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On September 16, a high-profile meeting between Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar and Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita in New York yielded a landmark agreement to deepen bilateral relations between the two North African and Middle Eastern nations. The core of the new deal elevates both countries’ existing diplomatic missions to full embassy status and paves the way for the appointment of resident ambassadors, marking a major step forward in the normalization process that began with the 2020 Abraham Accords brokered during former U.S. President Donald Trump’s first term. Two supplementary pacts — one focused on investment protection and another addressing double taxation — are also scheduled to be finalized before the end of 2024.

In a joint statement released after the announcement, the United States, Israel, and Morocco reaffirmed their commitment to the principles of the Abraham Accords, arguing that full, peaceful diplomatic and friendly ties between Rabat and Tel Aviv serve the shared interests of all parties, with the potential to drive regional stability and unlock new economic and social opportunities across the Middle East and North Africa.

But this latest advancement in normalization has unfolded against widespread public opposition in Morocco, where broad popular support for the Palestinian cause and consistent condemnation of formal ties with Israel have remained deeply entrenched since the original accords were signed four years ago. The announcement also comes just one week ahead of Morocco’s September 23 general elections, leaving the sitting government in a caretaker role with limited authority to act on major policy changes — a detail that has sparked internal political discussion over who holds ultimate decision-making power over foreign affairs in the kingdom.

When the Abraham Accords were first signed in 2020, the Islamist-leaning Justice and Development Party (PJD) held the premiership under Saadeddine El-Othmani. PJD officials have long clarified that the 2020 accords did not contradict the party’s official pro-Palestine stance, pointing to Morocco’s unique political structure, where ultimate authority over international relations rests with the monarchy, not the sitting head of government. “Yes, PJD was in power when the Abraham Accords were signed, but the decision was made by the king; the head of government in Morocco does not have the power over international affairs,” a senior active PJD member, speaking on condition of anonymity to Middle East Eye, explained. The caretaker status of the current government during the recent announcement, he added, only reinforces that the monarchy retains full control over this major foreign policy shift.

To date, PJD remains the only officially registered political party in Morocco that has openly condemned the latest agreement to deepen ties with Israel. Following an urgent virtual meeting held the same day as the New York announcement, the party released an official statement reaffirming its “firm and unwavering stance against any form of normalisation or agreements with Israel.” The banned Islamist movement Al Adl Wal Ihsane has also publicly denounced the diplomatic upgrade, with Dr. Boubker El Ounkhari, a senior member of the movement’s political circle, calling the move “a blatant affront to Moroccans’ sentiments and a provocation against the popular will.”

El Ounkhari emphasized that at a moment when international pressure should be mounting on Israel to hold it accountable for its ongoing occupation and military campaign in Gaza, Rabat has instead chosen to formalize and deepen its bilateral relationship with Tel Aviv. Morocco’s current governing coalition, made up of the leading National Rally of Independents (RNI), the Authenticity and Modernity Party (PAM), and the Istiqlal Party, has remained largely silent on the agreement, with senior party members citing the sensitive pre-election context as a reason to avoid public comment.

A senior RNI member, also speaking anonymously, told Middle East Eye that internal party reaction to the deal was marked by “a kind of rationality and calmness.” He framed this muted response as predictable, noting that Moroccan-Israeli relations have been an established, non-negotiable part of the kingdom’s foreign policy since the 2020 accords were signed. A senior PAM member echoed the sentiment of caution, explaining that no party figure would risk commenting on a divisive issue that could be weaponized by political opponents in the final days of campaigning.

Moroccan officials have sought to justify the diplomatic upgrade by framing closer ties as a tool to advance humanitarian and diplomatic support for Palestinians. Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita told reporters that despite deeper cooperation, “Rabat does not agree with Israel 100 percent” — a narrative that mirrors the justification Rabat used when it deployed military personnel to the U.S.-backed International Stabilisation Force in Gaza as part of the 2020 Trump peace plan. The RNI member echoed this government framing, arguing that “Morocco can use its relations with Israel as a channel of diplomatic dialogue and pressure for stopping escalation and advancing a two-state solution,” though he acknowledged that “Moroccan-Israeli cooperation does not automatically translate into benefits for the Palestinians.”

Critics of normalization have rejected this justification outright. Ahmed Ouihmane, president of the Moroccan Observatory Against Normalisation and a member of the national secretariat of the Moroccan Working Group for Palestine, dismissed the claim that normalization serves Palestinian interests as “nothing but nonsense and an insult to the intelligence of the Moroccan people.” He challenged the government’s narrative, asking: “If normalisation is a means to serve the Palestinian cause, what results have actually been achieved for the Palestinians through it?”

Ouihmane pointed to the staggering human cost of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, where the United Nations has recorded that at least 21,000 Palestinian children have been killed in Israeli attacks since October 2023. He argued that tangible support for Palestinians would require cutting all cooperation that enables Israel’s military operation, including ending Morocco’s role as a key transit hub for arms shipments bound for Israel — a role that has included facilitating transport of components for F-35 fighter jets used in attacks across Gaza. “Real aid for Palestinians would begin by denying the Israeli war machine any form of cooperation, support or facilitation – such as allowing Moroccan ports to receive ships laden with lethal weaponry destined for the Zionist killing machine,” he said.

The announcement of the diplomatic upgrade comes at a particularly fraught time for the Moroccan government, which is already navigating multiple concurrent crises ahead of the general election. These include ongoing fallout from the Ceuta migrant crisis, allegations of Moroccan involvement that the kingdom has denied, a major high-profile leak that exposed the personal data of more than 70,000 Moroccan intelligence personnel, and a controversial Spanish bill that would grant citizenship to Sahrawis born in Western Sahara during the Spanish colonial era — a move that Rabat strongly opposes.

Many political observers and insiders frame the ongoing advancement of normalization as rooted in long-standing geopolitical and strategic priorities, most notably Morocco’s claim to sovereignty over Western Sahara. In December 2020, the United States formally recognized Morocco’s sovereignty over the disputed territory in a side agreement that was tied directly to Rabat’s signing of the Abraham Accords. The Western Sahara dispute has dominated Morocco’s foreign policy for decades, with the kingdom locked in a long-running regional rivalry with Algeria, which supports the pro-independence Polisario Front’s claims to the territory.

The PJD member acknowledged that Western Sahara is a core driving force behind the kingdom’s policy, explaining: “The state has its own geopolitical calculations that drive it to make such difficult decisions, that sometimes run counter to the will of the people.” Even so, he added, the rights of Palestinians remain a core principle for pro-Palestinian activists across the kingdom, and no strategic calculation can justify formal ties with Israel.

El Ounkhari echoed widespread public frustration, noting that Moroccans have consistently rejected normalization across every recent poll and public protest, yet official policy continues to move steadily toward deeper ties with Israel. “The official process continues in the opposite direction, moving from one stage to another in deepening relations with the Zionist entity,” he said.

Since the start of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza in October 2023, peaceful pro-Palestinian protests have been held every week outside Morocco’s parliament in Rabat, drawing thousands of participants from a broad coalition of trade unions, political groups, and civil society organizations. The Moroccan Working Group for Palestine, which Ouihmane serves on, is one of the leading umbrella organizations coordinating this grassroots movement.

Just four days after the diplomatic deal was announced, Ouihmane was physically assaulted by alleged members of a pro-normalization group called “We Are All Israelis” on a major street in central Rabat, requiring hospitalization. Local activists note that the attack marks an escalation of tensions: prior to the assault, the loose network of pro-Israel Moroccans, which formed after October 2023, had limited its activities to online harassment of anti-normalization activists.

Despite the attack, Ouihmane told Middle East Eye that the grassroots movement would continue its fight across all levels to reverse the normalization process. “We will continue our struggle at all levels […] our goal is to overturn the normalisation process,” he said. The movement’s demands are clear: end all normalization efforts, close the Israeli liaison office in Rabat, and cut all forms of cooperation with what Ouihmane calls a “rogue entity.”

Protesters have repeatedly made their position clear in mass rallies across every region of Morocco, Ouihmane added, and the message remains unchanged: “Palestine is a Moroccan national cause, […] while normalisation is a betrayal.”

El Ounkhari emphasized that official state policy does not make normalization inevitable or acceptable to the Moroccan public. “Embassies may be opened, and ambassadors exchanged, but that does not mean normalisation has become acceptable to the Moroccan people. Palestine will remain present in the conscience of Moroccans,” he said.

A heated political controversy has erupted in the United Kingdom after senior Conservative Party figures launched explosive accusations that the current Labour government orchestrated a cover-up to hide alleged influence from “extremist” Muslim groups over the newly adopted definition of anti-Muslim hostility. However, newly emerging evidence and public statements from the chair of the definition’s drafting working group have completely undermined these high-stakes allegations, building on previous investigative reporting that exposed key contradictions in the Conservatives’ narrative.

The latest confrontation began this week when Shadow Justice Secretary Nick Timothy claimed that extremists “almost certainly influenced” the definition, which the Labour government formally adopted earlier in 2025. Timothy’s accusation was echoed by Shadow Housing, Communities and Local Government Secretary Katie Lam, who publicly questioned what public interest could justify withholding information about the definition’s drafting process, framing the deletion of public consultation submissions as deliberate secrecy.

But this narrative has been thoroughly undercut by Dominic Grieve, a former Conservative minister and the independent chair of the working group tasked with developing the definition. Grieve’s public intervention confirms long-running reporting from Middle East Eye (MEE), which first revealed last July that the British government actually barred the working group from holding formal consultations with major mainstream Muslim organizations, including the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) — the UK’s largest umbrella body for Muslim community groups, with more than 500 affiliated mosques, schools, and advocacy organizations across the country.

Instead, Grieve confirmed on Monday that the working group only met with individuals and organizations cleared by the government, adhering to the longstanding Conservative policy of disengagement from groups labeled controversial that the current Labour government has retained. “As the present government has kept the policy of its Conservative predecessors, no meetings took place with any groups or individuals who had been identified as having expressed unacceptable views incompatible with a free democracy,” Grieve stated.

This week, the Ministry for Communities launched a formal review into the deletion of public submissions received during the working group’s call for evidence, a move Timothy has seized on to push his “cover-up” claim. But government officials have clarified that the submissions were destroyed in compliance with UK data protection law, due to the large volume of sensitive special category data — including information on religious beliefs and political opinions — that cannot be legally retained longer than necessary for consultation purposes. Additionally, senior government sources with direct knowledge of the process confirmed that a large share of unsolicited submissions contained violent abuse and explicit death threats targeting working group members, leaving the government with no legal or practical reason to retain the material.

Contrary to Timothy’s framing, the working group’s final product is not a definition of “Islamophobia” — a term the UK government has formally discontinued — but a definition of “anti-Muslim hostility.” The government has explicitly denied any involvement by extremist groups in shaping the policy in a statement to *The Telegraph*, and Grieve has publicly pushed back directly against Timothy’s unsubstantiated claims. In a post on X, Grieve questioned Timothy’s credibility, writing: “Nick Timothy needs to decide whether he is a serious politician or a rabble rouser mingling valid points with entirely disreputable and unsustainable ones.”

Further contradictions in the Conservative narrative have come to light around the role of Policy Exchange, the neoconservative think tank where Nick Timothy holds a senior fellowship. MEE’s 2024 reporting confirmed that the working group actually extended a consultation invitation to Policy Exchange, an offer the think tank ultimately declined. Despite being invited to participate, Policy Exchange has emerged as one of the definition’s most vocal critics. In an August article for *The Telegraph*, Policy Exchange’s Head of Security and Extremism Paul Stott claimed the “secrecy surrounding Labour’s anti-Muslim hatred definition is chilling” and speculated that extremist groups could have influenced the working group’s deliberations — while failing to disclose that his own organization was invited to contribute to the process and declined.

A review of the working group’s actual consultation list confirms that the group held formal discussions with a range of critical and independent organizations, including the National Secular Society, Humanists UK, and the Community Security Trust, which monitors antisemitism. The group also consulted Trevor Phillips, a former broadcaster who was suspended from the Labour Party over unproven Islamophobia allegations that he has consistently denied, before having his suspension lifted in 2021. Along with these figures, the working group invited John Jenkins, a former British ambassador to Saudi Arabia and a Policy Exchange senior fellow, to give input on whether a formal definition would be useful. Jenkins publicly published his critical response in *The Spectator*, where he attacked the working group for having five Muslim members out of six, claimed the group had pre-determined its conclusions, and compared the adoption of any definition to a 1737 censorship law that restricted theatre licensing. In 2024, Jenkins was accused of endorsing online posts that are openly Islamophobic and spread anti-Muslim propaganda, a claim he never responded to when contacted by MEE.

Along with barring formal consultation with the MCB, the government also prohibited the working group from holding formal talks with the Centre for Media Monitoring (CfMM), a media watchdog that originally launched under MCB auspices but now operates as an independent organization focused on monitoring anti-Muslim media coverage. In response to the exclusion, an MCB spokesperson confirmed last year that the organization mobilized its grassroots membership to submit comments through the open public call for evidence, even without a formal invitation.

Parliamentary records further confirm that no contact took place between the working group and the four organizations Conservative politicians have repeatedly named as “extremist” — MEND, Cage, the Muslim Association of Britain, and the MCB. In a June parliamentary answer, Conservative MP James Cleverly asked whether the working group had engaged with any of these groups, and junior minister Nesil Caliskan explicitly confirmed that the department follows a policy of non-engagement with all four, and the working group did not meet with any of them. This explicit parliamentary denial has gone entirely unmentioned in public statements from Policy Exchange and Conservative politicians pushing the extremist influence claim.

Grieve has pushed back against Timothy’s repeated allegations by clarifying the open nature of the call for evidence process. “There was a call for evidence that allowed anyone to submit their opinion. Many did, including individuals with views right across the political spectrum, including extreme hatred of Muslims. These were not considered individually,” Grieve explained, noting that the working group was never responsible for retaining submissions long-term, and any deletion of material followed government policy set by Downing Street. “It was always for the government to decide what to do with our advice which was private to government. Whether or not the deletion of material received by us during the course of our work follows government guidelines or not is not for me to comment. We did not request it.”

The definition of anti-Muslim hostility formally unveiled by the government in March is not legally binding, and explicitly carves out protections for legitimate freedom of expression, including the right to criticise Islam as a religion. It defines anti-Muslim hostility as three core categories of harmful action: intentional criminal acts targeting Muslims or people perceived to be Muslim, harmful prejudicial stereotyping that frames all Muslims as uniformly negative to encourage hatred, and unlawful discrimination that disadvantages Muslims in public and economic life.

Ministers have repeatedly stressed that the definition does not restrict free speech, a point Grieve reaffirmed in his recent public statement. “It is certainly not a blasphemy law. There was no new law suggested and it was outside the terms of reference of the working group and specifically excluded,” Grieve said, noting that he has long campaigned to repeal blasphemy laws in the UK and would never have chaired the working group if restrictions on free speech were on the table. “To suggest this on the clear evidence of the wording and the text is nonsense,” he added.

Despite the overwhelming evidence contradicting his claims, Timothy doubled down on his cover-up allegations on Tuesday, repeating his demand for a full list of organizations that submitted comments to the working group. His request casts an extremely broad net, as any individual or organization was permitted to submit comments through the open call for evidence, and the MCB alone has more than 500 independent affiliated organizations across the UK. The longstanding disengagement policy that bars formal government contact with the MCB originated in 2020, when the organization published a public dossier documenting hundreds of alleged Islamophobic comments by Conservative MPs, councillors, and Downing Street advisers. The Conservative Party broke off relations with the MCB that year, and the current Labour government retained the disengagement policy when it took office in 2024.

A British coroner has opened the door to a significantly broader investigation into the 2024 Israeli drone strike in Gaza that killed three British aid workers, with new scope to examine evidence from both Israeli and UK military forces and probe whether British-manufactured weapons were used in the deadly attack.

The first pre-inquest review hearing held Monday at Avon Coroner’s Court in Bristol saw Senior Coroner Maria Voisin signal that the scope of the upcoming final inquiry will be expanded to include a full examination of the role Israeli authorities played in the three deaths. The victims, all former British military personnel working for security firm Solace Global at the time of the strike, were 47-year-old James Kirby from Bristol, 57-year-old John Chapman from Poole in Dorset, and 33-year-old James “Jim” Henderson from Falmouth in Cornwall. In addition to the three British citizens, the April 1, 2024 attack also killed Palestinian, Australian, Canadian, and Polish aid workers who were all part of a World Central Kitchen (WCK) aid convoy.

The deaths have remained a source of international controversy for months, particularly after a bombshell pre-recorded television interview released last month saw Colonel Nochi Mendel, the Israeli army officer who ordered the strike, say he felt “not sorry” for the attack and stood by his decision to target the convoy. Immediately following the strike, the Israeli military removed Mendel from his position as chief of staff of the Nahal infantry brigade. The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) has acknowledged the strike stemmed from a string of operational failures, including clear breaches of its own rules of engagement and internal standard operating procedures. However, in August the IDF announced it would not launch any criminal investigation into the strike, a decision that drew sharp condemnation from the governments of the UK, Canada, and Australia, with the three countries describing the choice as shameful.

Up to this point, the UK coroner’s inquest had only been focused on examining the roles of WCK and Solace Global, the private security firm tasked with protecting the aid convoy. But during Monday’s hearing, Voisin confirmed she was prepared to grant interested person status to both the IDF and Colonel Mendel, a procedural move that grants those parties formal access to evidence, the right to present testimony, and participation in the inquiry proceedings. Under UK coroner rules, interested person status is extended to any individual or organization with a direct connection to a death under investigation, including parties potentially implicated in causing the death.

Tayab Ali, the solicitor representing Kirby’s family, issued a statement welcoming the coroner’s decision. Speaking after the hearing, Ali noted that Kirby’s family has waited two and a half years for a full accounting of what happened. “What today means is that Colonel Mendel and the IDF can now take part, see the evidence and give their account, in a court that will properly examine what happened. James’s family would like to hear from him,” Ali wrote on social media platform X.

Ali added that on behalf of Kirby’s family, he has formally requested the coroner also compel testimony from the UK Ministry of Defence, the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, and Israeli arms manufacturer Elbit Systems. The legal team has also asked the coroner to investigate whether a Royal Air Force (RAF) aircraft that was operating over Gaza on the day of the strike passed intelligence about the aid convoy to the IDF, a question that remains unresolved.

Pete Weatherby KC, a barrister representing Henderson’s family, laid out the family’s key demands in a formal submission to the court. The legal team wants the inquiry to investigate whether an RAF surveillance plane that circled over Gaza for approximately five hours on the day of the attack gathered information that was subsequently shared with Israeli forces, noting the plane returned to its base just minutes before the strike was carried out. Weatherby added that the families also are demanding answers on whether the weapons used in the strike were manufactured in the UK, a question that Weatherby emphasized is a major matter of public concern across the UK.

Neil Henderson, father of victim Jim Henderson, said in a statement that the family hopes the expanded inquest will fully examine “the decisions and policies leading to the attack, and what role, if any, UK authorities or military equipment originating from the UK may have played.” For months, families of the three British victims have pushed for full transparency and legal accountability, after Israel’s decision to forgo a domestic criminal investigation left their calls for justice unanswered.