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Chomsky: 9/11 – was there an alternative? – Opinion – Al Jazeera English
- Morocco to begin TGV construction
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“I will be in Morocco at the end of the month with King Mohammed VI to lay the foundation stone for the Rabat-Casablanca-Tangier TGV that we will build,” French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Thursday.
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Maroc, le partenaire discret d’Israël | Slate Afrique
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Jason Isaacson, le directeur du Comité juif américain d’affaires gouvernementales et internationales, et fervent défenseur de la cause sioniste, a été décoré de la médaille de Chevalier du Trône du Royaume du Maroc.
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la visite chaotique des étudiants de l’Union des étudiants juifs de France (UEJF) avaient suscité une véritable levée de boucliers au Maroc, faisant dire à Mamfakinch, le média citoyen du Mouvement du 20 février qu’au Maroc, «il vaut mieux militer pour Israël que pour la démocratie ou la Palestine».
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Le réchauffement avec l’État hébreu s’expliquerait par l’affaire du Sahara, la position marocaine étant soutenue par des politiques américains proches du puissant Aipac (American Israel Public Affairs Comittee) et par des firmes de lobbying diplomatique basées à Washington
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C’est dans le militaire que cette «normalisation passive» est la plus discrète. Fait rarissime pour un pays arabe, Rabat a opté pour des achats militaires auprès de l’industrie d’armement israélienne. Le sujet est tellement sensible que les deux pays en font un secret d’État.
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Selon IsraelValley, le site officiel de la chambre de commerce France Israël, l’entreprise publique Israël Military Industries (IMI) a conclu avec Lockheed Martin un accord très juteux portant sur la fourniture de certains équipements et composants électroniques pour les deux escadrilles d’avions F-16 achetés par le Maroc aux États-Unis.
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Un batallón de obreros filipinos reforma la residencia del rey de Marruecos · ELPAÍS.com
Selon cet article d’El Pais, le roi du Maroc aurait employé 167 travailleurs philippins pour rénover sa résidence des Sablons à Rabat. Le travail de rénovation qui devait être fait initialement par une société marocaine (employant de la main d’oeuvre locale) aurait été annulé après que celle ci n’ait pas réussi à honorer les délais.
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[blog-express] :Moncef Belkhayat n’est pas un con. | C.J.D.M.
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The Arab Counterrevolution by Hussein Agha and Robert Malley | The New York Review of Books
A rather pessimistic but starkly informative reading into the situation in the Arab world post-Sidi-Bouzid, from the NYRB (via @Arabist).
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The outcome of the Arab awakening will not be determined by those who launched it. The popular uprisings were broadly welcomed, but they do not neatly fit the social and political makeup of traditional communities often organized along tribal and kinship ties, where religion has a central part and foreign meddling is the norm. The result will be decided by other, more calculating and hard-nosed forces.
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Nationalists and leftists will make a bid, but their reputation has been sullied for having stood for a promise already once betrayed. Liberal, secular parties carry scant potential; the appeal they enjoy in the West is inversely proportional to the support they possess at home. Fragments of the old regime retain significant assets: the experience of power; ties to the security services; economic leverage; and local networks of clients. They will be hard to dislodge, but much of the protesters’ ire is directed at them and they form easy targets. They can survive and thrive, but will need new patrons and protectors.
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That leaves two relatively untarnished and powerful forces. One is the military, whose positions, as much as anything, have molded the course of events.
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And then there are the Islamists. They see the Arab awakening as their golden opportunity. This was not their revolution nor was it their idea. But, they hope, this is their time.
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Quietly, the Islamists might present themselves as the West’s most effective allies against its most dangerous foes: armed jihadists, whom they have the religious legitimacy to contain and, if necessary, cripple; and Iran, whose appeal to the Arab street they can counteract by not shunning the Islamic Republic and presenting a less aggressive, more attractive, and indigenous Islamic model.
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Should they be called upon to participate in affairs of state, their reputation will suffer at a time of predictable popular disillusionment and economic turmoil. The combination of high expectations and unfulfilled promises may expose them to protests they are ill-suited to endure.
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The more traditional Islamists, such as the Muslim Brotherhood, bend their views to placate foreign or domestic concerns, the more they take part in governing, the more they risk alienating those of their followers drawn to Salafism and its stricter interpretation of Islam. As the Muslim Brotherhood struggles to strike a balance, the Salafists could emerge as unintended beneficiaries.
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Revolutions devour their children. The spoils go to the resolute, the patient, who know what they are pursuing and how to achieve it. Revolutions almost invariably are short-lived affairs, bursts of energy that destroy much on their pathway, including the people and ideas that inspired them. So it is with the Arab uprising.
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There are many possible outcomes—from restoration of the old order to military takeover, from unruly fragmentation and civil war to creeping Islamization. But the result that many outsiders had hoped for—a victory by the original protesters—is almost certainly foreclosed.
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Hisham Almiraat
A Moroccan blogger's rambling on culture and politics
Hisham Almiraat 