The new Marrakech Museum for Photography and Visual Art, designed by British architect Sir David Chipperfield and opening in 2016, will house a permanent collection of lens-based art from the 19th Century to the present as well as contemporary art exhibitions. BBC News Africa

* Marrakech hosts a new photography exhibition — 10 Contemporary Moroccan photographers – at  El Badi Palace, the first in a series leading up to the opening  of the permanent home for the new Marrakech Museum for Photography and Visual Art in 2016 *

BBC News Africa (September 13, 2013) — The Moroccan city of Marrakech is hosting the first in a series of exhibitions in the lead-up to the opening of a permanent home for the new Marrakech Museum for Photography and Visual Art (MMPVA), scheduled for 2016.

Until the new MMPVA opens, the museum is using the city’s El Badi Palace, pictured here, as a temporary space.

The exhibition — 10 Contemporary Moroccan photographers — has just opened at the palace.  As well as looking at the work of established photographers, it showcases a younger generation of artists such as Tangier Diaries by Hicham Gardaf.

Inspired by Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Franck and Richard Avedon, Marrakech-born Daoud Aoulad-Syad captures black and white images during his solitary journeys across Morocco. Here a man transports a TV in the capital, Rabat.

Yasmina Bouziane’s untitled Self Portrait is her signature work. “It turns the tables,” explains David Prochaska in the book Modern Art and the Idea of the Mediterranean. “Instead of the Western male photographing Arab women in an Orientalist studio setting, the Arab woman turns the camera on the implied Western male viewer.”

Born in Larache in 1961, photographer Hassan Hajjaj left Morocco for London at an early age. He combines the visual elements of contemporary fashion photography and pop art in works such as this entitled Dotted Crew.

This is the concept artwork for the MMPVA’s new building, designed by British architect Sir David Chipperfield. It is due to open in 2016.

The new MMPVA will house a permanent collection of lens-based art from the 19th Century to the present day as well as presenting a program of contemporary art exhibitions.

10 Contemporary Moroccan Photographers runs until 25 October and includes work by Yto Barrada, Hicham Benohoud, Carole Benitah, Daoud Aoulad Syad, Hassan Hajjaj, Hicham Gardaf, Lamia Naji, Leila Sadel, Ali Chraibi and Yasmina Bouziane.

“Graffiti is more than expression; this year has shown that it is also a way for Moroccan youth, civil society and government to come together.” Al-Hussein Al-Midrat, Council of Youth Leaders in Agadir, Common Ground

* City-sponsored initiative in Al-Dusheira, Morocco created space for youth to use their energy in a constructive manner… “You can be anybody’s son, but good manners are better than good lineage” showed up overnight on walls. *

Common Ground, by Al-Hussein Al-Midrat (Al-Dusheira, Morocco, September 17, 2013) — Walking through the narrow streets and alleyways of Al-Dusheira’s Juhadiyya neighborhood, beautiful, colorful graffiti urging readers to protect the environment draws my attention. In Al-Dusheira, in southern Morocco, you could wake up one day to find the facade of your house covered with phrases and images drawing attention to an issue, or expressing ideas and the pulse of young people.

Graffiti enjoys a special place in the hearts of young Moroccans. It may contain words and expressions written in shorthand, or coded in such a way that only youth can decipher. It’s the language of the street, with a certain element of rebellion, but rarely intended to slander or insult.

But graffiti is more than expression; this year has shown that it is also a way for Moroccan youth, civil society and government to come together.

In June the Municipal Council of Al-Dusheira and civil society organizations like Al-Dusheirah Associations Forum (Majd) joined together to celebrate International Environment Day. They organized initiatives for residents to decorate city walls with murals highlighting the region’s culture, art and history. Youth from the city participated by painting murals that encouraged education for citizenship and a sense of belonging and civic responsibility to their society, the environment and local culture.

More support for youth graffiti art, and encouragement for them to utilize their talent for voluntary civil work, will provide them with experience, abilities and other skills, while helping the Municipal Council of Al-Dusheira achieve greater environmental protection and raise awareness about other issues affecting the city.

This initiative created space for youth to use their energy in a constructive manner. Slogans like “A clean neighborhood is worthy of its citizens,” “God is beautiful and loves beauty” and “You can be anybody’s son, but good manners are better than good lineage” showed up overnight on walls.  Paintings of the Moroccan flag, and the Kingdom’s slogan “God, the Homeland, and the King” aimed at expressing national belonging, cultural, linguistic and artistic pluralism.

This was done in Arabic and Tamazight (the language of the indigenous Amazigh population of North Africa), calling for coexistence among people of Amazigh or Arab origins. Such messages reinforce the 2011 Constitution reform, which states that the Amazigh language is an official language in Morocco.

Young people participating in the initiative volunteered to transform the city’s main street into a unique mural that exhibits all that comes to their minds.

The Municipal Council awarded youth graffiti artists in a number of categories, including the cleanest neighborhood, the most beautiful mural and the best slogan encouraging greater youth and civil society organization participation.

Enthusiasm on behalf of these young people, and their awareness of the problems from which their society suffers is sufficient for them to take initiative to promote awareness of environmental and other issues.

Youth are already at the forefront of environmental activities in Al-Dusheira like generating less trash at home, contributing to recycling efforts, organizing campaigns to paint walls, clean alleys and preserve green areas.

Such activities provide youth with financial support, provide activities to fill leisure time, and encourages them to undertake voluntary work. Such initiatives provide alternatives to poor, marginalized youth at risk for drug and alcohol abuse and delinquency.

Graffiti has always been a vehicle by which youth express their feelings. Through such projects it also becomes a conduit for young people to participate in their communities and present constructive solutions to the challenges facing all Moroccans.

###

*Al-Hussein Al-Midrat is a member of the Council of Youth Leaders in Agadir, and the director of the electronic newspaper Agadir TV. He studies Arab Culture and Arts at the University of Ibn Zahr. This article was written for the Common Ground News Service (CGNews).

Source: Common Ground News Service (CGNews), 17 September 2013, www.commongroundnews.org

Morocco bound—Stars Damian Lewis, Claire Danes, Mandy Patinkin from Showtime’s hit “Homeland”

* Security fears send “Homeland” to Morocco—With U.S. considering strike on Middle Eastern nation,  Showtime drama switches locations to other side of the Mediterranean.*

Hollywood Reporter, Telegraph (September 17, 2013) — Much of Homeland‘s third season is already in the can, but planned shoots for Israel have been axed on account of the precarious situation in Syria. The filming teams moved to Morocco instead, despite original plans, Israeli news source Ynet reported.

A representative from Homeland producers Fox 21 confirms to The Hollywood Reporter that the anticipated shoot in the Tel Aviv area will now take place on Morocco as tensions continue to escalate in the Middle East amid talk of a possible U.S. air strike against the regime of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad.

Morocco has so far largely avoided the chaotic upheavals of the Arab uprisings in the region, the London Telegraph reports.

Homeland has previously filmed in Israel, with parts of the first two seasons shooting in Tel Aviv as well as Barta’a, a small town that straddles the Green Line. The series holds close ties with Israel. Howard Gordon and Alex Gansa‘s Emmy-winning thriller is based on the Israeli format Hatufim (Prisoners of War) from Gideon Raff, and just two months ago producers held a press conference in the country detailing plans to shoot in the Jewish state.

“Homeland” Hollywood Reporter

The decision to move shop comes as little surprise given the threat of military action in the area and widely reported anxiety over possible retribution from Syria should such a strike occur.

Gordon’s Fox 21 pilot Tyrant, which follows and unassuming American family drawn into the workings of a turbulent Middle Eastern nation, will also shoot in Morocco. The buzzy project is currently in consideration at FX.

Homeland returns to Showtime on Sept. 29.

When it debuted, the show hit an all-time high for a new drama series on Showtime, the US cable channel which holds the broadcasting rights, the Telegraph reports. Both Danes and her leading co-star Lewis have recently received Emmys for their roles.

PHOTOS: ‘Homeland’: Portraits of the Emmy-Winning Cast and Creators

UD student Madalyn Becker spent her summer in Morocco, teaching through the America’s Unofficial Ambassadors program. UDaily

*Moroccan education — The children were a joy to work with. “It was so different,” she said. “I’ve worked in summer camps. I’ve worked with a lot of kids. They were so excited to learn.”*

UDaily, by Matthew Bittle (September 18, 2013) — University of Delaware students spent their summers in many different ways. Some had jobs, some had internships, and some just enjoyed the time off. Junior international relations major Madalyn Becker had a rather unique experience: She spent her summer in Morocco helping local children.

Becker interned with America’s Unofficial Ambassadors, an organization that “builds mutual understanding and enhances people-to-people partnerships between America and the Muslim world,” according to its website. Becker first found out about the group during one of her spring classes.

“My professor knows the founder of AUA,” said Becker, who has a minor in Islamic studies. “He came in and talked to class about internship opportunities.”

At the time, AUA had internships in three countries: Zanzibar, Indonesia, and Morocco.

Moroccan children play soccer on a makeshift field.  UDaily

Becker thought Zanzibar sounded interesting, but coincidentally, she had also been hoping to travel to Morocco someday. Additionally, Becker had been studying French, one of the languages spoken in Morocco, through school since age 10.

She applied to intern in Morocco, which intrigued her with its cultural and political dynamics, as well as the potential to share her knowledge of French. The application process involved submitting a resume to a committee, explaining how such an experience would help her and how she would be able to benefit the community.

She was accepted to the program as one of eight volunteers in Morocco, and they left on June 27. The eight of them all worked at different tasks, with one creating a website and two others working in national parks while Becker herself spent time at a local school in the village of Tarmilaat teaching French to 25 students ranging in age from five to 22.

A Moroccan home.

During her time in Morocco, Becker lived in a dorm at Al Akhawayn University, located in the city of Ifrane about 15 minutes from Tarmilaat. Though the town had no stores or restaurants, the city contained these things.

The village was located in the mountains, meaning the temperature often dipped quite a bit at night. Becker said it was not what she expected, given that the stereotypical image of Africa is deserts and heat.

While there, she took classes on Arabic, one of the official languages of Morocco, at Al Akhawayn University and lived with a Moroccan student studying there. That helped make the experience even more authentic for her.

[Continue Reading…]

“Dream of a peaceful Mali has now come true,” said Morocco’s King Mohammed VI at inauguration of Mali’s new President, Ibrahim Boubakar Keïta. “Morocco will remain a faithful, committed partner.” MAP

* “Morocco and Mali… embrace the same values of tolerance and openness to others, and this represents the bedrock of the spiritual bond between our two countries.

“Morocco will spare no effort to support Mali…recently set up a multi-disciplinary military field hospital in Bamako, which is supported by medical & humanitarian emergency assistance.”*

Maghreb Arab Press (Bamako, Mali, September 19, 2013) – Morocco’s King Mohammed VI delivered remarks today the inauguration ceremony of the new President of Mali, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita.

Full text of remarks by Morocco’s King Mohammed VI:

King Mohammed VI of Morocco

“Praise be to God May peace and blessings be upon the Prophet, His Kith and Kin.

Your Excellency Mr. Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta, President of the Republic of Mali,

Distinguished Heads of State and Government,

Honorable Presidents and Representatives of Malian institutions,

Your Excellencies,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

My presence among you on this memorable day illustrates the Moroccan people’s friendship and their commitment to their unique relationship with the Malian people.

On this solemn occasion, I would like to extend, once again, my warmest congratulations to His Excellency Ibrahim Boubakar Keïta on his election as President of the Republic.

I wish you every success, Mr. President, in your endeavours to fulfil the legitimate aspirations of the people of Mali for peace, harmony and progress.

I would also like to take this opportunity to pay tribute to the Interim President, Mr. DioncoundaTraore, for wisely supervising the sensitive transition period.

In this respect, I wish to commend the efforts exerted by the Heads of State and Government of ECOWAS Member Countries and of Chad, alongside those of the Republic of Mali, our sister nation, during the painful ordeal this country recently went through.

I also wish to reiterate my thanks to the President of the French Republic, Mr François Hollande, for his country’s open and crucial support, and for France’s dynamic, bold diplomacy, both of which have contributed to the achievement of peace and stability in Mali.

Mr. President,

Despite difficulties that were once deemed insuperable, Mali managed to hold credible, transparent presidential elections, upholding the country’s sovereignty, stability and unity.

This success was undoubtedly the most pertinent response to the erring of radical and extremist groups of all kinds, everywhere else in the world.

As we pride ourselves on this collective victory over obscurantist and separatist forces in Mali, we all remain aware of the magnitude of the challenges that must be faced during this new phase of national reconciliation and reconstruction:

• A peaceful reconciliation between all Malians, open to all political trends. The creation of a specific “Department for National Reconciliation and Development of the Northern Region” constitutes a solid, promising basis for the achievement of reconciliation;
• Sustainable reconstruction through the consolidation of political, representative and security institutions, the revamping of development institutions and infrastructure and, finally, the reorganization of the religious domain. All of this is to be carried out while fully upholding the sovereignty and the free choice of Malians.

Mr. President,

The noteworthy presence of Mali’s friends in Bamako today clearly shows you can rely on their shared commitment to continuing to support you for the achievement of your mission – a mission which is as difficult as it is exhilarating. The international community will remain at your side to lay the ground for a new political and territorial governance system that suits your country’s geographical, economic and cultural characteristics.

Mr. President,

Mali’s unique cultural features have always constituted a major component of the Islamic heritage and of the African identity.

Any concerted international action that does not give due consideration to the spiritual and cultural dimension will therefore be doomed to failure. The partnership the Kingdom of Morocco wishes to propose for the tangible and intangible reconstruction of Mali is fully in line with this philosophy.

It is absolutely necessary to repair the material damage suffered and to treat symbolic wounds through the rehabilitation of mausoleums, the restoration and preservation of manuscripts and the achievement of socio-cultural revival.

Islamic customs and practices in Morocco and Mali are the same. They are nurtured by the same precepts of moderation and of the “middle-of-the-road” approach. Both countries embrace the same values of tolerance and openness to others, and this represents the bedrock of the spiritual bond between our two countries.

Guided by this common set of spiritual values and aware of the need to safeguard those values against all risks and perils, I am pleased that we will be signing an agreement for the training, in Morocco over the next few years, of 500 Malian Imams.

This two-year training course will be mainly devoted to the study of the Maliki rite and of the moral doctrine that rejects any form of excommunication.

Mr. President,

As a fervent advocate of South-South cooperation, Morocco will spare no effort to support Mali — our sister nation and neighbor — in the socioeconomic sectors which you deem a priority for the country. It will support Malian human development programs, particularly in the areas of executive training, basic infrastructure and health. In this respect, the Kingdom of Morocco has recently set up a multi-disciplinary military field hospital in Bamako, which is supported by medical and humanitarian emergency assistance.

Our cooperation will encourage the business community in both countries to become more actively involved in promoting trade and investment between our two nations, thus boosting employment and encouraging the transfer of skills and capital.

Mr. President,

All African sister nations have a vital role to play in this important reconstruction mission.

Unfortunately, and in spite of the stakes involved, certain states and parties seek to demolish where others choose to build. It is in keeping with a long-established, immutable tradition of cooperation with sub-Saharan sister nations that Morocco intends to shoulder its historical responsibility in this regard.

I have personally been devoting special attention to this key element of Morocco’s external relations, seeking to reinforce it as much as possible.

A founding member of the Organization of African Unity, Morocco is not a member of the African Union. Yet, it has sought, in a fully autonomous way and more than ever before, to launch tangible initiatives and efficiently carry out concrete projects. Today, significant results have been achieved, and Morocco intends to build on these achievements by carrying on with its untiring efforts to promote solidarity with sister nations.

Mr. President,

The dream of a peaceful Mali has now come true. In this new chapter of Malian history which is being written today, Morocco will remain a faithful, committed partner.

Thank you.”

“Dream of a peaceful Mali has now come true,” said Morocco’s King Mohammed VI at inauguration of Mali’s new President. “Morocco will remain a faithful, committed partner.” Photo: MAP

*Click here for full text of King Mohammed VI’s remarks in Mali*

MACP (Washington, DC, Sept. 19, 2013) — At the inauguration of Malian President Ibrahim Boubakar Keïta, King Mohammed VI cited Morocco’s and Mali’s shared values of “tolerance and openness” and deep cultural and spiritual bonds, pledging Morocco’s support for “this new chapter of Malian history.”

That support includes offering to train 500 Malian Imams using Morocco’s moderate and tolerant form of Islam to help fight the spread of extremism within their communities. Mali held successful presidential elections this past July after a year-long takeover of the northern part of the country by extremist groups.

King Mohammed VI pledged his support to the new President of Mali, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, to help rebuild Mali’s war-torn economy and democratic institutions. Photo: MAP

“The dream of a peaceful Mali has now come true,” said King Mohammed VI, the only North African or Arab Head of State to join the ceremony.  “In this new chapter of Malian history which is being written today, Morocco will remain a faithful, committed partner.”

The King said, “Both countries embrace the same values of tolerance and openness to others, and this represents the bedrock of the spiritual bond between our two countries.”

King Mohammed VI, Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita chair signing of agreement to train 500 Malian Imams with Morocco’s moderate, tolerant form of Islam to help fight extremism.  Photo: MAP

“Morocco will spare no effort to support Mali,” said the King, in helping to rebuild Mali’s war-torn economy and democratic institutions with human development programs, leadership training, basic infrastructure, assistance to reestablish business and commerce, and health services.

The King noted Morocco “recently set up a multi-disciplinary military field hospital in Bamako,” supported by medical and humanitarian emergency aid.

Morocco’s King spoke with French President Francois Hollande at the inauguration ceremony. Photo: LeMatin/MAP

* For the full text of the King’s remarks, go to: http://www.map.ma/en/activites-royales/full-text-speech-delivered-thursday-hm-king-mohammed-vi-inauguration-ceremony-mali

King Mohammed VI, Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita chair signing of agreement to train 500 Malian Imams with Morocco’s moderate, tolerant form of Islam to help fight extremism.  Photo: MAP

Maghreb Arab Press, MACP (Bamako, Mali, September 20, 2013) – Morocco’s King Mohammed VI, Commander of the Faithful, and the new Malian President, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, on Friday chaired the signing of an agreement on the training of 500 Malian Imams (religious scholars).

The action is part of Morocco’s contribution to reconstruct Mali and address the threat of extremism. Mali held successful presidential elections this past July after a year-long takeover of the northern part of the country by extremist groups.

Before signing the agreement, King Mohammed VI and the Malian Head of State held a private meeting, during which the Malian leader reiterated his thanks to the Moroccan King for traveling to Bamako for the inauguration ceremony and supporting efforts for peace and harmony in Mali.

The agreement, signed by Morocco’s Endowment and Islamic affairs inister, Ahmed Toufik, and Malian Minister for Territorial Administration and Decentralization, Moussa Sinko Coulibaly, addresses issues of religious cooperation, including Morocco’s commitment to train 500 Malian Imams over several years.

Morocco and Mali share the same cultural and religious identity, mainly Sunni Islam and the Maliki school of Islamic law, as well as the same values of tolerance and openness towards others. The two nations are committed to peace, security, stability, development, and good political and territorial governance in the region.

King Mohammed VI in Mali for inauguration of President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita. Under new religious affairs co-operation agreement signed Nov. 11 in Rabat, Morocco and Mali will “share ideas and information with regard to ways of countering extremist thinking.” Magharebia

* “We need to cut the ground from under the feet of the fanatics and extremists by tackling the religious vacuum.” – Analyst *

Magharebia, by Siham Ali (Rabat, Morocco, November 13, 2013) — Morocco and Mali will work together to promote the moral values of Islam and the rejection of takfirist ideology.

Under a religious affairs co-operation agreement signed Monday, November 11th in Rabat, Morocco and Mali will “share ideas and information with regard to ways of countering extremist thinking, and ensure that Islamic principles of tolerance are obeyed and become the norm in both countries.”

To implement the accord at the ground level, Morocco and Mali will arrange congresses to co-ordinate their standpoints on Islamic issues of mutual interest

Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita (center) walks past Moroccan King Mohammed VI during Sept. 19 inauguration in Bamako. AFP/Issouf Sanogo

Scholarships at institutes of higher education may also be offered to Malian students.

Morocco had already pledged to train 500 Malian imams. On Monday, the first group of ninety young Malians arrived in Rabat to train for two years.

Some are already imams in Mali, while others hope to become imams after completing their studies in Morocco.

Ahmed Aissa Mohamed, one of the young beneficiaries, said that the new generation of imams would be trained to deal with the challenge of combating extremism and encouraging Muslims to open up to other religions.

Malian imam Abdullah Soulaimane, agreed, noting that “everyone today wants to issue religious fatwas, but issuing them requires an in-depth knowledge of Islam, in order to avoid lapsing into extremism that harms society.”

To achieve the desired goals, the training for the Malian imams will cover more than religion. They will also study the history, geography and institutions of Mali, human rights, mental health, the media and other issues.

Training clergymen is a sure way of tackling fanaticism, especially in a country, which has been damaged by terrorism, political analyst Hamid Chentoufi told Magharebia.

“We need to cut the ground from under the feet of the fanatics and extremists by tackling the religious vacuum,” he said.

The post Morocco, Mali Sign New Religious Affairs Accord – Magharebia appeared first on Morocco On The Move.

* The essential guide to the country’s suitability as a meetings hub *

“As a melting pot of cultures & civilizations, combined with its strategic location, legendary hospitality and openness of its people, it is not surprising organizing conferences has become second nature to Morocco.”

Zawya (November 13, 2013) — The Moroccan National Tourist Office is delighted to announce the launch of the 2014 edition of MEET Morocco. This 92-page, high-quality publication highlights Morocco’s suitability as a destination for meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions, with features on the kingdom’s principal regions, the main visitor activities, new infrastructure and hospitality developments, meetings facilities and a comprehensive list of hotels.

MEET Morocco is produced in collaboration with Nicholas Publishing International, a Dubai-based publishing company that specializes in the meetings sector, including the bi-monthly MEETme, a professional planners’ and suppliers’ reference tool for up-to-date news, case studies, in-depth features, industry insight and country reports on the Middle East’s meeting industry.

MEET Morocco, which will be officially launched at EIBTM in Barcelona on November 20th, is a valuable tool for meetings and event planners, offering comprehensive information about meetings, conferences and incentives facilities in the country.

MNTO and NPI will be distributing 8,000 printed copies and 2,000 CDs of the MEET Morocco guide at major international travel trade shows and mailed to specialist databases of meeting planners, corporate travel and events buyers in the United Kingdom, Germany, Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland and the Gulf region. The publication can also be accessed online at www.visitmorocco.com and www.meetmiddleeast.com

Features in MEET Morocco 2014 include: Morocco and Vision 2020 – New developments – Meetings overview – Agadir – Casablanca – El-Jadida – Essaouira – Fez & Meknes – Marrakech – Rabat – Tangiers – Golf – Atlas Mountains – Eco Tourism – Spas and wellness – Hotel overview and factsheets – Alternative meetings venues – Shopping – Dining & Nightlife – Getting around.

“As a melting pot of cultures and civilizations, combined with its strategic location, its legendary hospitality and the openness of its people, it is not surprising that the organization of conferences and meetings has become second nature to Morocco,” says Abderrafia Zouitene, Chief Executive Officer of the Moroccan National Tourist Office.

“In Morocco,” he adds, “events can be inspired by the unique characteristics of each region. Whether colored by the energy of Marrakech, lulled by the serenity of Essaouira, soothed by Agadir’s sea breezes, driven by the energy of Casablanca, inspired by the deserts of Ouarzazate, event planners can offer their clients a unique event and an unforgettable experience.”

Meet Morocco is the third collaboration between NPI and the Moroccan National Tourist Office, following earlier MEET Morocco titles published in 2002 and 2009.

“As specialists in producing meetings guides for countries across the MENA region, we understand just how unique and how special Morocco’s product is. With visitor numbers climbing and with impressive new meetings facilities opening in every major destination, we believed it was the right time to produce a third edition of MEET Morocco. We believe it will become an important tool for promoting the destination as a meetings hub in North African and the Mediterranean,” said Rob Nicholas, managing Director of NPI.

The post Moroccan National Tourist Office launches 3rd edition of MEET Morocco 2014 – Zawya appeared first on Morocco On The Move.

Students look at a display at the Judaism Museum in Casablanca on Jan. 28, 2011. Abdelhak Senna/AFP/Getty Images

* ‘Risalat New York,’ the Arab world’s only non-Israeli Jewish-hosted radio show, offers perspective from Brooklyn *

Joseph Braude

Joseph Braude, The Tablet
November 14, 2013

Sunday night for me is always Moroccan radio night. From a home office in Brooklyn surrounded by echo-absorbing foam, I write a commentary in Arabic about the week in Arab politics and then read it into a microphone. Next, I upload the sound file to a studio in Casablanca, where a producer adds the theme song, and it airs the following day to an audience of 1.75 million under the title Risalat New York—“Letter from New York.”

My show has the distinction of being the only radio program hosted by a Jew on Arab airwaves that doesn’t originate in Israel. But more than three years after the broadcast debuted, my Muslim audience now finds it ordinary, rather than aberrant, to hear a Jewish voice opine on Arab affairs in their mother tongue. In numerous Arab countries, such a situation would be revolutionary—but in Morocco, where the leadership has proactively nurtured Muslim-Jewish understanding for years, it’s merely one step forward among many. Given that the listenership has begun to spread beyond the kingdom’s borders, moreover, Risalat New York presents a case in point of how the broader Moroccan policies that keep me on the air can help spread tolerance in other places where Arabic is spoken, too.

A century ago, the region’s demographics were considerably more diverse, and considerably more Jewish. A million Arabic-speaking Jews still lived throughout the region; in some Arab cities, almost every Muslim knew at least one. Jews formed a professional class, deeply engaged in mainstream culture wherever they were allowed to be. Iraq’s national orchestra, composed overwhelmingly of Jewish musicians, broadcast a live radio performance across the region each week into the 1940s. Leila Mourad, the Barbra Streisand of Egypt, starred in some of the most popular Arabic movie musicals ever made. Jews published prolifically in Lebanese and Syrian media and contributed to the major newspapers of Baghdad, where even a Zionist daily with reporting from Palestine was licensed in the 1920s. In Morocco, Jews began publishing newspapers as soon as printing presses became available. The Hadidi brothers of Casablanca, Pinhas Assayag and David Chriqui of Tangier, and one of the country’s few female journalists, Rahma Toledano, were all well known to Muslim and Jewish readers. Some published in Spanish or French, then the languages of politics and commerce, while others wrote for a narrower audience in Judeo-Arabic—the Moroccan equivalent of Yiddish—printed in Hebrew block characters.

It is of course hard even to picture such a media landscape in the Middle East today, when the great emptying of the Arab world’s Jewish communities is slipping out of living memory. But through the most difficult years of the 1930s and 1940s, the Moroccan monarchy ensured that its country remained a haven for Jews: In 1941, Sultan Mohammed V rejected calls from the Vichy French occupiers of his country to turn over the 265,000-strong Jewish population to the Nazis. After WWII and Israel’s creation, Jews remained in Morocco for longer than their co-religionists elsewhere in the region—but those who stayed understood that the price of their security was to keep a much lower profile. By the 1960s, barely any Jews remained active in the media. The few who continued writing were leftist dissidents, and by the 1970s they too had put down their pens.

Morocco’s Jewish community now numbers around 5,000—a shadow of its former self, yet the largest in the Arab world. Though Moroccan cities, towns, and even mountain villages are full of Muslim grandparents who speak fondly of the Jews they knew as children, few of today’s youth have even met one in the flesh. Much of what they hear about Jews comes from regional satellite television networks that use The Protocols of the Elders of Zion to explain Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians. The monarchy has taken steps to offer a corrective to these ideas: Mohammed VI, the present king, has called for a negotiated settlement between Israel and the Palestinians, even as he condemns Israeli settlement building and human rights violations. Moroccan schoolchildren learn about their country’s Jewish heritage. Hebrew and Arabic hymns are performed side by side in festivals of sacred music. Synagogues in the country are fiercely protected, and some have been publicly rededicated in joint ventures between the Jewish community and the state. In a 2011 speech, the king countered the scourge of Arab Holocaust denial by describing the tragedy as “a wound to the collective memory, which we know is engraved in one of the most painful chapters of the collective history of mankind”—and called on Moroccans to observe Yom HaShoah.

Next week King Mohammed VI will meet with President Obama in Washington, D.C., his first official visit since 2002. They are expected to discuss Syria, Iran, the rising al-Qaida threat in the African Sahel, and the status of talks between Israelis and Palestinians. On the latter issue, the monarch can offer resources that could prove invaluable to a negotiated settlement: As chairman of the Arab League’s Jerusalem Committee, he is an advocate for the rights of Palestinians whom Ramallah trusts. In the Gulf, heads of state regard him as a member of their families. For decision-makers in Israel, he is first and foremost the grandson of Vichy-era Sultan Mohammed V. He is also the only Arab leader to have legislated equal rights and protections for his country’s Jewish minority in a new constitution and a reliable intermediary between Israel and those Arab states with which it lacks formal relations. As for Israeli voters, a million of whom are either natives of Morocco or have a Moroccan-born parent or grandparent, he embodies a tradition with which many still identify: a feeling of attachment that goes hand-in-hand with their pride in Israel. Above all, he is a head of state who has made his personal affinity for Jews into formal domestic policy and won over a large swath of the population to the values he espouses.

These efforts are part of a larger, ongoing relationship between Moroccans in and out of government and Jews in Israel and the diaspora, Ashkenazim and Mizrahim alike. As Shmuel Segev, a former Israeli military intelligence officer, described in a recent book, the two sides have quietly made common cause in the halls of Congress, worked together in the Middle East to mitigate disputes between Israel and its neighbors, and fostered security and intelligence cooperation. Looking ahead, they recognize the urgency of brokering a Palestinian-Israeli peace settlement—but also know that hostility toward Jews in the broader Arab Muslim world will not end with the establishment of a Palestinian state. With only a few thousand Jews left in Arab lands, the question of how to build and nurture new emotional bonds with hundreds of millions of Arab Muslims remains open.

In 2007-2008, I spent half a year in Casablanca researching a book on Arab security services. The government gave me permission to embed with a unit of the federal police in order to learn about its operations firsthand. I watched interrogations, accessed case files, and followed night forays into the city’s shantytown. The picture that emerged was far from rosy, but it ultimately reflected progress toward police reform. Entering this fraught environment was feasible only because I had spent years learning Arabic and living in Arab countries. What drew me to the region and language was a feeling of deep personal affinity: My mother was born in Baghdad. She and her family fled Iraq along with 125,000 other Jews in 1951, leaving 2,700 years of history in the country behind. My family still mourns the loss of friendships in Baghdad and savors memories from the city’s better times.

My study of the Moroccan police was facilitated by Ahmed Charai, the owner of a media company in Casablanca that published a weekly news magazine and held a stake in the country’s third-largest daily newspaper, Al-Ahdath al-Maghrebiya. Ahmed is a Moroccan Muslim patriot who calls on Jews and Muslims to team up—and practices what he preaches: He sends his children to a local branch of the Alliance Israelite schools, where the ratio of Jewish to Muslim students is 90-10 and everyone studies Hebrew as well as Arabic. On visits to the United States, where he sits on the boards of trustees of several think tanks including the Center for Strategic and International Studies and Foreign Policy Research Institute, he also devotes time to connecting American Jewish leaders with Moroccan movers in support of peace efforts between Israel and its Arab neighbors.

In 2010, two years after I departed Morocco, Ahmed put in a bid for one of 10 national FM broadcasting licenses tendered by the government. They were to be the first privately owned radio networks in the kingdom’s history. He won a license and founded MED Radio, which provides a lively mix of current affairs, cultural, religious, and family programming, in a combination of Arabic and French, and that supports the egalitarian values he believes in. On a visit to New York that June, Charai invited me to contribute a weekly commentary to MED Radio in Arabic. I could broadcast according to my conscience, he assured me. Asked whether he thought my Jewish background would be a liability for him, he expressed confidence that Moroccans were ready for a Jewish broadcaster: The audience would judge the segment on its merits, he insisted.

I have been on the air every week since then—except for one month off each Ramadan, when programming is predominantly religious. I started out reporting cautiously about the region, but as supportive messages from the audience began to reach me via social media, I felt encouraged to loosen the format. I reported from drug rehab clinics in Egypt and Bahrain, taped and parsed jihadist sermons from a Salafi mosque in Tunis, and asked disaffected Iranians to describe domestic repression in their country. Voices from Washington and Tel Aviv have helped demystify the workings of both cities. Via Skype, I take listeners farther afield—earlier this month to South Korea, where the director of the national broadcasting company’s Arabic service described, in fluent Arabic, the strategy of her country’s outreach to Arab publics. As an outgrowth of my friendship with the production team in Casablanca, I’ve also been able to migrate narrative and sound techniques used on American public radio to the Moroccan airwaves for the first time: Ayn Ala Tunis (“Eye on Tunis”), an hourlong documentary, based on my visit to the country, fuses Tunisian poetry, folklore, music, and street sounds with the voices of Tunisian politicians and preachers.

When the subject matter touches specifically Jewish subjects, I speak openly about my background. In a segment about Jewish communities in Arab lands last February that featured the voices of Arabic-speaking Jews as well as an Islamist calling for their murder, I asked listeners to imagine the psychological impact of his rhetoric—on Jews, as well as on the young Muslims who pray at his mosque. The program drew a favorable response—and a phone call to the network from the Moroccan minister of information, who is a member of the governing Islamist Party of Justice and Development. He conveyed curiosity about the program, I’m told—but no complaints.

MED Radio, now the most popular privately owned network in the kingdom, has provided a conduit for a friendly Jewish voice to build a relationship with a large Muslim audience. As such, it has achieved a meaningful “force multiplier” effect in a situation of vast demographic asymmetry. Such efforts are no substitute for the face-to-face contact between Muslims and Jews that once typified urban life in Morocco. But Twitter, Facebook, and Skype now enable a broadcaster’s relationship with an audience to become a two-way street. I feel very fortunate to live in a time when such connectivity is possible and never miss a chance to take advantage of it. Meanwhile, the program has more than 5,000 listeners outside Morocco, primarily in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states, via their smartphones. A few of them are producers from pan-Arab TV networks, such as Al-Arabiya, who went on to host me as a commentator for their audiences, which number in the tens of millions. Though Arabic-speaking Jews from Israel have appeared on pan-Arab television before, they have mostly been confined to debates on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. To break out of the Hardball-style “squawk box” and win acceptance as a voice on a range of Arab and Islamic issues is, I feel, a step forward—and for me, it was the unique cultural environment of Morocco that made it possible to take that step.

***

Joseph Braude is the author, most recently, of The Honored Dead. In addition to his Arabic broadcasting, he hosts an English-language podcast and is working on a book about Arabic media.

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The Spice Market in the Medina of Marrakech, where it gets crowded with shoppers in the evening. Kenichi Kubo / The Yomiuri Shimbun

*For designer Yves Saint Laurent (1936-2008), the mood of Marrakech was inspiration for his designs, place to relax*

The Japan News, by Kenichi Kubo / Yomiuri Shimbun Correspondent (Marrakech, Morocco,  November 14, 2013) — A prosperous Islamic capital from the 11th to 13th centuries, Marrakech, one of Morocco’s most popular tourist destinations, retains traces of its traditional culture. To Yves Saint Laurent, a designer known as the “king of French fashion,” the city was a source of inspiration.

Walking through the Medina, an old part of the city, one can see colorful ethnic clothing, carpets and accessories at storefronts on the narrow, mazelike streets. Women veiled from head to toe in deep blue walk along the street.

One can smell a distinct aroma in the air. Although the Medina is a place where ordinary people carry out their daily lives, it is an extraordinary place for foreigners that gives them a mysterious uplifting feeling.

Yves Saint Laurent was attracted to different cultures, as seen in Jan. 2002. The Associated Press

Saint Laurent, who had already gained a reputation in Paris for his work, visited Marrakech for the first time in the 1960s. He was attracted to the mood of the city, which was reminiscent of his hometown of Oran in Algeria.

In 1980, Saint Laurent and his partner, industrialist Pierre Berge, bought a mansion with a 10,000-square-meter garden in Marrakech. Saint Laurent worked there as his second base after Paris. The mansion had once been owned by French painter Jacques Majorelle. Saint Laurent always stayed at the mansion for a while after Paris Fashion Week, which was held twice a year.

“For him, the mansion was a place to relax and gain inspiration for new designs,” said Quito Fierro, 51, head of the administrative office of the Majorelle Gardens.

When he was a child, Fierro used to visit Saint Laurent with his mother, who was an interior designer. Reminiscing about Saint Laurent, Fierro said, “He was very shy, but he used to joke a lot.”

Clothes designed by Saint Laurent in the late 1960s to the early 1980s clearly reflect traditional Moroccan culture as seen in the Medina. For example, in a dress that was made with white cloth and embroidered with colorful thread for Paris Fashion Week in 1982, one can see the influence of ethnic costumes of the indigenous Berber people of northern Africa.

To learn more about Berber culture, Saint Laurent used to visit rural villages. His deep curiosity about different cultures broke fresh ground in the field of fashion design.

These days, as many as 700,000 tourists visit the Majorelle Gardens every year. Many of them go to the Berber Museum in the garden, where about 2,000 items including ethnic costumes and ornaments that were collected by Saint Laurent are on display.

One can see that aspects of traditional Moroccan culture have spread through their use as an essence in Saint Laurent’s creations.

Local young people impressed

Moroccan fashion designer Fadila El Gadi, who works mainly in Paris and Marrakech, found a direction for her career after seeing Saint Laurent’s creations. When she was still relatively unknown as a designer, she visited Saint Laurent several times and learned the beauty of traditional Moroccan ethnic costumes and ornaments.

From this experience, she adapted designs and techniques unique to her country into her own creations. “I owe him for always giving me a supportive push,” she said. Saint Laurent’s sense of beauty still influences the local fashion scene.

Yves Saint Laurent was born in Oran in western Algeria, which was then under French colonial rule. He moved to Paris at the age of 18 and started working in the field of fashion design as an assistant of Christian Dior. He introduced fresh new styles of female clothing, including safari jackets and jumpsuits, which broke many of the stereotypes of female clothing at the time. He gained a reputation for such work.

In 2002, he retired. After his death in Paris, some of his ashes were scattered at his mansion in Marrakech.

Kubo is a correspondent in Cairo.

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‘Polka Dot Posse’ by Hassan Hajjaj. Financial Times

* “The new Marrakech Museum for Photography and Visual Arts (MMPVA) is up and running… already set out a clear intention not to be another flat-pack globalized culture house, but something more surprising.” *

Financial Times, by Francis Hodgson (Marrakech, Morocco, November 15, 2013) — There is something interesting happening in Marrakech. The new Marrakech Museum for Photography and Visual Arts (MMPVA) is up and running. Some might say it is running before it can walk, since it has as yet no permanent building, no properly constituted staff, and only hints as to where its collection will come from.

Logistical considerations of this kind, which often delay the launch of museums for years, have been pushed aside. More importantly, this museum has already set out a clear intention not to be another flat-pack globalized culture house, but something more surprising.

It is temporarily housed in the historic El Badi Palace, in the centre of Marrakech, while its permanent home is built. British architect David Chipperfield has prepared plans for an enormous and spectacular building to be built on the outskirts of Marrakech. A program of exhibitions, already under way, has been anything but routine.

The first show is given over to 10 contemporary Moroccan photographers. The quality is mixed, admittedly, but it was brave to open a museum with local, relevant, fresh work in a vernacular immediately graspable by the local population.

Hassan Hajjaj is a relatively known artist with a strong record, notably in London where he has lived for some years.

He showed small clear color portraits of sitters dressed in studiedly ironic clothing (a djellaba in the characteristic monogram of the Louis Vuitton company, for example) on which the background has been painted out in bright north African colors or patterns.

These are framed first in woven mats made of strips cut from plastic bags and, outside those, in slats cut from recycled tires with their tread still legible as the carved pattern on the frame. These vaguely hip-hop artworks are full of sampled imagery and borrowed allusion, complex reflections on globalization and consumerism and how those things arrive in a place such as Morocco.

Yto Barrada’s ‘Blue Dragonfly’ Financial Times

Yto Barrada, shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse prize in 2006, showed a simple picture of a young girl sitting on a step looking at a dragonfly. Barrada, who has always been able to compose and frame with a gloriously controlled classical beauty, simply gave us here a characteristic Moroccan contrast between mainly dun colors and the sudden sharp blazing iridescent burst of the bug.

A series of stitched photographs by Carolle Benitah was interesting, too, although a notch lower in quality. This was subtle and good photography, well chosen and at a high level.

Then the museum upped the ante. Five photographers from the Magnum agency were invited to spend a little time in Marrakech and create work based on the city. They found it harder than expected because the Magnum habit has been to photograph for books or magazines first and for the pictures only to leech on to museum walls after a time. Some, among them Jim Goldberg, simply didn’t come up with anything much. Goldberg’s skill comes in opulent fugues of sequencing and display, and he ran out of time to do that.

The two most interesting responses were from Susan Meiselas and Mikhael Subotzky. These contrasting photographers – Meiselas, the older, with the unimpeachable credentials and the eye of a hawk, and Subotzky, the younger, fashionable but with the jury still out on whether he will turn out to be the real deal – had exactly the same core reaction. They found it impossible to photograph the people of Marrakech in the straightforwardly piratical manner that photographers normally regard as OK.

This is partly because Marrakech in particular, more than many other places, has a huge tourist population that photographs incontinently. In Marrakech, people are used to holding out their hands for money to be photographed, and are used to photographs having absolutely no meaning in the wider scheme of things.

Meiselas’ solution was to come up with a pop-up studio, in a public space in the market, in which she asked women to volunteer to be pictured. If they then decided they didn’t want to be part of the show, it cost them a small but appreciable sum to remove their pictures from the series. Meiselas quietly put the Dh20 notes of those who opted out on the walls where the picture would have been.

Mikhael Subotzky’s ‘Marrakech’ Financial Times

This simple strategy goes deep. There were stories of women weeping when they saw the respect with which the photographer had treated them and, at the other extreme, of women who hadn’t sat later putting pressure on those who had to withdraw for reasons of decency.

Some of the sitters came to the opening night of the show, to be confronted for the first time not only by the strange paraphernalia of a museum but by the first representation of themselves done with honor and skill. You couldn’t have found a better way to raise awareness of issues around the roles and treatment of women in Morocco, to challenge preconceptions and to provoke debate.

Subotzky went another way. He equipped himself with a motorbike and a piece of video kit normally used by estate agents to make 360-degree views of the houses on their books. With these he was able to chug through the city. The film is rough but very powerful: the ground tilts and slides, seemingly toppling out of the frame.

Sometimes his camera sidles along the side of tourist buses, filming them filming the city. Then, suddenly, he’s on the bus, a direct affront. Down back alleys, through the main tourist spots, this little film is a shifting, unsettling rollercoaster between voyeurism and the veil. To see such a thing with the eyes of a Marrakech resident must be a very thought-provoking experience.

Not bad for a museum that is only six weeks old. Its driving force, managing director (and curator pro tem) is David Knaus, founder of the Palm Springs Art Museum Architecture and Design Pavilion.

Part of the finance comes from Karen Ruimy, a Moroccan who gave up a successful career in the financial sector in favor of a number of cultural activities. And as Knaus explains, “we have a very reliable partner in the Minister of Culture, Mohammed Sbihi, who has provided the site at El Badi Palace in a landmark private-public partnership.”

[Continue Reading…]

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Nizar Baraka, head of the Economic, Social and Environmental Council (CESE), leads presentation in Rabat recommending new development model for southern provinces, following an extensive series of meetings and consultations with more than 1,500 stakeholders in the region. Aujourd’hui

* The development model applied so far in the southern provinces has reached its limits. In search of a new dynamic, Nizar Baraka unveils an ambitious new model. *

(Article in French)

Aujourd’hui Le Maroc (November 11, 2013) — The head of the Economic, Social and Environmental Council (CESE) presented a “development model for the southern provinces” with ambitions that fascinate and figures enough to make your head spin. However, on Friday in Rabat before an audience of journalists and members of the committee drafting the document, Nizar Baraka appealed to realism and strove to demonstrate a faithful president’s commitment to focusing on the concrete.

His answer to comments about the size of the financial and human resources to achieve “sustainable development and sustainable social progress” in the Saharan provinces in times of scarcity comes down to this: the sacrifices Morocco has already made for its southern provinces are huge.

But, he said, let there be no mistake, this is not so much a matter of quantity and amount of resources, because “the development model applied so far in the region has reached its limits.” He said we need “a new dynamic based on the requirements of sustainability, participatory democracy and social cohesion, oriented towards the creation of wealth and jobs.” […]

Based on its four key principles, Baraka said: “This development model, which was made by and for local people, also aims to make our southern provinces a geostrategic center contributing to peace, stability and shared prosperity for the whole Euro-African region.”

In its medium-term phase-the next 10 years, the model projects a doubling of the GDP of these regions and to create 120,000 jobs. Objectives will be accompanied by social measures to expand the ranks of the middle class, including the eradication of one of the flaws that have burdened the development work in these territories: rent-seeking and the inequitable distribution of resources and income.

Airport in Dakhla, Morocco. New model for development presented by Morocco’s Economic, Social and Environmental Council (CESE) calls for turning the southern provinces into a regional hub of progress and prosperity between the Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa. Medias 24

The EESC model calls for a “more equitable social system based on social safety nets targeting the most vulnerable populations, based on criteria known to all.” But, said Baraka, the new development model focuses not only on the search for sustainable and inclusive development that primarily benefits local people.  It is also noteworthy for the goal of making the region a center for the transmission of wealth and progress at the continent level. The aim, he said, is to turn the southern provinces into a hub between the Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa through a series of projects that make it the center of a communications and telecommunications network.

Recommended ways to achieve this include: a maritime cluster, adequate connectivity plan based on the development of electric highways, the construction of the bypass and the Atlantic desert road, the strengthening of port, maritime and air transport network and development establishment of a platform for digital planning and logistics platforms and commerce. Efforts that will be reinforced include the creation “of centers opened for Maghreb and sub-Saharan regional cooperation in education, skills training, higher education, health and applied scientific research excellence.”

All this has a cost, said the EESC president, who advanced a today figure of 140 billion dirhams [over 10 years]. He said that while the state is expected to be the main source of funds, improving the attractiveness of infrastructure investments and improving the business climate should generate private capital. In the immediate future, a key element of the program is attractive tax incentives. […]

As a comprehensive development program, Baraka said the new model had to embrace all aspects of social life, emphasizing in particular a restoration of confidence between citizens and state officials by promoting public participation and giving primacy to the law, breaking with the cash economy and freeing private initiative, and also by replacing the current social policies with an integrated human development strategy. He also said that the strength of the program lies in the fact that it establishes a system of conditional cash transfers targeted at vulnerable populations, establishes a model of management and distribution of natural resources conscious of sustainability and equity, with short-term incentives that seek to open up the southern provinces.

The EESC President also cited the project’s recognition of culture as a right, a lever for development, and a key to the success of the advanced regionalization. To be effective, he said, carrying out the new development model should be based on decision-making and project implementation at the local level. Advanced regionalization is suitable for this institutional framework, he concluded, with the support of Mohamed Horani, EESC member and former president of the CGEM, who said it is the royal will that marks the implementation of the regionalization for the southern provinces.

 [Continue reading in French…]

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Portraits by Marrakech-born pop artist Hassan Hajjaj, popularly known as Morocco’s Andy Warhol. Photograph: Hassan Hajjaj

* “If the future is all about harnessing the brilliance of the past, the medina’s star has never shone so brightly”…A new wave of artists is tapping into Marrakech’s rich artisanal heritage, bringing a contemporary vibe to the city’s most historic neighborhood. Tara Stevens meets some of its leading lights *

The Guardian, by Tara Stevens (Marrakech, Morocco, November 15, 2013) — It’s just another sunny Saturday morning in the cool, green oasis that is Le Jardin (lejardin.ma), a lively riad cafe in the heart of the Marrakech medina and the social hub of the emerging arts scene in the old city.

What strikes me about the gathering at my table is the cosmopolitan nature of it all. Kamal Laftimi, who owns the cafe, is there with a New York-based restaurant designer, Sebastian de Gzell, discussing a project they will open together in the spring. His wife, Laila Hida, is the creator of a philanthropic new studio space, Riad 18. Artsi Ifrach turns vintage Moroccan textiles into haute couture, while Algerian designer Nyora Nemiche, who sells her flamboyant abaya robes from a pop-up shop above the cafe, counts Erykah Badu and rapper Mos Def among her fans. Together, they form part of a creative revolution that is bubbling away behind the city’s ancient walls.

All this started simmering two decades ago, when Marrakech-born pop artist Hassan Hajjaj burst onto the scene. Popularly known as Morocco‘s Andy Warhol – for his eye-opening photographic interpretations of life in the medina, recycled sardine can lanterns and Coke-crate benches – Hajjaj acquired international renown, but only recently has he been celebrated at home.

“When I started out in 1993 it was a very lonely place to be, because people didn’t understand what I was doing,” he tells me from his technicolor home-cum-gallery, Riad Yima (riadyima.blogspot.com), which he opened in 2006. “Morocco only valued fine, traditional art. It was not until Vanessa Branson [Richard Branson's sister] started the biennale that Marrakech became a proper city, artistically.”

Branson set up the Marrakech Biennale (marrakechbiennale.org) in 2004, to encourage dialogue and diversity among international and local arts communities, showcase venues in both the walled old city (such as her own recently refurbed riad, El Fenn) and the new town, the Ville Nouvelle, and focus on new media and contemporary art.

The city now has 25 galleries, and they are fast embracing the artisanship of the medina. Stephen di Renza, the newly appointed creative director of Yves Saint Laurent’s former home and gardens, the Jardin Majorelle (jardinmajorelle.com) in the new town, is among those looking to ancestral Moroccan savoir-faire as he sets about reimagining a historic collection. “The know-how is deeply refined here,” he says. “I’m using 16th-century Islamic arts motifs to embroider leather in a way that feels very modern.”

Jardin Majorelle, former home of Yves Saint Laurent. Photograph: Frank Van Den Bergh/Getty Images

Built like a chunk of honeycomb, the medina is comprised of several neighborhoods spinning out from its heart – the Djemaa el-Fna square – and woven together by whip-thin lanes and knotty souks. Navigating it seems hopelessly complicated – the city’s biggest challenge and its greatest thrill. Thus, after coffee, I’m trotting after Artsi Ifrach, better known as Art/C (art-c-fashion.com), a fashion designer whose parents are from Mellah, the Jewish quarter south of the Djemaa el-Fna. As he twirls through its heavily scented spice souks, he stops every few minutes to riffle through what look like piles of junk on threadbare blankets.

“Look,” he cries, triumphantly brandishing a powder-pink porcelain ashtray, an art deco cigarette case, and a battered silver teapot. They are to be props for the old family house he was recently given by his father, and which he opened last week as a showroom for his fashion and art collections (viewing by appointment). Ifrach’s garments are created out of antique textiles and curios, each with a history – where he found it, who made it, who wore it. “I don’t do the catwalk,” he purrs, velvety eyes flashing. “I can’t tell the story of the work in 15 minutes, so I present it in a gallery format.”

His father’s house is exactly that: several oblong rooms glowing with the pastel-colored light of vintage stained glass that bounces off the artifacts of family life in the 1960s. Ifrach has kept it just as he found it, using the house as a frame for mannequins dressed in clothes from previous collections, such as his French revolution-inspired bathing suit and a rich red dress with an antelope on the front, cut from an antique woven blanket he found hanging on the wall.

“The longer I’m here the more I appreciate the culture and history of the medina,” he explains. “As artists and designers, we are learning how to express that in new ways, which for me is about getting back to the innocence of creation.”

Likewise, third-generation carpet dealers the Soufiane brothers (13 Souk des Tapis, Rahba Kedima) are located deep within a particularly tangled section of the souks in the central medina. (Call and they’ll come and pick you up, because it’s hard to find on your own.)

They call their tiny hole-in-the-wall stall “Moroccan Bling”, as it drips with traditional white, sequined wedding blankets. But, they confess, it’s just an appetizer for their larger showroom, which sells carpets with a contemporary edge: geometric shapes, bold colour combinations and new materials woven by the same skilled artisans. And these are presented in an elegant, newly tiled, slate-grey courtyard house that was built by the Saadian dynasty in the 17th century.

Jardin Majorelle, former home of Yves Saint Laurent. Photograph: Frank Van Den Bergh/Getty Images

The house provides a private stage, on which potential customers can view a stock of 6,000 kilims and carpets, and (in a city of precise copycats) ensures their designs remain one of a kind. It’s a far cry from the leather slippers, woven rugs and beaten brass lanterns that are the souks’ well-worn cliche, and it reflects a new era – as people look with fresh eyes at what the medina can offer.

Curiously, given Moroccans’ inherent distrust of the camera, the most popular medium among the country’s young artists today is photography. They work hard to save for the kit, yet there’s no formal photography school, so they glean what they can from the internet. It’s down to outside influences to help inspire, educate and put things in context, which is generating a force all of its own.

Patrick Manac’h of the Maison de la Photographie (maisondelaphotographie.ma) opened his three-storey house near one of the medina’s few landmarks, the Ben Youssef madrasa, as a public archive of life in Morocco, featuring photos that date from the 19th century.

“These houses can help tell a bigger story and be used to interpret Moroccan life and culture for everyone,” he says, as we stroll around his latest show, Astonishing Travellers.

Manac’h now receives up to 200 visitors a day, and this week opens his douiria, an 18th-century apartment annexed to a grand house. It is lavishly decorated with original pigment painted plaster and unexpectedly sleek Berber motifs, which, after painstaking restoration, will be complemented by a small, carefully edited collection of art and design from the era.

“Marrakech is full of hidden treasures, if you know where to look,” he adds, urging me not to miss the new exhibits at the Palais el-Badi. The “incomparable” palace (as its name translates into English) has long been one of the medina’s key attractions. An imposing ruin inhabited by beak-clattering storks, it always provided a welcome stillness but, as of September this year, it has become the temporary home of the new Museum for Photography and Visual Arts (mmpva.org). The British architect David Chipperfield has been commissioned to complete the project, which will open near the Menara Gardens in 2016. Until then, a section of the old palace has been restored as a gallery space and the dynamic Kamal Laftimi has been put in charge of creating the site’s cafe-bookstore, to encourage people to spend time here by offering a more relaxed cultural environment.

Riad Yima, Hassan Hajjaj’s home-cum-gallery

“We’re facing two extremes,” says the museum’s cultural manager, Mostafa Aghrib. “People living here want modernity, but tourists want tradition. Our aim is to push Moroccans to fulfil their destiny as artists while reconnecting with their roots. It’s an incredibly hopeful time to live here.”

The first exhibition, A Day in the Life of the Medina, by Magnum photographers, will show at the Palais until February 2014. Locals are capitalizing on the buzz created by such a blockbuster show. A group of young artists known as The Mint Collective (mintcollectivemb5.com) is launching a simultaneous exhibition at Riad 18, a local house made over in Tadelakt and concrete by photographer Laila Hida. It’s a cool, contemporary space operating as a blank canvas for artists and photographers, poets and writers, dancers and musicians to work, exhibit and perform; the show will update every two weeks between now and February.

Hida says she has always felt that something was missing in terms of places to meet and exchange ideas on culture and the arts in an accessible way. “There is very little formal arts education here,” she says, “so it’s important that it’s not intimidating and is accessible to all.”

In the casbah, effectively a walled city within the walled city, and the medina’s most up-and-coming neighborhood, Mike Richardson of Ripon, North Yorkshire – the man who set up the phenomenally successful Cafe Clock in Fez – is soon to open Café Clock II (cafeclock.com) in an old school. Marrakech was the first place Richardson visited in Morocco when scouting for a new project (he’d previously been maître’ d at The Wolseley restaurant in London), but with the city then beyond his means, he settled in Fez. Cafe Clock has been ground-breaking in its ability to integrate a foreign and Moroccan clientele; Richardson’s cafe in Marrakech aims to do the same, and will feature cooking classes, Arabic lessons and calligraphy. However, it’s the storytelling initiative that gets Richardson excited.

“When I first came here I remember being mesmerized by the storytellers in the Djemma el-Fna, but I felt like an outsider because I couldn’t understand,” he tells me over a drink on his rooftop. “It’s a dying art form, but we’ve been speaking to the elders and they’ve agreed to perform here with translators so that we can create video archives, and also – inshallah – encourage a new generation of storytellers.”

If the future is all about harnessing the brilliance of the past, the medina’s star has never shone so brightly.

[Continue Reading…]

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Cheb Khaled speaks to Al Arabiya’s Morning Show, aired November 14th, 2013. Al Arabiya

* “After being awarded Moroccan citizenship back in August, Algerian superstar Cheb Khaled has found himself the de facto spokesperson for greater Maghrebi cooperation… Khaled may have started a trend: there are reports that Algerian tennis star Lamine Ouahab has followed Khaled’s footsteps in taking up Moroccan citizenship — and that he’ll now be representing the kingdom in international competitions.” *

Blouin News, by Lora Moftah (November 15, 2013) — As relations between Algeria and Morocco continue to deteriorate over the hot-button Western Sahara issue, there is still one prominent North African advocating unity in the face of increasing antagonism between the neighbors: Algerian superstar Cheb Khaled — who is now also a Moroccan citizen.

The internationally-acclaimed singer, who had a large part in popularizing the Algerian folk genre raï, has long been the pride of his native country and now he’s playing an unexpected supporting role in the most recent round of drama unfolding between Algeria and Morocco.

After being awarded Moroccan citizenship back in August, Khaled has found himself the de facto spokesperson for greater Maghrebi cooperation — as the political tide has shifted in the exact opposite direction. Speaking to Al Arabiya on Thursday, Khaled voiced his hope that “art” and “love” could repair strained ties. “Look at Europeans — they are united, how come we Arabs in North Africa don’t make a greater united Maghreb?” he asked.

He’s not the first to ask this. The long-stalled Arab Maghreb Union (AME) between Algeria, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, and Mauritania was envisioned in the late 1980′s as the solution to this very problem. But because of the intractable political divisions between Algeria and Morocco, the regional bloc has been largely inactive. And the flare-up in tensions between the North African heavyweights provides a less than ideal context for its resurrection. Political provocations around Western Sahara along with the diplomatic drama that unfolded from an incident in which a young Moroccan tore down an Algerian flag during a protest have intensified the decades-old rivalry between Algiers and Rabat.

As popular as Khaled may be in his home country, his acceptance of Moroccan citizenship still rankled many Algerians.

[Continue Reading…]

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The Sixth MEDays International Forum issued a “Tangier Announcement,” calling for the forming of an African coalition for immigration and development, to further boost cooperation among African countries. MEDays

Kuwait News Agency/KUNA (Tangier, Morocco, November 17, 2013) — The Sixth MEDays International Forum called for forming an African coalition for immigration and development, to further boost cooperation among African countries.

As the forum concluded its activities Saturday night, it expressed hopes that such coalition would guarantee the respect of the basic rights of immigrants belonging to the forum’s member countries, in addition to facilitating legal immigration.

The “Tangier Announcement” issued by the forum considered that the resolution of the coast security crisis will only be reached by adapting an integrated regional strategy between the African partners, one that Moroccans and Europeans would contribute in.

The four-day forum themed “Ways to develop in an unstable world,” held under the auspices of Moroccan King Mohammed VI, called for reaching a mechanism for consulting, exchange of information, proactive vigilance in order to fight illegal trading in drugs, weapons, and human trafficking.

The announcement renewed it support for Arab peace initiative being the only resolution for the Israeli-Palestinian cause, that comes in accordance with the international legitimacy on the base of two states resolution within 1967 boarders, and the establishment of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, as well as the immediate cease of building of settlements.

The Arab Spring countries are facing a political transitional phase, the Tangier Announcment stressed, calling upon Tunisians to hold collective responsibility and remain courageous enough to allow the county which was the cradle of Arab revolutions, to achieve main aspirations of the people.

It also called for international campaigning and mass mobilization for the sake of Libya’s success of the political transition.

MEDays called for opening land borders between Morocco and Algeria for the sake of the people of both countries, in addition to renewing the call for the international community, especially the European Union (EU) and the United States to encourage initiatives targeting further integration between the five Arab “Maghreb” countries by holding a conference between the leaders of those countries.

The forum called for reforming the resolutions of United National Security Council (UNASC) in order to reach a better representativeness for developing countries.

Chairwoman of the Arab Businesswoman Council, Sheikha Hussa Saad Al-Abdullah Al-Sabah, participated for the first time in the Sixth MEDays International Forum, along with 2,500 other Arab and foreign figures from the fields of politics, media, economy, intellectuality, from all over the world.

The Moroccan Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation Salaheddine Mezouar, and Chairman of Amadeus Institute Brahim Fasi Fihri, along with Sheikha Hussa Al-Sabah attended the concluding session of the forum.

The Amadeus Institute is a think tank and policy organization based in Morocco and founded by Brahim Fassi Fihri in 2008. The organization produces research and analysis on strategic issues concerning Morocco, North Africa and Middle East, the Mediterranean region, Africa and the South.

MEDays forum tackled various political, economic, intellectual, and environmental issues.
The forum offered the Grand Prix of MEDays 2013 to Mali country, represented by President Dioncounda TRAORE who led the country during the transitional phase, in recognition to Mali’s democratic transmission of authority and holding presidential elections who which the country out of the conflict it suffered during the last two years.

MEDays Prize for Political Initiative was offered to the Egyptian former MP and political activist Mona Makram Obeid, in recognition n to her efforts in defending democracy, besides protecting the rights of women and Coptic minority.

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The Moroccan American Trade & Investment Center (MATIC) sat down with Jean-Marie Fahmy of FGT and Ryan Anderson at MANAS to discuss their work, and what they view as the challenges and opportunities of doing business in Morocco. MATIC

* The Moroccan American Trade & Investment Center (MATIC) interviews Jean-Marie Fahmy of FGT and Ryan Anderson at MANAS on their joint project, MDG Management, and what they view as the challenges and opportunities of doing business in Morocco. *

November 18, 2013

MATIC – Morocco has become a popular destination for international corporations looking to take advantage of the country’s friendly, stable business climate and easy access to both European and African markets.  In fact in 2012, the UN ranked Morocco the top receiver of FDI in the region. This rapid growth has created an opening for consulting and advisory firms to provide management training and other services to facilitate business in Morocco’s emerging market.

One of these advisory firms is MDG Management, a joint project between FGT Incorporated and the MANAS Development Group that’s nearly thirty years in the making.  The Moroccan American Trade & Investment Center (MATIC) sat down with Jean-Marie Fahmy of FGT and Ryan Anderson at MANAS to discuss their work, and what they view as the challenges and opportunities of doing business in Morocco.

****************

MATIC: How and why did MDG Management and MANAS Management Group come together to work in Morocco?

Ryan Anderson:  Over the last eight years, we’ve focused on two fundamental things:  delivering management consulting services to local businesses in challenging emerging markets, and helping North American companies establish their operations in high-opportunity, high-growth emerging markets.

About two years ago we began the market research process to identify an opportunity to set up a high-quality provider of professional development services. And through a pretty extensive market research process that began with 50 countries, in Central Asia, North Africa, and the Middle East, we ended up selecting Morocco as the place to launch the initiative.

MATIC: What made Morocco the right choice?

Anderson: What struck us about Morocco that is really different is that there is consistent, strong, multi-sector growth and a government that is committed to setting up sound macroeconomic and legal conditions and has a vision to drive that kind of multi-sector growth.  That’s not something we saw in other places we evaluated, where the market is driven in one sector, like hydrocarbons. I’ve never seen a place that is simultaneously a VPO center and a manufacturing and distribution center, with access to those high-growth West African emerging markets and the developed economies of Europe. To see the number of multinationals that are setting up their regional headquarters not in London, but in Casablanca, for us we just thought, ‘Wow, here is an opportunity for us to help those companies in setting up and scaling up their frontline managers, but also to help Morocco continue on that sustained pattern of economic growth.’

MATIC: What needs are you trying to meet for these multinationals and growing Moroccan firms?

Anderson: When we visited Morocco we were fortunate to sit down with many senior executives and business leaders to really understand three things—first, their read on what they were trying to accomplish in Morocco and the region; second, what they were trying to accomplish in their organization; and third, what the skills were, the human management skills, behaviors, and so on they needed in order to accomplish those goals.

What we consistently heard from business leaders was that they thought Morocco represented a tremendous commercial opportunity, but that it was really difficult for them to find frontline and middle managers. These comments kept coming up over and over and over again.

So the product suite that we’ve entered the market with in partnership with Jean-Marie is a direct reflection of what we hear from business unit leaders. We’re interested in training frontline managers and middle managers to go produce quantifiable results.

MATIC: How do you do that?

Fahmy:  In our literature, there are eight factors [that determine the success of a project]: time, budget, quality, justification, satisfaction of the customers, satisfaction of the management, satisfaction of the team, and measuring the previous seven.

What we find is very often people will put an accent on one of them, like the budget or time. But you have to deliver the eight to be successful, not one or two of the eight. You have to keep in mind that they are interrelated; if you cannot deliver one, then all the others won’t work. Our approach is to deliver the whole thing. It’s really management by results, rather than management by profit.

MATIC: What makes your training approach unique?

Fahmy: If I was to say one thing, it’s that we’re bringing back common sense to management. It’s very refreshing, very simple, very applicable and very much common sense. The difference between this training and other training in the area of management is the fact that it is extremely practical. You can apply what you learn, immediately, the moment you walk out of there, in your day to day job, and results should be apparent very quickly.

Anderson: Our typical customer is a large organization or corporation and we build a personnel or professional development suite around their needs. Typically, in other words, we don’t offer our services to the individual customer or to one or two professionals. If I was to say one thing, it’s that we’re bringing back common sense to management. It’s very refreshing, very simple, very applicable and very much common sense. The difference between this training and other training in the area of management is the fact that it is extremely practical. You can apply what you learn, immediately, the moment you walk out of there, in your day to day job, and results should be apparent very quickly.

MATIC: What was your reaction to the King’s speech about revamping the education system to include more vocational training?

Anderson: We were very encouraged by and appreciated the King’s comments and insights—we thought they were especially relevant in the way that his comments tied the quality of education and training to both personal welfare of the people and long-term economic growth. And, like I said, we want to be a part of the solution he’s talking about by providing real, hands-on practical training that is consistent with what the market requires so that it allows people to be more marketable and successful, and drive and facilitate the success of companies

Jean-Marie Fahmy is the President and Founder of FGT Incorporated, which he formed in 1987.

Ryan Anderson is the Director of Business Development for the MANAS Development Group.  He was previously Director of Global Product Deployment at Assurant Solutions.

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Actress Sharon Stone attends the ‘Behind The Candelabra’ premiere during The 66th Annual Cannes Film Festival at Theatre Lumiere on May 21, 2013 in Cannes, France. Image: Vittorio Zunino Celotto/Getty Images

Albawaba (November 19, 2013) — Hollywood actress Sharon Stone will be polishing up a new trophy in her name soon. The starlet will be honored at the Marrakech International Film Festival in Morocco.

The 55-year-old “Basic Instinct” star will be paid tribute for her long successful career in the film industry.

Festival producers will be dishing out another award to honor actress Juliette Binoche, reported femalefirst.co.uk.

Recently, Stone received the Stanley Kramer Social Artist Award for her philanthropy efforts in September at the Catalina Film Festival in California.

Last month, she was honored with the Nobel Peace Summit Award from the Dalai Lama in Poland, for her help in the fight against HIV and Aids. The Marrakech International Film Festival runs from November 29-December 7.

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Senegalese & Malian soldiers train with US special forces in Mali. Photo credit: US Army Africa

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 Richard Miniter, Contributor

Richard Miniter, Forbes
November 19, 2013

Is our first African-American president ignoring Africa and thereby putting America at risk?

Today is the first-ever visit by Morocco’s king to the White House during the Obama years.  The press, which is consumed with ObamaCare’s roughly 100,000 web site sign ups and some 5 million projected insurance policy cancellations, should be paying closer attention to this historic visit by the Moroccan monarch.

Africa is increasingly important to America’s security—yet it has received scant presidential attention since President Obama’s headline-making Cairo speech. North Africa is now home to some 15 al Qaeda affiliates, according to U.S. government reports. Several al Qaeda factions attacked the U.S. diplomatic outpost in Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012 and murdered the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans, according to congressional investigators.

Islamic militants have carried out more than 1,000 attacks in Algeria, Libya, Tunisia and Morocco since 2010. Ansar Dine, another al Qaeda offshoot, conquered some 300,000 miles of northern Mali—prompting a French military intervention (with minimal American assistance).

The Polisario Front, an Algeria-based separatist group, has been assisting al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) in moving guns and men across the Sahara into Algeria and Libya. Ansar al-Sharia, an al Qaeda faction, has gained control of some 400 mosques in Tunisia, according to the National Interest magazine, and allied itself with one of major political parties there. Al Qaeda-linked militants recently attacked a shopping mall in Kenya while Somali groups have attacked American and allied shipping off of its coasts. Everywhere you look, Africa is becoming the new battleground in the War on Terror.

Yet the Obama Administration, above the career bureaucrat level, has paid little attention. Instead Africa is seen as a scene of Biblical disasters: droughts, floods, pestilence, disease and war.  The Administration sees Africa as a place to send aid money. Instead it is a new Afghanistan, where the U.S. has a strategic interest in fighting al Qaeda and boosting free trade ties. Today’s visit by King Mohammed VI, a key ally in the War on Terror and a bold reformer, offers a rare chance to reset America’s foreign policy.

The king is precisely the kind of African leader that the president should be should be lauding and working alongside. Morocco is America’s oldest ally in Africa. The 1786 Treaty of Peace and Friendship between these two nations was signed by Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, America’s longest unbroken treaty relationship.

The king, who directly supervises the kingdom’s military and intelligence agencies, has led efforts to combat al Qaeda across the region. Morocco foiled plots to kill Americans in Morocco and elsewhere and its intelligence officers have provided vital aid in interrogating North African detainees at Guantanamo. Its moles inside various al Qaeda factions have provided valuable information that, according to American intelligence sources, has literally saved lives.

The king has personally paid for the training of imams in Morocco and Mali, to promote non-violence and tolerance. In one innovative program, the king has underwritten efforts to train some 200 women religious leaders to coax believers away from radical Islam. His unique standing as “commander of the faithful” of his nation, a religious title, gives him the ability to direct religious instruction and preaching. This accomplishes far more than America’s Arabic-language broadcasts ever could.

And the king’s democratic reforms have been a rare bright spot on the continent. Under his leadership, Moroccan voters approved a new constitution in 2011 that specifically protects the rights of Jews, Christians and other religious minorities and included strong new protections for the rights of women. More importantly, Morocco became Africa’s first constitutional monarchy, ceding power to an elected parliament on all domestic affairs. Multi-party elections have become commonplace in the past decade at the local, regional and national levels. And a free press freely covers the political melee.

Meanwhile, Morocco has signed a number of free-trade agreements with America, the European Union and a clutch of sub-Saharan African states. Morocco has reformed, deregulated and privatized its banking, pharmaceutical and telecommunications industries—creating strong economic growth.

In short, Mohammed VI seems to be among the very few Africa leaders adopting the vision that President Obama laid out in his Cairo speech.

It is time that America hit the “reset button” with Africa. When President Obama and King Mohammed VI sit down, they can begin work on countering al Qaeda through both classic counterterrorism and the king’s unique civil society efforts promoting religious instruction among imams, scholars and women leaders as well as encouraging free trade and economic growth across the continent.

If the president and the king can become partners, both African and American lives could be saved. And it would give Obama an African legacy he currently lacks.

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On March 27, 1963, Morocco’s King Hassan II was welcomed  to Washington, DC by President John F. Kennedy.  On November 22, 2013, the North African leader’s son, Morocco’s reigning King Mohammed VI, meets with President Barack Obama at the White House to carry on the vision that has sustained the Morocco-US strategic partnership since 1787. Click photo for video from JFK Library.

**50 Years Ago – President Kennedy welcomed Morocco’s King Hassan II on visit to  the US, on March 27-30, 1963 – Click here to see video of visit**

John F. Kennedy Library and Museum (Boston, Massachusetts, November 19, 2013) — On March 27, 1963, President John F. Kennedy warmly welcomed Moroccan King Hassan II on a three-day state visit to the United States.  On November 22, 2013, the North African leader’s son − Morocco’s reigning King Mohammed VI − is visiting the White House at the invitation of President Barack Obama, for meetings to deepen a long friendship and strategic partnership between the two countries that dates back more than two centuries.

The meeting marks a poignant date for both leaders, the fiftieth anniversary of the tragic death of President John F. Kennedy.

Fifty years and eight months earlier, at Union Station in Washington, DC, President Kennedy and King Hassan spoke with eloquence and grace about the common vision and shared values that have sustained the two countries’ partnership for so long. President Kennedy recalled George Washington’s letter to Sultan Mohammed III in 1789,  which offered thanks for Morocco’s early help to the new nation and praise for the Morocco-US “Treaty of Friendship and Peace,” now the longest-standing treaty of its kind in US history.

The visit and two leaders remarks were recorded on six-minute and 18-minute film reels that are archived at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Boston, Massachusetts.

President Kennedy said:

“Your Majesty, it is a high honor to welcome you to the United States.  I am confident that your visit here on this occasion, will be as fruitful and as beneficial to both of our countries, as the visit of your illustrious father, with my predecessor President Eisenhower, several years ago.

“Though a wide ocean separates our two countries, they have been bound together throughout our history.  Your country was the first to recognize the United States in the most difficult days of our revolution. Our first president, President Washington, [wrote of] our Constitution to your country in 1789.

“From that day to the present, the ties have been intimate, in war and in peace.  We are very proud to welcome you here, your Majesty.  Your distinguished record as the leader of your country, which occupies a position of strategic importance in the world, which occupies a position of increasing significance along the Mediterranean, and along the Atlantic, for all these reason, we are particularly glad to welcome you here at the present time.

“You will find, your Majesty, that you come to a country that knows Morocco.  A good many of our sons have fought there, lived there in war and in peace, and we are proud to welcome you here on this occasion.  And we know your visit will be beneficial to both of our countries and to both of our peoples.”

King Hassan II said:

“Mr. President, friends, at this moment as I meet your Excellency and renew my acquaintance with the people of the United States of America, I am deeply moved by a feeling of joy and of happiness.  I wish to thank you Mr. President, for taking the lead in making possible this occasion, thus affording me the opportunity to meet your Excellency personally, and to visit again this great country which has realized splendid achievements in progress and civilization.

“Speaking for myself, and on behalf of my people and my government, I deem it a great and real pleasure to meet the people of the United States, their President, and their government, as well as to express to them the affection and the admiration we cherish for them. It is with pleasure, also, that I express our strong desire to consolidate the friendship which has characterized our traditional relations that date back to the independence of the United States.

“My people, bent as they are, on establishing and furthering close relations with all the nations of the world, whether small or big, are pleased that I have come to visit this great country of yours, and will follow with deep concern the progress of my visit here. My  people are hopeful, also, that this visit will prove to be a means for further understanding and closer relations between them and the people of the United States.  And that it may usher in a new era of stronger ties, in the field of true and honest and unselfish cooperation in their mutual interests, as well as in the interest of the cause of freedom, peace, and human dignity throughout the world.”

On his first stop of the official trip, King Hassan II traveled to Philadelphia, where he visited Independence Hall and met with the Mayor at the Liberty Bell.

In Washington, the Moroccan leader was welcomed by President Kennedy and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy to a state dinner at the White House. He also met with Members of Congress and the diplomatic corps, and paid his respects to fallen veterans at Arlington National Cemetery.

King Hassan wrapped up his US trip in New York City, where he met the Mayor, spoke with leaders at the United Nations, and dedicated a mosaic hand made in Fez that became a permanent exhibit at the UN headquarters building.

For more information about the film, go to: John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

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