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“Taza before Gaza. “ The formula slams like a slogan. Taza is a pass of the Rif, high place of the Amazigh claim in Morocco. Playing on the phonic proximity with Gaza to assert the primacy of the Berber cause over solidarity with Palestine is one of the linguistic discoveries of Moroccan Amazigh activists. In the kingdom, they are the only ones to have rejoiced in broad daylight with the diplomatic normalization with Israel decided on December 10, 2020 by King Mohammed VI, in exchange for the recognition of the Moroccan character of Western Sahara by the former president. American Trump.
The majority of public opinion applauded the Western Sahara component of the “deal” but remained silent on reconciliation with the Hebrew state. Many Amazigh activists do not share the surrounding embarrassment. Their pro-Israel sympathy is even so uninhibited that they propose to erect December 10 as an anniversary. “The historical symbolism of the event must be celebrated”, thus proclaims the Confederation Atlas Transift, a coalition of Amazigh associations from the Moroccan High Atlas.
Israel seen as a model
This is because the Hebrew state is considered by some Berber activists as a successful model of reappropriation of an ancestral land. “Since the time of colonization, the Amazighs have seen their culture and their history rejected and repressed, explains Mohamed El Ouazguiti, coordinator of the Confederation Atlas Transift and creator of the information site AmazighWorld. At the same time, in the Middle East, the Hebrews, victims of the same fate, managed to revive their identity and even their language. ” The claimed analogy nourishes a feeling of closeness.
When Morocco decided in 2000 to close its liaison office in Tel Aviv in reaction to the second Intifida, a whole fringe of Amazigh militants expressed their disagreement. Five years later, a project for a friendship group between Berbers and Israelis was born in the city of Agadir but the initiative failed after having sparked controversy. Since then, it is online, on Facebook and WhatsApp, that these supporters of the rapprochement have found refuge.
The World Amazigh Congress (CMA), a coordination structure of Amazigh associations created in 1995 at the international level, was even inspired by the model of the World Jewish Congress (WJC), according to Mohand Tilmatine, one of the founders of this organization. organization and researcher on the Berber question. The CJM was created in 1936 with the aim of becoming the “Diplomatic arm of the Jewish people” but above all to defend the establishment of a Jewish home in Palestine. “The Israeli model is highly appreciated by a section of militant Amazigh society but this comparison has its limits, specifies Mr. Tilmatine. Amazighs have been discriminated against on a land they have never left. “
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