http://www.bigeye.com/073199.htm
Funeral in
Morocco
By Eric Margolis, July 31,
1999
Tangier, Morocco - Death has a remarkable way of
making people forget reality. The western and Arab leaders
who flocked last week to the funeral of King Hassan II of
Morocco produced the same outpouring of fulsome adulation,
cloying hypocrisy and general unreality that marked the
internment of the late King Hussein of Jordan.
Hassan was `a great democratic leader,' a man whose `firm
grip led his people to prosperity and security,' who `worked
incessantly for Mideast pace,' and maintained a `stable,
moderate Islamic nation.' There were tears aplenty as
western democratic leaders, including Emoter-in-Chief, Bill
Clinton, vied to laud their dear friend, the good and kindly
King Hassan. Right on the cue, the western media took up the
theme, lamenting the loss of the `moderate' Hassan who had
been such a friend to the US and France.
There were only two true points in this outpouring of
staged grief: the `firm grip' and `friendship' with the west
parts.
Hassan ruled Morocco with an iron hand for 38 years,
using his 196,000-man armed forces and ubiquitous secret
police. Thousands of political or tribal opponents, and
those who sought to change Morocco's medieval feudal system,
were imprisoned, tortured, sent to remote camps in the
desert, or killed. The most important Moroccan political
dissident, Mehdi Ben Barka, who called for an end to the
monarchy and creation of democracy, was kidnapped in Paris
by Moroccan and Israeli Mossad agents and murdered.
Hassan was indeed a great friend to western interests,
but he, like so many other rulers of Arab and Muslim
nations, was no friend of his own people. Shockingly, today
over 50% of Morocco's 29 million are illiterate, this in a
nation that has been a center of civilization since ancient
Carthage.
Per capita income is only $3,600. Unemployment, 30%.
Morocco cities are squalid, disease-ridden and crumbling.
Beneath the exotic charm seen by tourists is widespread
malnutrition, crime, and suffering. There are no jobs, no
housing, and no hope for the onrushing demographic wave of
teenagers about to hit Morocco.
Hassan spent his time and treasure keeping himself in
power and fending off his many internal and external
enemies. Instead of schools, the Defender of the Faithful
built a large, tough army that was often employed by his
protectors, US and France, in covert military missions in
black Africa.
The King of Morocco was indeed active in the Arab-Israeli
peace process and maintained close links with Israel.
Morocco has a large native Jewish community which was
honorably treated and protected. But the king also
reportedly received large, secret annual stipends from the
world Jewish community to retain his friendship, as well as
protection and support from Mossad and the Israeli military.
There had been a similar arrangement between Israel and
Sudan's former ruler, Gen. Jaffar Nimieri.
France and its intelligence service also played a key
role in keeping Hassan in power. Morocco guarded the
northern flank of France's neocolonial possessions in black
Africa and was a bastion against the spread of militant
political Islam. Morocco supplied the US with highly useful
air, naval and intelligence facilities.
The only Moroccans to benefit from Hassan's rule were the
royal family and its hangers-on, and a small commercial
oligarchy that grew rich and, as everywhere in Africa,
kicked back a percentage to the ruler.
Hassan's son, Mohammed VI, only now emerging from his
father's shadow, is regarded as a rather soft, weak young
man, given to night clubs and fast cars. Here and in Spain
rumors abound about the new king's sexual proclivities, a
serious concern in highly conservative Moroccan society.
The new king will have to face explosive social and
economic tensions that have been building for decades.
Perhaps he will surprise everyone and rise to the challenge.
But he must duplicate his father's renowned skill in
juggling Morocco's labyrinthine tribal politics, and keep
the armed forces in check by shuffling military commanders.
He must contend with the powerful interior minister of 20
years, Driss Basri, who commands the secret police. The king
may even face a renewal of the separatism that led, decades
ago, to the challenge to his father by the mighty feudal
lord, El Glaoui, or even to a general rising by the fierce
tribes of the Riff Mountains, whose great Islamic leader,
Abd-el-Krim, nearly drove Morocco's French colonial
occupiers into the sea in the 1920's.
Eighty years later, Morocco still remains under foreign
influence as a joint US-French satrapy. Morocco's regime
faithfully aides western strategic and regional interests,
it cooperates with Israel and with other autocratic Arab
regimes in combating Islamic and secular democratic forces
seeking to modernize the backwards region. This is what the
western media terms `stability' and `moderation.'
But you can smell revolution brewing up in the dank
warrens of Morocco's filthy souks, where a people,
long-oppressed, intimidated, and ruthlessly exploited by a
tiny, western -supported feudal class, seem ready to explode
in pent-up fury and violence. This is what happened in the
Shah's Iran.
Feudalism is headed for the graveyard of history. But you
certainly wouldn't know it watching western democratic
leaders praising medieval monarchism at this week's lavish
funeral in Morocco.
Copyright: Eric Margolis, 1999
