Losing Morocco

Perhaps no state in the Middle East has such a long history of friendship with the United States as Morocco.

Perhaps no state in the Middle East has such a long history of friendship with the United States as Morocco. Sure, the United States has had tight ties with Israel, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia, but the US-Moroccan relationship predates these by more than 150 years.

Throughout the Cold War, Morocco stood firmly in the pro-Western camp, never so much as even flirting with the Soviet Union as Egypt did, let alone joining its camp as Algeria and Libya had. Since the end of the Cold War, Morocco has taken a no-nonsense approach both to Islamist radicalism and terrorism. Saudi Arabia spent decades funding radical Islamism; Morocco spent decades seeking to repair the damage, combining good, hard intelligence and security work with the development of perhaps the most successful training program to ensure religious authorities act as a force of restraint, spirituality, and tolerance rather than a catalyst for radicalism.

How unfortunate it has been that the United States, and the United Nations, seem intent on undermining the only stable, tolerant country in the Sahel. Much of their efforts appear to rest on bad history and personal agendas.

Morocco’s Prince Moulay Rachid addresses attendees at the 70th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, September 30, 2015. REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz.

The root of the dispute centers on the Western Sahara. For decades, the Polisario Front, a Marxist group with the same relationship to the Algerian military that Hezbollah has to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, operated under the pretense of leading the self-styled Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic. It argued that it was the rightful heir to the Western Sahara and that Morocco, which incorporated the region in 1975, is occupying “Africa’s last colony.”

Human rights activists and academics have never met an oppressed colonial people for which they couldn’t advocate. Alas, the Polisario’s case was nonsense. Historically, the territory now comprising the Western Sahara has been as much a part of Morocco as Virginia has been part of the United States. Indeed, five Moroccan dynasties dating back more than a millennium have their roots in the territory. The only reason why the Western Sahara is a separate territory in many eyes is because the Spanish seized it and held it as a colonial spoil.

To support the Sahrawi claims is not only to embrace a Cold War throwback, but also to legitimize the very imperialism that so many anti-colonial activists say they oppose. For officials — UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, for example — to refer to the Moroccan presence in the Western Sahara as ‘occupation’ is nothing short of ignorant. Historically and legally, it’s no such thing.

Now, John Conyers and Joe Pitts, both congressmen, write in Politico that Morocco promised the Western Sahara a vote on its independence 41 years ago but hasn’t fulfilled its pledge. Not quite. While they are right that the UN established a mission (MINURSO) to organize a referendum to determine the desire of Sahrawi refugees, they completely ignore the fact that Algeria has for a quarter century refused to allow an independent census to determine who in the Tindouf refugee camps, which the Polisario and Algerian security run like prisons, actually comes from the Western Sahara as opposed to Mauritania or Algeria. The congressmen should understand the importance of accuracy and standing. After all, they are among the 435 members of the House of Representatives. If suddenly, 800 people showed up claiming to be members, they probably wouldn’t consider the resulting vote legitimate.

Pitts is co-chairman of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission and genuinely cares for human rights. He castigates Morocco for “brutal” rule in the region but he appears unaware that the Western Sahara is now among the most prosperous regions of Morocco on a per capita basis for all its residents. Morocco has also granted the Western Sahara regional autonomy.

The United States has too few friends to ruin relationships gratuitously.

Here’s a modest proposal for all those who claim to advocate on behalf of the Sahrawis: Demand that Algeria adopt the same regional autonomy model as all Algerian minorities, be they Sahrawis or Kabyles or anyone else who desires the same right to control their own fates. They might also demand freedom of movement. What Algeria does to freedom of movement of the Sahrawi is akin to what the Soviet Union did with Jews. Let the Sahrawis vote with their feet, and leave Algeria for Morocco should they so choose. That would be the best referendum of them all.

That the Obama administration equivocates on Morocco is unconscionable. National Security Adviser Susan Rice has bashed Morocco in seemingly bizarre and personal ways, and Moroccan officials worry that Samantha Powers’ advocacy background might lead her to sympathize with any people who play the colonialism card. The woefully inaccurate Politico article only convinces the Moroccan public that the United States is pursuing a vendetta the purpose of which they cannot fathom.

A new US administration might begin to right wrongs when it enters office in less than eight months, but the damage that can be done in the interim is significant. The United States has too few friends to ruin relationships gratuitously. To do so would be bad for national security, bad for diplomacy, and bad for human rights.

How sad it would be if Obama’s legacy included ending one of the United States’ longest and most productive relationships in both Africa and the Arab world.