hunting down and deportation of migrants. Sometimes, the creators of these hateful messages deliberately confuse Black migrants with Black North African citizens. From the Atlantic Ocean to the Egyptian border, there is a Black Maghrebi population whose ancestors were slaves or settled in North Africa several centuries ago. They are certainly citizens, but they are still considered second-class ones.

A few years ago, in 2016, a Black model of Algerian nationality, Amina Hamouine, had to face an extraordinary campaign of hatred because she had the idea, or the “bad idea” as her detractors would say, of being photographed wearing a Kabyle dress—the Kabyle people are Berbers from the region of Kabylia. This was an unforgivable mistake for those who identify the Kabyle woman from the whiteness of her skin.

Too Black?

Recently, Khadidja Benhamou, an Algerian citizen from Adrar in the south of the country, was deemed “too Black” to wear the crown of Miss Algeria 2019—her skin color did not represent all Algerians, it seems.

But it is not only the “little people” who indulge in these feelings that sociologists and anthropologists call “systemic negrophobia.” Some Algerian leaders do as well. In 2017, five years before the Tunisian president’s remarks, senior officials of Algiers, which has a virulent anti-colonial past, were not kind to migrants either.

Ahmed Ouyahia, an Algerian politician who has been appointed prime minister ten times—an absolute record— and who at the time was head of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika’s cabinet as a minister of state, described African migrants on the private television station Ennahar TV as “[t]hese illegal foreigners bring[ing] crime, drugs and several other scourges.” At the time, Ouyahia was the secretary general of the National Democratic Rally (RND), one of the two crutches, along with the National Liberation Front (FLN), that support the government in Algeria.

His words were echoed and amplified a few days later by Algerian Foreign Minister Abdelkader Messahel, who identified the arrival of sub-Saharans in the country as a “threat to national security.”

But the ultimate horror was reached again in 2017 in Libya, when footage filmed by CNN journalists revealed to the world the unimaginable in the 21st century: an auction of migrants from Nigeria at a market near Tripoli.

Anti-racism laws

To counter this unfortunate litany of racist acts, Tunisia passed a law in 2018 penalizing racism and established January 23 as the “National Day for the Abolition of Slavery.” However, the 2018 law, historical, innovative, and the first of its kind in the Arab world, was annihilated by the verbal outrage of President Saied on February 21, 2023, when he evoked a “criminal plan prepared at the beginning of this century to change the demographic composition of Tunisia” and whose objective was to transform the country into an “African-only country” and to remove its “Arab Muslim” identity.

Of course, one can try to nuance this reality by recalling, for example, the decision of the Moroccan authorities to launch campaigns to issue resident permits, such as in 2014, which initially resulted in the regularization of 25,000 undocumented migrants. It can also be argued that, like Tunisia, Algeria adopted a law criminalizing racial discrimination in 2020. But these gestures of goodwill have little impact if they are not followed by campaigns to educate the local population on the need to accept the “other.” Campaigns that television stations refused to broadcast, as was the case in Morocco.

All crises, whether economic or security-based, produce exasperation that ends up finding a scapegoat, and African migrants have become the ideal candidates. They pay for the economic crisis and the criminal behavior of a minority in their own community.

As a scapegoat, they also pay the price for some of the services rendered by the Maghreb states to Europeans: to showcase its status as a paid gendarme of the European Commission, Morocco got carried away by its destructive zeal on June 24, 2022, when it violently curtailed an attempt by several hundred migrants, mostly Sudanese, citizens of a “brotherly Arab” country, to force their way into Ceuta, a Spanish enclave on Moroccan territory.

EU responsibility

The result—24 dead according to the Moroccan authorities, 37 according to a local association, not counting the missing—has not only tarnished Morocco’s image in Africa but also revealed another problem that is worth studying. In which state in the world, except for the former East Germany and the now defunct Berlin Wall and migrants escaping war to Greece and Italy, are dozens of people killed to prevent them from leaving a country that is not theirs to seek refuge elsewhere?

A tragedy that ended with a congratulatory gesture worthy of the former East Germany, as the president of the Spanish government, Pedro Sánchez, praised the brutal intervention of the Moroccan police force.

Finally, the European Union’s migration policy, which consists of preventing human beings from moving freely, by force if necessary, has helped this local outbreak of racism and intolerance, and dynamited several principles, some of them religious, that were thought to be immutable.

Pan-Africanism, the egalitarian and anti-slavery utopia propagated in most of the post-independence Maghreb countries, especially Algeria, has come to an end. The myth introduced by these countries of an integrating Islam that makes no distinction between a white and a Black person has been shattered. Despite many migrants adhering to Islam, they are treated as strangers to the Ummah.

W

ho was behind the release of thousands of confidential Moroccan documents, many of which are now being highlighted in the international press to support corruption charges against current and former MEPs at the center of Qatar Gate and Morocco Gate?

It is a mysterious case. In 2014, a “hacker” by the name of Chris Coleman published thousands of documents on Twitter and various social networks, many of them classified as “confidential” or “secret,” as well as a huge mass of correspondence, emails, and archives of all kinds exposing in great detail the way the DGED (General Directorate of Studies and Documentation, the Moroccan foreign intelligence agency) and the Moroccan Ministry of Foreign Affairs worked.

There was everything: reports on everything and everyone, studies, correspondence, requests for instructions, and above all the names of the DGED’s regular collaborators. Not the usual police snitches, but prominent members of society, Moroccans and foreigners, journalists, politicians, experts, senior officials, members of civil society, etc. Lists of gifts and generous sums of money paid to some politicians, closed this incredible inventory.

For example, the names of Pier Antonio Panzeri, the former Italian MEP, and his assistant Francesco Giorgi, both currently imprisoned in Brussels for the Qatar Gate and Morocco Gate affair, appeared in these documents without anyone taking notice.

Another example was Fight Impunity, the association created by Panzeri in Brussels, and which is now at the center of the scandal, which was exposed as the brainchild of the late Moroccan ambassador to the European Union, Menouar Alem, in a confidential report sent to the Moroccan foreign ministry in 2012.

At the time, namely 2014, a few people quickly accused “Chris Coleman” of being a forger and laughed at this “Marocleaks,” before retracting. The Moroccan state at no time questioned the authenticity of this immense documentation while certain media outlets accused neighboring Algeria of being behind this giant leak.

But who is this “Chris Coleman”? Who is behind this computer genius who managed to pump almost five gigabytes, and surely more, of data from the servers of the DGED and the Moroccan diplomacy to disperse them on the web? It is a question that has been asked a thousand times. Some have claimed that it was indeed a “hacker,” others have presented him as an ex-head of the DGED who broke with his management, and there are even those who have seen the hand of another Moroccan secret service to discredit the DGED, headed since 2005 by Mohamed Yassine Mansouri, a friend of King Mohamed VI. In short, a war of services.

There has always been a lot of imagination in the world of spies. In this case, however, the truth is simple if we carefully scrutinize the ups and downs of relations between Morocco and some countries considered “allies.”

The person who chose the name “Chris Coleman,” named after the former Welsh international footballer, is apparently a soccer fan, but he is not a hacker hiding somewhere in a dingy office surrounded by computer screens. And Algeria, which is hated by some Moroccans, is absolutely not involved in this affair, as some have tried to accredit.

The structure – a state one – behind “Chris Coleman” and which has exposed Moroccan counterespionage and diplomacy is probably the French DGSE (Direction générale de la Sécurité extérieure).

What follows is the result of several weeks of investigation and cross-checking that reveal that an underground and very unfriendly war has been going on for a decade, or perhaps more, between the French DGSE and the Moroccan DGED.

It all began on May 24, 2014, with an article that appeared on the Moroccan website le360. The article titled “Convocation of the French Ambassador: New Revelations” was written by Mohamed Chakir Alaoui, a former junior employee of the Agence France-Presse (AFP) office in Rabat.

Alaoui was not known in the Moroccan journalistic world, having never revealed any sensitive case. But on that day, he dropped a piece of information that would set the world on fire. “Agnès Féline,” he wrote, the “second secretary at the French embassy” is the “head of the antenna of the General Directorate of External Security (DGSE) in Morocco.”

This revelation startled the French embassy in Rabat and by extension the Parisian directorate of the DGSE. French diplomats and spies wondered how a journalist who was not an expert in the shadowy world of intelligence knew that Féline was indeed the “head of the DGSE antenna in Rabat.” At the same time, revealing Féline’s true function was tantamount to putting her in grave danger.

The French intelligence center quickly came to the conclusion that the information had been dictated to Alaoui by the Moroccan intelligence service, the only one to know Féline’s true status.

But why did the site le360 reveal the true function of a French spy? The Moroccan intelligence services were seeking revenge for a terrible humiliation suffered a few months earlier by the boss of the DST (Directorate General of Territorial Security). In February 2014, the French police sought to arrest the director general of the DST Abdellatif Hammouchi at the residence of the Moroccan ambassador to France in Neuilly-sur-Seine. A judge wanted to hear from the head of Moroccan spies after complaints of torture in Morocco filed by several French citizens, including former world kickboxing champion Zakaria Moumni.  Hammouchi had to leave France in a hurry, without passing through the Parisian airports. This was a great humiliation for the head of the Moroccan secret services.

The president of the Spanish government Pedro Sánchez flew to Morocco on Thursday, April 7, to have a ftour (Moroccan iftar) with King Mohamed VI, and thus seal a reconciliation with his southern neighbor. It is more than likely that the harira, the traditional soup that Moroccans eat to break their fast, must have had a bitter taste for the Spanish leader.

A few hours before he flew to Rabat, the Spanish Congress of Deputies voted a “Proposición no de ley,” a Spanish parliamentary non-binding non-legislative motion, harshly reproaching the president for his reversal on the Western Sahara conflict.

Only 118 deputies of Sánchez’s PSOE (Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party) voted against the motion. The rest, a total of 168 deputies, some of whom are part of the government coalition or support the government without participating in it, and the conservative right-wing Popular Party MPs voted in favor of the motion. Sixty-one other deputies abstained, representing the far-right Vox and the center-liberals Ciudadanos (Citizens).

With the exception of the Socialists, everyone wanted to express their disagreement, if not anger, at the president for breaking a 46-year-old consensus, respected by all Spanish executives—right, center, and left—since the death of General Franco.

As a former colonial power that is still considered by the UN as the administrative power of Western Sahara (Morocco being a de facto power), Spain was bound to a certain so-called active neutrality. It was not supposed to lean towards either Morocco or the Polisario Front independence fighters. However, in a letter to the King of Morocco, Sánchez stated that he favored the Moroccan proposal of autonomy offered to the Saharawis in 2007, dubbing it “the most serious, realistic, and credible,” thus dynamiting this old and very sensitive balance.

In a widely read tweet, Iceta shared an article from the daily El Periódico de España in which he explained that there had been a barter between Spain and Morocco. In exchange for Madrid’s acceptance of the Moroccan autonomy proposal for Western Sahara, Rabat is said to have committed itself to stop claiming the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta, Melilla, and the Canary Islands. “The agreement obliges Morocco to give up Ceuta, Melilla, and the Canary Islands,” the newspaper wrote peremptorily.

And this is where it all gets murky and incomprehensible. By negotiating its renunciation of the self-determination of the Saharawis, in violation of international law since it is the UN that manages this conflict, did Madrid obtain written assurances from the Moroccans? Nothing could be further from certain.

Morocco will never give up its claims on Ceuta and Melilla, which it has economically suffocated by closing its borders and putting an end to smuggling, which is one of the sources of the prosperity of these two free ports.

It is not for nothing that Morocco has built a huge port on the Strait of Gibraltar, Tangier-Med, in one of the most important maritime crossing points in the world. Tangier-Med, considered today one of the largest ports in Africa, competes directly with the port of Algeciras, located on the other side of the strait, but also with the port of Ceuta.

As for Melilla, the unilateral closure in 2018 of the only land custom crossing between Spain and Morocco, that of Beni Ensar, opened after the Treaty of Fès in 1912 and ratified after Morocco’s independence in 1956, is another manifestation of the Moroccan will to strangle the economy of this city.

On the other hand, although Morocco does not formally claim the Canary Islands, in 2020, the House of Representatives (lower house of parliament) voted two bills extending Moroccan territorial waters to a point overlapping with those of the islands.

It is therefore hard to see Rabat giving up its historical claims to landlocked territories in Africa only to thank the Spanish government for saying that it found the Moroccan autonomy plan for Western Sahara to be the “most serious, realistic, and credible.”

Moreover, in the joint Spanish-Moroccan declaration at the end of the meeting with Sánchez in Rabat, there is no mention of Ceuta and Melilla. On the other hand, Article 3 of the document refers to the “full normalization of the movement of persons and goods,” which “will be re-established in an orderly manner, including appropriate arrangements for land and maritime customs and control of persons.” Does this mean that Morocco will reopen the old Beni Ensar land customs, which was abruptly closed in 2018? It is possible, but not yet certain.

What is certain, however, and is written in Article 6 of this declaration, is that Morocco seems to be backing down on its claims to the territorial waters of the Canary Islands, since it talks about the reactivation of a “working group on the delimitation of the maritime spaces of the Atlantic seaboard (…) with the aim of making concrete progress.” This seems to indicate that Morocco will review the two laws that allow Moroccan territorial waters to overlap with those of Spain.

Morocco has always dreamed of hosting the World Cup in order to foster a positive image of itself to the world. The economic benefits, of course, are a prime consideration, but there are also other important, undeclared reasons. Yet, despite considerable efforts, thus far, Morocco has not yet managed to host the coveted cup; Morocco is busy with selling a positive image of its status as a moderate, pro-Western Muslim country, and one that spearheads the fight against “Islamist terrorism.”

To some, these titles are necessary, and especially for European politicians from all parties who are anxious to maintain good relations with Morocco because of its role as a paid policeman on the European Union’s southern border. According to international terrorism experts, including many Europeans, the “spearhead against terrorism” attribute might be exaggerated – but that is another story.

So, what a wonderful opportunity for a country whose image has deteriorated considerably in recent years after many violations of the fundamental rights of its citizens to find itself positively projected on the international scene with an event like that of the young boy Rayan, who fell into a water well near the village of Tamorot, a community located near the town of Chaouen in the mountains of northern Morocco. In this dramatic story, Morocco had everything to gain by capturing the solidarity and affection of the whole world in order to make people forget, at least momentarily, the regime’s shortcomings.

We are not going to get into second-rate conspiracy theories such as the claims that the Moroccan regime orchestrated the fall of little Rayan for political and diplomatic gain. This is neither true nor fair. But without too much hesitation one can say that the fall of this child and the quick realization in “high places” in Rabat, the capital, that Morocco could benefit from it in the media, made it possible to exploit this episode for propaganda purposes.

We saw it. As soon as the tragedy began, all public media outlets, including radio and television stations, as well as private media outlets and the written press were all immediately put to work, with special envoys or local correspondents, to make this accident a major event in the lives of Moroccans. A tragedy that was to end with a climax: Rayan was to be brought out of his grave alive. And above all, saved by Moroccan hands.

The fall of 5-year old Rayan was a tragedy that Morocco wanted to end with a climax: Rayan was to be brought out of his grave alive. And above all, saved by Moroccan hands.

By refusing to accept foreign help, precious and experienced, by making Rayan’s rescue a strictly national affair, and by putting in place the material and technical means to succeed, the Moroccan authorities had in mind a recent, similar tragedy that shook Andalusia in 2019, a Spanish region very close to the north of Morocco. There, a child named Julen had fallen into a well and rescuers had tried to save him from a gruesome death. After 13 days of superhuman effort, the Spanish rescuers, including a team of miners with expertise in underground rescue, failed. The child was found lifeless. But, for almost two weeks, Spain had found itself at the center of the world.

Today, questions and certainties remain. In seeking to show the world Moroccan “know-how” in this field at all costs – when Morocco has none – have the authorities sinned out of vanity? Did the person or persons who piloted the Rayan operation from Rabat and knowingly refused foreign help, especially that of a very experienced Spanish team that had worked on the rescue of little Julen, get carried away by a patriotic but ingenuous, even reproachful, impulse? It is difficult to answer, as the decisions taken at the top of the state are extremely opaque.

On the other hand, and this is the main backlash, during this crisis, Moroccans discovered that a significant part of their press, especially the prolific electronic sites, had a particular vision of what the National Press Council (CNP) calls “journalistic ethics.” This official body, which has so little regard for the many ignominious violations of human dignity practiced by media close to the government, suddenly remembered that a very large part of the electronic press, many of whose members had an official press card, were in fact “yellow” media.

The CNP had to wake up from its lethargy to condemn in strong terms this trashy press for having overstepped “ethical limits” by displaying “petty sensationalism to increase the number of views, among other methods, to monetize humanitarian dramas.” The CNP was obliged to detail this “petty sensationalism,” such as the publication of photos of little Rayan dying and bloodied at the bottom of the well.

While Morocco did, in fact, benefit from international media interest during the five days of this unfortunate misadventure, it was unable to achieve the climax it had hoped for – namely, to show the world the image of a living Rayan in the hands of Moroccan rescuers. Instead, Rayan unwillingly served up on a silver platter the obscene nature of this defamatory press, which is largely funded by the taxpayer.

Arguably, the only gain for the Moroccan population from this affair is a likely new legislation, which the House of Representatives of the Moroccan Parliament is reportedly preparing, to effectively regulate the illegal but tolerated practice of well construction. In the desert, south of the country, water wells are dug to alleviate the ravages of the endemic drought that prevails there. In the mountains of Morocco, to the north, wells are used to irrigate cannabis crops, the production and sale of which has just been regulated by a new law.

A very modest outcome from such a great and ephemeral media show.

Morocco and Turkey have the potential to establish a promising political and economic cooperation, based on mutual respect and national interests. In addition to the shared cultural and religious ties, both are important geopolitical actors of the MENA region, the Mediterranean, and the Islamic world at large.

Over the past two decades, Morocco and Turkey have intensified their diplomatic relations and trade volume, sharing experience in many sectors such as migration, military cooperation, security affairs as well as the textile and construction sectors.

Turkey regards Morocco as an important partner given the dynamism of Morocco’s economy and the kingdom’s geographical location as a gateway to Africa. But there is also a competitive aspect to this relationship.

From 2011 onward, the Turkish-Moroccan relations indicate a state of reluctance to establish strong relations. Invited by the chief of the government in 2013, then Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan visited Morocco, seeking a strategic partnership, but he was not received by King Mohammed VI. Moreover, Erdoğan was boycotted by the General Confederation of Moroccan Enterprises.

While the coalition government’s leading political party, the Party for Justice and Development in Morocco, had a strong cooperation with Turkey’s JDP (Justice and Development Party or AKP), the monarchy refused to have strong relations with Turkey. However, in December 2014, King Mohammed VI and his family were received by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan at his home. It was a friendly and unofficial meeting.

In the summer of 2016, two years later, Morocco condemned the coup attempt against Turkish President Erdoğan and met the Turkish government’s demands to crack down on FETO (Fetullah Terrorist Organization) institutions in Morocco. As a response, in 2017, Morocco closed seven FETO schools and arrested many of those who are affiliated with the group.

Unbalanced Free Trade Agreements

The Turkey-Morocco free trade agreement (FTA) signed on April 7, 2004, in Ankara, and entered into force at the beginning of 2006, provides a significant impetus to bilateral cooperation.

In 2018, the trade volume between Turkey and Morocco increased to around $2.7 billion, which is a positive indicator of the agreements made earlier. Despite the gradual increase, Morocco requested a review of some clauses of the FTA after its local industries and businesses suffered a loss, and the trade balance with Turkey experienced a deficit following the entry into force of the accord in 2006.

This imbalance is due to the similarity of certain sectors in both countries, such as textiles, leather, construction, public works, and distribution networks. In parallel, the Turkish investments in the Kingdom of Morocco were not materialized as expected. The volume of Turkish investments in Morocco does not exceed 1% due to the lack of the promotion of direct Turkish investment in the country, notably through joint-venture operations. However, to increase Turkish investment, Ankara should invest in new sectors such as the pharmaceutical industry, banking services, or insurance, in addition to the establishment of joint investment platforms.

In October 2020, up to 90% additional customs taxation was imposed on Turkish products for a period of five years. These additional taxes cover a total of 1,200 different products in different categories, led by the industry, food, and textile sectors.

The changes and additional taxation were implemented after a controversial 18 months. The Moroccan government thinks that the 2004 free trade agreement with Turkey has a negative impact on Morocco’s trade deficit. For Morocco, enhancing the free trade agreement to overcome impediments for equitable sharing of benefits is critical for sustainable cooperation and is necessary for a win-win perspective.

A Strategic Partnership to What Extent?

While Morocco and Turkey’s bilateral relations are based on common interests on security, migration, development, and territorial integrity, the former Saudi-Turkish confrontation affected regional stability and led to further geopolitical polarization in the Maghreb region. The long-standing rivalry between the two important powers of North Africa, Morocco and Algeria, has always been the determining factor in the steps of international and regional powers toward the region. Maintaining economic and political relations with both countries is an important factor in Turkey’s insistence on a neutral policy toward the region’s two important countries.

One of the most sensitive and important issues is the Sahara crisis. Here, Algeria is providing both financial and political support to the Polisario militias, and Turkey’s relationship with Algeria and its lack of clarity on this issue has led to tense relations between it and Morocco.

In December 2019, the state-owned Turkish television channel TRT World aired an interview with Sahrawi separatist Aminatou Haidar. Haidar’s critical discourse towards the Moroccan state triggered a wave of criticism by Moroccan media. The broadcast was considered blackmail after a call for a readjustment of a free trade deal with Turkey by the Moroccan government.

In economic terms, the visit of Algerian Foreign Minister Sabri Bukadoum to Turkey on September 1, 2020, and his commitment to offering important opportunities to Turkish investor companies, is an indicator of the rivalry between Morocco and Algeria in the Maghreb region and the African continent.

The defeat of the Justice and Development Party (PJD) in the most recent general elections in Morocco is a blow for conciliatory Islamism (vis-à-vis the monarchy) and a resounding victory for the Royal Palace. How did the PJD fall from 125 MPs in the House of Representatives, the lower house of parliament, to only 13 MPs, making it the eighth political party in the country? In fact, there is no mystery and one can easily explain this debacle.

The PJD’s critics – and there are many in Morocco – argue that the defeat of the Islamists is the natural consequence of a punishment vote. “During the ten years that they governed Morocco, the Islamists have not been up to the task,” is often heard on Moroccan streets.

This is both true and false. It is true that the PJD lost the elections because it failed miserably on many fronts, primarily the economic and social ones. The party could not improve Moroccans’ economic conditions, could not reduce the huge social disparities, and could not fight against the endemic corruption. It’s claimed that the PJD has not tried to balance power with the Royal Palace by demanding, as the 2011 constitution allows, a real separation of powers.

At the same time, this is not true insofar as the PJD had no control over the government’s strategic decisions. It was certainly at the head of a theoretical majority in the parliament, but the government’s decisions were imposed on it. The parties, which were literally “stuck” to the PJD, came from different backgrounds and did not necessarily share its values and conservative views.

Should we therefore pity the PJD or label it a victim of the system? No. The PJD has voluntarily allowed itself to be drawn into a posture of total submission to the Royal Palace, serving primarily the interests of the monarchy instead of those of the people who voted for it.

Since 2011, when PJD Secretary General Abdelilah Benkirane was appointed head of government, and after his replacement by Saad Dine El Otmani in 2017, the PJD, which won all elections in this period except the latest one, has accepted all the royal cabinet’s diktats.

Apart from the post of head of government, the PJD has let the important ministries, without which nothing can be done in Morocco, slip away and has fallen back on secondary ministerial departments. When PJD officials were appointed, for a time, to head some of these important ministries, such as the Ministries of Justice and Foreign Affairs, the Royal Palace placed its men in key positions in order to chaperone the Islamists and to control them.

To this, we must add that the JDP has accepted to take responsibility for all the unpopular measures of the last ten years, knowing that, at the very least, they hurt the feelings of a large part of its electorate, and, at worst, they directly affected their lives.

In all fairness, the PJD is not the only one responsible for its downfall. Other factors also contributed to it. The involvement of the Moroccan state is one of them. For several years, the continuous disclosure of sexual scandals affecting important members of the party by press close to the “deep state” – some real and others invented – contributed to tarnishing the PJD’s reputation.

To this, we must add the direct interventionism of the Minister of the Interior Abdelouafi Laftit in the political life of the country with the aim of putting a spoke in the Islamists’ wheel. For example, it was Laftit, a man of the Royal Palace, who imposed a new electoral law in 2019 that was unfavorable to the PJD. This law brings about a new distribution of seats in the House of Representatives calculated on the basis of the number of registered voters and not of voters. And the funny thing is that this reform was imposed by the Ministry of the Interior on a government led by the main victim of this law: the PJD.

The money that flowed during the elections also contributed to the weakening of the PJD.

The other major factor that contributed to weakening the PJD is the money that flowed during the elections – a fact that was denounced by the Moroccan branch of the NGO Transparency International. Transparency International did not name the beneficiary of this venal strategy, but the Authenticity and Modernity Party (PAM), which came second with 87 MPs, specifically accused the National Rally of Independents (RNI) which won 102 seats of corruption.

To sum up, the latest general elections in Morocco, and especially the legislative elections, meant a terrible setback for the PJD and a victory, as a consequence of a long-standing strategy, for the Royal Palace. Not only is the PJD out, but a friend of King Mohammed VI, the billionaire and president of the RNI Aziz Akhannouch has been entrusted with forming the new government.

With a close friend of the sovereign at the head of the government in Morocco, a balkanized parliament, and a reduced and fragmented Islamist opposition, the legislature promises to be quiet and without upheaval – with a downside, however. Since 2011, the PJD has complacently played the role of the villain, the punching bag that is supposed to take the blows instead of the Royal Palace, in order to preserve the image of the monarchy.

The fall of the PJD in Morocco and the appointment of a man from the Royal Palace, who is said to be a newcomer even though he has been heading the Ministry of Agriculture since 2007, changes the situation. Akhannouch and the RNI are creatures of the real Moroccan power. If the new head of government succeeds in his bid to modernize Morocco and reduce social inequalities, it will be to the benefit of the Royal Palace. If he fails, it is the king who will be primarily responsible.

When the news circulated that Morocco’s leading political group, the Development and Justice Party (PJD), has been trounced in the latest elections, held in September, official media mouthpieces in Egypt celebrated the news as if the PJD’s defeat was, in itself, a blow to the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood movement. Regionally, political commentators who dedicated much of their time to discredit various Islamic political parties – often on behalf of one Arab government or another – found in the news another supposed proof that political Islam is a failure in both theory and practice.

“Regionally, the news of the (PJD) failure was greeted with jubilation,” Magdi Abdelhadi wrote on the BBC English website. “Commentators regarded the fall of PJD as the final nail in the coffin of political Islam,” he added.

Missing from such sweeping declarations is that those who greeted the defeat of the PJD with ‘jubilation’ are mostly the very crowd that dismissed political Islam even during its unprecedented surge following the ‘Arab Spring’ in 2011; and the same intellectual mercenaries who unashamedly continue to sing the praises of such dictators as General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in Egypt and the various Arab monarchs in the Gulf.

The PJD was not only defeated but almost completely demolished as a result of the vote, saving only 12 seats from the 125 seats it had obtained after the 2016 elections. The reasons behind such failure, however, are being misconstrued by various entities, governments and individuals with the aim of settling old scores and tarnishing political rivals. The ultimate objective here is to cement the status quo where the fate of Arab nations remains in the grip of brutal, corrupt and self-aggrandizing rulers, with no tolerance for genuine political plurality and democracy.

Those who insist on viewing Arab and Middle Eastern politics through generalized, academic notions have also found in the outcome of the Moroccan elections a perfect opportunity to delve further into sweeping statements. These knee-jerk, cliched reactions were boosted by the ongoing political crisis in Tunisia, the main victim of which, aside from Tunisian democracy, is the Ennahda Islamic party.

Democracy Crisis in Tunisia

On July 25, Tunisian President Kais Saied began a series of measures that effectively dismantled the country’s entire democratic infrastructure, while concentrating all powers into his hands.

Taking advantage of the poor performances and endemic dysfunction of the country’s major political parties, including Ennahda, as well as the festering economic crisis and the growing dissatisfaction among ordinary Tunisians, Saied justified his actions as a way “to save the state and society.”

Deterministic vs Dynamic Politics 

When the Arab Spring first began, starting in Tunisia in early 2011, it seemed that the fall of dictators and the rise of democracy was inevitable; also certain seemed the rise of Islamic parties, which has, indeed, registered substantial victories in various democratic elections throughout the Middle East and North Africa. Egypt’s Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) – which was founded by the country’s Muslim Brotherhood Movement – won 37 percent of the votes in the parliamentary election in 2011; Morocco’s PJD secured over 25 percent of available seats in the parliament, while Ennahda obtained 89 of 217 seats.

Then, it was common to discuss Islamic parties as if they are all branches of the same ideological – in fact, in the view of some – even political movement. ‘Political Islam’ became synonymous with the ‘Arab Spring’. Some saw this as an opportunity for ‘moderate’ Muslims – marginalized, exiled and often tortured and killed – to finally claim what is rightfully theirs; others, namely Israeli and right-wing western intellectuals and politicians, decried what they saw as an ‘Islamic Winter’, claiming that democracy and Islam would espouse an even greater anti-western and anti-Israeli sentiment.

Often missing from most of these discussions is the national context, under which all Arab politics, whether Islamic-leaning or otherwise, operate. In Morocco, for example, King Mohammed VI played his own political game to ensure the survival of the monarchy in the age of democratization. He quickly drew the Islamists nearer to him, offered a veneer of democracy, while practically holding on to all aspects of power.

Though it will take time to reach a conclusive analysis, it is possible that the PJD’s downfall was a result of its willingness to compromise on its declared principles in exchange for a very limited share of power. Indeed, at times, it seemed as if the Islamic party, elected to steer the country away from the rule of a single individual, was serving the role of the King’s official political party. This was manifested in the PJD’s acceptance and eventual endorsement of Morocco’s normalization of ties with the State of Israel in December 2020.

The Islamists’ recent defeat in Morocco, however, must not be viewed as a crisis in political Islam, for the latter is a theoretical concept that is in constant flux and is open to various, often radically opposing interpretations by different scholars and under different historical contexts.

While the PJD, for example, signed off to the King’s normalization with Israel, Ennahda vehemently rejected it. Indeed, each Islamic party seems to behave according to different sets of priorities that are unique to that party, to its socio-economic setting, political objective and, ultimately, to its own unique interests.

What had to happen, happened. Algeria and Morocco have broken off their diplomatic relations. Algerian Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra made the announcement on Tuesday, August 24, 2021, during a press briefing. Before announcing this fatal outcome, Lamamra made a long presentation in which he listed all his country’s grievances towards Morocco since Algeria’s independence in 1962.

Lamamra began by recalling the Sands War, which pitted the two Maghreb armies against each other between the end of 1963 and the beginning of 1964. He went on to describe all the misunderstandings between the two states over the past 60 years, recalling, of course, the eternal dispute over Western Sahara between the Sahrawi independence fighters of the Polisario Front, supported by Algiers, and the Kingdom of Morocco since 1975. He then moved on to recent history, touching on the recent tensions, which have been shaking the two countries and are not minor.

Here are the reasons that pushed Algiers to break its relations with Rabat. Algeria considers that the normalization of diplomatic relations between Morocco and Israel in December 2020 means the installation of a “Zionist vanguard” in the Maghreb. And this, it has claimed since December, constitutes a threat to its security. The recent official visit to Morocco of the minister of foreign affairs and future prime minister of Israel, Yair Lapid, has only added fuel to fire.

Although it is still not known if he did so with the approval of the Moroccan authorities, from Raba, Lapid criticized the “rapprochement [of Algeria] with Iran” thus expressing the opposition of the Rabat-Tel Aviv axis to the supposed Algiers-Tehran axis. By doing so, he exported to the Maghreb the geostrategic rivalry between Israel and Iran. This move was viewed as a mistake in the eyes of many Moroccans who, despite a bitter Saudi campaign that led to the breakdown of diplomatic relations between Morocco and Iran, do not consider Iran an enemy.

For several years, Rabat has been trying to give credence to the idea that Tehran, through the Lebanese movement Hezbollah, supports the Polisario Front militarily, with the acquiescence of Algeria.

For several years, Rabat has been trying to give credence to the idea that Tehran, through the Lebanese movement Hezbollah, supports the Polisario Front militarily, with the acquiescence of Algeria. But for the moment, despite a few rare opinion articles in the Moroccan and foreign media linked to the Moroccan regime, no serious investigation has been able to confirm this scenario. Even the Americans, although vigilant towards Iran and Hezbollah, have not detected anything.

The other Moroccan blunder that set off the fire was the quasi-recognition of MAK, the Movement for self-determination of Kabylie, supported by Rabat and considered a “terrorist organization” by the Algerian government.

The Algerian state announced its decision to “review” its relations with Rabat and to intensify security control on the western borders due to “the incessant hostile acts” by Morocco.

A few days later, Algeria declared that the forest fires that ravaged the north of the country were caused by MAK militants. To further increase its pressure on Morocco, Algiers accused Morocco of training MAK activists in military camps.

The rupture of diplomatic relations was a matter of days. To show that there was no return back and to signify that the bridges between the two countries had been definitively cut, on August 26, Algiers announced that it would no longer use the Maghreb-Europe Gas Pipeline that connects the Algerian oil fields with Europe via Morocco. Mohamed Arkab, the Algerian energy minister, explained to the Spaniards that from now on, the Algerian gas would only go through Medgaz, another pipeline that links Algeria directly to Spain, without passing through Morocco.

This Algerian decision constitutes an economic loss for Morocco, which used to pump 900 million cubic meters of natural gas every year, let alone the financial losses that Rabat will suffer as it will no longer collect money from Spain for using its territory.

What will happen now? It is unlikely that the escalation between Algeria and Morocco will end with the severing of diplomatic ties.

What will happen now? It is unlikely that the escalation between Algeria and Morocco will end with the severing of diplomatic ties. The fear that Moroccans and Algerians residing in both countries will be expelled from their homes as was the case in 1976 at the height of Algiers’s recognition of the Polisario Front is palpable, yet unlikely, unless the situation escalates.

Today, there are only skirmishes between the Royal Armed Forces (FAR) and the Saharawi independence fighters who broke the ceasefire with Morocco last year after the events of the border post of Guerguerat that separates the disputed territory of Western Sahara from Mauritania.

But we are still in a pre-war situation which has the potential to continue. It can also tip over into an all-out conflict if Algeria allows and supports the Polisario Front in going beyond today’s military commitments.

Morocco and Algeria have engaged in a dangerous arms race in recent decades. In 2015, Algeria’s military budget was $11 billion, while Morocco’s was only $3 billion. Morocco caught up with Algeria after launching a $22 billion five-year rearmament plan in 2017 and then reintroducing mandatory military service in 2018. The two countries have arguably reached a dangerous military equilibrium that experts say will often end in conflagration.

A war, even limited and short, would considerably weaken the two economies, which are already in bad shape, provoke sentiments, and make the much-needed reconciliation far away. Above all, it would destabilize the entire Maghreb region. This does not suit the European Union, which needs Algeria and Morocco to fight illegal immigration.

Morocco and Algeria share a common history, religions, and vernacular languages. Even if the two people might not identify with the diplomatic squabbles and bellicose desires of their rulers, a conflict with death and destruction would break this fraternal bond, which today, despite assurances from both sides, hangs by a thread.

Recently, there have been a number of high-profile meetings between the leadership of Libya’s Government of National Unity [GNU] and that of Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco. Besides hosting discussions and affirming their support for the political transition and further cooperation on security, several economic deals have been announced.

Libya and Algeria agreed to resume flights, reopen land borders and launch maritime lines and on the measures to boost trade and investment. Following a visit at the end of May by Tunisia’s Prime Minister, Libya and Tunisia concurred on facilitating border crossings. Morocco just hosted another round of intra-Libyan talks.

While to some, this may seem like a new tangent for Libya’s complicated foreign policy, it is actually a logical and healthy continuation of previous initiatives. Proximity, shared culture, interdependence and shared threats give the countries of the Maghreb common interests. Despite some different circumstances and the intense rivalry between Algeria and Morocco, all three countries have tried to appear neutral and offer constructive diplomatic assistance while attempting to limit any contagion to their own fragile situations.

Historical Context

Besides geography, the countries of the Maghreb share a lot of culture and history. In more recent times, the late Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi attempted coups against the leaders of both Morocco and Tunisia as part of his numerous, failed attempts at a larger union. There has also been discord between other members, notably Algeria and Morocco, who have longstanding differences, especially over the fate of the Western Sahara.

Despite all this, Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, and Tunisia established the Arab Maghreb Union in 1989 to promote cooperation and economic integration. However, the issues that divided them proved too difficult to overcome and the organization quickly became dormant. Initially the poorest country in the region, the discovery of oil in the 1950s made Libya the richest nation and therefore an important economic motor for the whole Maghreb. Despite this new wealth, Qaddafi’s quixotic governance meant that Libyans often depended on their neighbors for goods and services.

Plenty to Deal with at Home

Besides good intentions, these three western neighbors may also have had domestic considerations for not getting involved militarily in the Libyan conflict. Without a source of considerable outside financing, it would have been very costly to start an unnecessary foreign adventure and these countries had plenty of drama to deal with. Having overthrown the authoritarian rule of President Zine el-Abidine Ben, Tunisia was going through many growing pains with its more open politics.

There was intense competition between Islamist and more secular parties. A truth commission appointed to investigate human rights violations of previous regimes accused President Beji Caid Essebsi of committing crimes while serving in the government of Ben Ali’s predecessor, Habib Bourguiba. Essebsi died while in office in 2019. The process to replace him was somewhat ambiguous and a formal constitutional court had yet to be established.

Algeria had gone through its own civil war from 1991-2002 and had remained under emergency law until 2011. During the period of the Libyan crisis, long-time President Bouteflika had serious health problems and there were numerous protests demanding more freedom and political change. Following massive street protests, Bouteflika resigned in 2019.

Morocco has continued to deal with its conflict in Western Sahara with the Polisario Front, which rejects its 1975 annexation of the territory.  Following the Arab Spring, Morocco engaged in its own reform program. While avoiding the intense disturbances of many of its neighbors, some tensions have remained.

Common Security Worries

Besides the issues that they have sometimes foisted on each other, the Maghreb countries share many other concerns like radical cross-border groups and pressure by the European Union to stem the flow of migrants. People also flow within the region. After the fall of Qaddafi, an estimated 200-400,000 Libyans decamped to Tunisia [out of a population of around 11 million].

Several thousand Tunisians fought for jihadist groups in the Middle East or Libya between 2011 and 2016. Besides being the closest major theatre of operations, Libya also served as a launching pad for attacks like that of Daesh attack on the border town of Ben Guerdane, allegedly motivated by an air attack on its training base.

Tunisia reinforced its patrols and built a sand barrier covering 168 of the 468 kilometres of its porous border with Libya. An estimated 600 Tunisian extremist jihadis are reckoned to remain in Libya, primarily in the south. Others continue to fight in other countries, including the nearby Sahel region. Though reduced, the threat has not disappeared but the security restrictions are a heavy burden on the economy, particularly for pastoralists and other border communities.

Like Tunisia, Algeria shares a border with Libya and has been worried about infiltration by  Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb [AQIM] like the attack on gas facilities at Ain Amenas and a possible return of radicalized Tuaregs who had served in Qaddafi’s paramilitary “Islamic Legion” such as happened in Mali. The Government reinforced its border with Libya by deploying an additional 30-40,000 troops but like Tunisia, it also has to worry about security restrictions disturbing border livelihoods.

Morocco does not share a border with Libya, but some recruitment of fighters to go to Libya is alleged to have taken place there.

Also… The Sahel

While Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco are concerned by issues in Libya, it is worth remembering that the southern part of Algeria is in the Sahel region and Morocco is close by, if not formally part of it. Several countries of the Sahel are experiencing serious problems of violent Jihadi attacks, inter-ethnic conflict and coups besides chronic issues of extreme poverty and climate change.

Even though they not among the most affected, the Maghreb nations must be watchful of threats and spillover coming from the Sahel as well. Morocco has started to take a keen interest in developments and has started to play a role in the G5 Sahel force.

The Amazighs, usually referred to as Berbers, are native inhabitants of North Africa. Their presence stretches from the Canary Islands of Spain to Morocco, Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, and Egypt. Today, they also make up a considerable percentage of immigrants in many countries outside North Africa.

The Amazighs trace their origins to the Libyan tribes that formed strong political entities such as the Garamantes the Gaetulians, and the Meshwesh. The Meshwesh, in fact, annexed Egypt and even installed Shoshenq I as a pharaoh. His lineage carried on for centuries through the 22nd and 23rd Egyptian dynasties (945–720 BC). Apart from this, the Amazighs’ cultural influence on ancient civilizations was extensive as detailed in Greek and Egyptian mythology.

Throughout time, two great powers emerged in the territories where the Amazigh lived: the Phoenicians and the Romans. The Amazighs’ relationships with these two powerful states changed drastically ranging between war, alliances, and cooperation. Yet, throughout the various kingdoms they established, the Amazighs – mainly the Massylii and the Masaesyli – maintained an independent and free will.

The Amazighs, colonialism, and postcolonialism

Due to migration and the unfolding of political events, many Amazighs forgot their language and became Arabized Amazighs. Amazighs speak Darja, the local North African dialect as their primary and mother tongue. North African Darja is highly influenced by the Amazigh language, which is very difficult to understand for native Arabs of the Middle East.

Starting from the colonial era in North Africa, the Amazighs like their African neighbors, lost territory and power to the Europeans, mainly to Spain, Portugal, France, and Britain.

Many other Amazigh groups have kept their native tongue. Such groups include the Chaoui people of eastern Algeria; the Chenouas in western Algeria; the Amazighs of Tripolitania in Libya; the Kabyle people, who are the inhabitants of the historical autonomous region of northern Algeria; and the Chleuh in High Atlas and the Souss Valley of Morocco. Other groups include the Riffians of northern Morocco, the Mozabites of southern Algeria, the Zenata of western and southwestern Algeria, and the Tuaregs of the Sahara.

Starting from the colonial era in North Africa, the Amazighs like their African neighbors, lost territory and power to the Europeans, mainly to Spain, Portugal, France, and Britain. They had to fight long and bloody wars of independence to gain their freedom from colonial powers that created new territorial changes, including the creation of modern Algeria, Morocco, Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Tunisia, and Libya.

Today, in Algeria, Tamazight, along with French and Arabic, is one of the three main languages used in media. In 1996, Tamazight began to be taught as an optional subject in regions where it is spoken. On December 27, 2017, Algeria’s former president Abdelaziz Bouteflika recognized Yennayer, the first month of the Amazigh year, as a public holiday to be celebrated on its first day (January 12) every year.

Amazighs are gaining greater political presence in Algeria and Morocco. Many Amazigh figures reached high positions in the social and political hierarchies. Examples include the former president of Algeria, Liamine Zéroual, and its current president Abdelmadjid Tebboune, and the current prime minister of Morocco, Saadeddine Othmani.

In 2019, the Amazighs contributed greatly to the Algerian protests, also known as the Hirak Movement, which resulted in the deposal of the regime of President Bouteflika.

In Algeria today, political parties and popular movements are pushing for granting the Amazighs more rights such as including the Amazigh language as a mandatory language in schools and promoting the restoration of the Amazigh cultural heritage sites. The last two decades have seen an improvement in the political, cultural, and social status of the Amazighs in North Africa, but the road ahead to a full recognition of their rights in still long.

The unification of the Amazigh language and education

To this day, there’s no unified Amazigh language – at least, this is the case in Algeria, where each region claims the use of its local language as the de facto learning language. Academics concerned about the issue are divided between three examples and groups.

The example of the German language where all Amazigh languages become one. The Italian example where one Amazigh language is taught in all regions, and thus the other languages fade away and in time merge with the new de facto official language. And the federal example, where each region keeps its local language.

The main issue, however, in introducing the Berber language to the school system is the alphabet as there are three suggested systems to write Berber texts. The first is Tifinagh, the Amazigh alphabet system, which is still widely used in the Tuareg region. This very old alphabet is found throughout North Africa’s old inscriptions and ruins.

Today, it has been developed and made official by local authorities. It is widely used at facilities such as schools, post offices, and banks, yet some scholars argue that it is not practical and that is hard for new learners, who, instead of learning a new language, have to go through learning a new system instead.

The limited understanding of African migration continues to hinder effective policies, far from addressing the current lived realities and migration drivers. Often, Africa is negatively represented as a continent of mass migration to Europe, lacking nuance and depth to the existing drivers and patterns.

According to the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs Population Division (2020), Africans migrate more within the continent than overseas. According to the Africa Migration Report, African migrants comprise no more than 14 percent of all global migrants. An African perspective is needed to demystify all myths, fears, and misconceptions, especially during this pandemic.

Prior to COVID-19 pandemic, socio-economic conditions, climate change, and internal conflicts served as significant push factors for most African migrants. However, the sanitary crisis has resulted in unprecedented socioeconomic impact across the African continent and brought a new driver for a wave of migratory flows. The restriction on human mobility and other measures imposed to tackle the pandemic have impacted the overall economic activities and livelihoods. The situation became alarming for the vulnerable persons in the African countries.

In parallel, as internal conflicts intensify in the Sahel, the region’s socio-economic conditions worsened, and hundreds of thousands of people are awaiting the opportunity to migrate for a better future inside the continent or through Morocco on to the European continent.

Despite the regularization of 50,000 migrants during the two campaigns of 2014 and 2016 launched by the Moroccan government, estimated numbers of irregular migrants in Morocco demonstrate a significant increase of migrants without legal status.

However, it is important to note that the exact percentage of migrants who have been smuggled and trafficked could not be calculated at the national level, whether for those crossing the perilous Mediterranean and the Atlantic, the desert, or those crossing borders in Ceuta and Melilla.

The general trend of migrants opting to reach Europe through Morocco are men and women under the age of 35 and more recently young couples. Migrants mainly from Congo Brazaville, Guinea Conakry, Ivory Coast, Senegal, Cameroon, Mali, Liberia, Nigeria, Gambia, Eritrea, Sudan, Tchad seek to reach Europe by landing on the Moroccan coasts or through the borders of Ceuta and Melilla.  Sometimes, migrants could be minors, especially from Guinea Conakry and Senegal.

“I was working as a maid before the pandemic, I tried to save money to pay my journey to Spain, but I couldn’t work during the confinement, it was challenging and hard to cover basic needs ( food and rent ), I was forced to do prostitution to get some money for a living.”

African countries are most affected by poverty, famine, desertification, and various deadly pandemics, resulting in a high percentage of Africans deciding to migrate and are forced displaced.  Due to the failure of effective policies to address the root causes of irregular migration, migrants are victims of traffickers and smugglers along the routes. According to the Global Report on Trafficking in Persons 2020, migrants are at more risk for human trafficking, disappearance, and loss of life.

As an example, a migrant recounts his dangerous and hell-like journey from Cameroon to Morocco stating to Politics Today that:

“From the beginning of the journey, you are the target of organized criminal groups, you can come across smugglers who take all your money, torture you, and ask you to call the family to send them money so they can free you. I faced the same treatment along the route, it’s Bis-Repitita, in front of me. Two migrants lost their lives as a result of multiple tortures.”

The African countries cannot curb these problems without good coordination between different institutions and adequate support for local development efforts. Without shared responsibility, African countries will not be able to put in place a model that ensures the prevention of irregular migration and the assistance and protection of migrants. In addition, African countries also have to cooperate in developing initiatives to realize the vision of Agenda 2063 of an integrated Africa. The African Union revised Migration Policy Framework (MPFA 2018-2030), and the African agenda on migration was adopted in 2018. In his capacity as an African leader on migration, King Mohammed VI, through the African Agenda on Migration, proposed the creation of The African Migration Observatory in 2018. The official inauguration was under the African Union’s aegis on 18 December 2020 in Rabat, Morocco.

The African Migration Observatory is envisaged to develop a mechanism of collecting, analyzing, and sharing information between members to promote controlled management of migration flows. The Observatory will generate geographically balanced information on migration that responds to the continent’s needs in terms of factual management of the phenomenon. 

It is a real challenge for African Union to develop autonomous institutions, such as the African migration observatory. As such, the implementation of these policies needs to be funded by African funds. Efforts should be made to ensure the complementarity of financial and technical resources between African countries.

They also need to improve the coordination control systems to improve data collection and information exchange. But, in the scarcity of national migration observatories, the African Union members have to create national institutions as focal points of the African Migration Observatory.

Morocco has always had two “sacred” causes. The first and the oldest cause is Palestine, which had been there since the declaration of the State of Israel in 1948, eight years before the Sherifian Empire regained its independence from France and Spain. The second “sacred” cause dates to 1975, when, Spain handed over the keys of Western Sahara to Morocco and Mauritania following the Green March and the Madrid tripartite agreements.

This was a poisoned gift by Spain that triggered a war between Morocco and the Saharawi independence fighters of the Polisario Front. The withdrawal of Mauritania from its zone, that is the southern half of Western Sahara, in 1979, pushed King Hassan II to occupy the zone militarily in order to prevent the Polisario from using it for their own benefit.

The Moroccans have always held the causes of Palestine and the Western Sahara close to their hearts. With the exception of a few small Berber groups, all Moroccan political parties have continuously declared themselves pro-Palestinian.

For the Western Sahara conflict, only one political formation of Marxist affiliation, Annahj Addimocrati (The Democratic Way), is neutral and calls for the holding of a referendum on self-determination as accepted by Hassan II and adopted by the eighteenth summit of the Organization of African Unity (OAU), the forerunner of the African Union (AU), in 1981.

The position of the Democratic Way is rare in a country where the concept of “national consensus” has been imposed, according to which all Moroccans are obligatorily in favor of the Moroccanness of the Sahara, and those who deviate from considering Western Sahara as Moroccan, as well as those who call for the holding of a referendum, although granted by Hassan II, are considered “traitors.”

Until President Trump announced the U.S. recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara in exchange for the restoration of diplomatic relations between Morocco and Israel, these two issues were never discussed together. Neither of these two causes was more important or more sacred than the other.

And it was unthinkable that one could ever be bartered for the other. However, this is precisely what just happened. By agreeing to re-engage with the Israeli state, the King of Morocco Mohamed VI has broken, even if he defends himself against it, this consensus on Palestine by making a major geostrategic deal.

Hence, a large portion of the Moroccan population didn’t understand the Israel move. While Moroccans are satisfied that the current U.S. administration’s recognition of their country’s sovereignty over Western Sahara, they are mortified by the king’s decision to restore diplomatic relations with Israel, which is considered a colonial state.

In a country like Morocco, which has an allegedly constitutional monarchy, the elected representatives in the House of Representatives (the lower house), despite knowing the feelings of their electorate base, didn’t express their voice, at least symbolically, revealing their dissatisfaction with the move.

However, nothing happened in the country, where public opinion does not count and where virtually all political parties have long been tamed. Only three parties have declared opinions contrary to the royal decision.

Nothing happened in the country, where public opinion does not count and where virtually all political parties have long been tamed.

The Federation of the Democratic Left (FGD), with two deputies in the House of Representatives that protested, but softly; and two other movements without parliamentary representation, who are still considered as the real opposition parties in Morocco: the Marxists of the Democratic Way, and the Islamists of the powerful association Al Adl Wal Ihsane (Justice and Spirituality). The latter used the same word to say no – “treason.”

The fact that El Otmani was forced by the Royal Palace to sign, in front of television cameras on Tuesday December 22, 2020, the tripartite agreements with Jared Kushner and a high representative of the “Zionist entity,” Meir Ben-Shabbat, a close adviser to the Israeli prime minister, was felt by him and his electoral base as a strong slap in the face.

On Wednesday, December 23, 2020, Abdelillah Benkiran, the predecessor of El Otmani as the head of the PJD and the government, stated that “the PJD could not oppose the decisions taken by the king” because it is part of the state. This disturbed the party’s base even more.

The public humiliation inflicted on El Otmani was, however, the price that had to be paid for accepting the meagre power granted by the Royal Palace. What is even more dramatic is that PJD ministers cannot even resign to escape the general opprobrium. In Morocco, the ministers, let alone the prime minister, do not resign. They are dismissed or resign at the request of the king.

Morocco, as recognized in the West, is a “moderate” Arab and Muslim country. However, if it is really moderate, it is only so in its relations with the European Union and the United States of America.

As for everything else, the Moroccan monarchy is a genuine autocracy. The King of Morocco reigns, governs, is the supreme chief, and the chief of staff of the Royal Armed Forces (FAR), and has the country’s greatest fortune. To support the legitimacy of his dynasty, he also proclaims himself as the “commander of the believers” and claims to be directly descended from the Prophet Muhammad.

If we add to these powers, both temporal and religious, the fact that the sovereign directly controls several “ministries of sovereignty,” such as the foreign affairs and the interior, and that all the secret services are under his control, it is easy to understand why Moroccans and their representatives in parliament and government, are unlikely to do much to reverse the royal decision on normalization with Israel.

In the end, the “sacred” causes in Morocco are neither Palestine nor the Western Sahara. The first sacred cause is the survival of the Alawite dynasty. By abandoning Palestine, the King of Morocco, who is also the chairman of the Al-Quds Committee, consolidates the Moroccan presence in Western Sahara.

A Morocco without the Sahara, following billions of dollars in investment for the development of this arid region, serving as a manna, could simply mean a Morocco without a monarchy, some believe.

This is true and false at the same time. If one day, for one reason or another, the survival of the monarchy is to depend on the abandonment of Western Sahara, the king would not hesitate a single second to get rid of it, probably using similar fabricated arguments as those used today. Given the king’s stronghold on the state’s repressive apparatus, Moroccans will not object. They will let go of Western Sahara, as they are doing today of Palestine.