The Official Makhzen Provokes Algeria In Its Territorial Integrity

A dangerous escalation by the Moroccan Makhzen regime, by reviving an old and sterile debate that is considered one of the historical reasons that triggered the bloody conflict with Algeria. This serious drift comes from the director of the “Royal Documents”, whose provocative statements dealt a blow to the territorial integrity of Algeria.
This person is Bahija Al-Simo, the director of the “Royal Documents”, and she was a guest on the Moroccan News Agency forum on Tuesday, claiming that the body she runs has documents confirming the ownership of the makhzen for the eastern sahara, according to her false description, and by which they mean parts of the western and southwestern region of Algeria ( Bechar, Tindouf and Kenadsa), in statements that will follow.
And Moroccan media outlets circulated a video of the director of the “Royal Documents”, quoting the official news agency, and it is the first time that official institutions affiliated with the Makhzen regime have made such statements, which means that these institutions have received the green light from decision-making sources in the Makhzen applying more fuel to the burning fire.
The last such statement dates back to 2013, when Hamid Chabat, the leader of the Moroccan Istiklal Party, called on the people of Morocco to take back what he falsely and wrongly called usurped territories from Algeria, such as the city of Tindouf, Béchar, and Kenadsa located in the sahara, and the Algerian authorities responded on that day by describing those statements as ” It constitutes a dangerous and irresponsible deviation, which we condemn with all force,” as stated by the official spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the time, Ammar Bélani.
The Istiklal Party is considered one of the parties affiliated with the opposition, which removed the official status of its leader’s statements. Therefore, the statements of the leader of the Moroccan Istiklal Party at the time were considered mere political bids for internal marketing, as long as the party lost its historical glow, noting that the bilateral relations at that time were not severed as they are today.
As for the new statements, they are par excellence official. The party that embraced these statements and called for them is the official Moroccan news agency known as “MAP”, which receives directives directly from the royal palace. As for the author of the statement, it is Bahija Al-Simo, who runs an official archival institution, “Royal Documents”. .
The Moroccan official associated the “Eastern Sahara”, as she called it, with the “Western Sahara”, which Morocco has occupied until today, and the Makhzen regime usually employs it under the slogan of “territorial unity”, which it could not justify legally and historically, at least with regard to the Western Sahara that entered the wheels of the United Nations and the corridors of the International Court of Justice in the Dutch city of The Hague, which ruled in a ruling issued by it that the Moroccan Makhzen regime has no authority at all over the occupied Sahrawi lands.
Although the forum witnessed interaction between the attendees, including journalists and others, and the director of the archive, none of them dared to admit that the Makhzen regime did not fire even a single bullet at what they call the “Eastern Sahara” or the southwestern regions of Algeria before the exit of the French occupation, as well as the Sahara.
On focus, the occupied Western sahara, before the departure of the Spanish occupation, just as is the case today with more than twenty Moroccan islands occupied by Spain, in addition to the cities of Ceuta and Melilla, which were finally annexed a few days ago as two customs gates for Spain on Moroccan soil.
The question that arises here is: What is the purpose of making these statements at this particular time, when Algerian-Moroccan relations are going through one of their worst stages over many decades?
Some observers go to link the issuance of statements aimed at the territorial integrity of Algeria by Moroccan officials, at a time when the Moroccan street is witnessing an uproar, in protest against the regime because of the outrageous high cost of widely consumed foodstuffs, which are protests that are growing from day to day, while the Moroccan monarch is present. As the first decision-maker, away from the country for many months, which makes it more likely that the Makhzen engaged in this provocation in order to divert the attention of the Moroccan street away from its daily suffering towards external issues.