Exit Hasan of Morocco: west mourns the death of another loyal servant

Khalil Marwan

Rabi' al-Thani 19, 1420 1999-08-01

Occupied Arab World

by Khalil Marwan (Occupied Arab World, Crescent International Vol. 28, No. 11, Rabi' al-Thani, 1420)

King Hasan of Morocco, one of the longest-reigning rulers in the Muslim world, was buried in Rabat on July 25, two days after his death in a Rabat hospital. In keeping with recent tradition, his funeral was attended by a large entourage of his foreign masters; the number of foreign leaders attending the funeral of a Muslim ruler has become a measure of his usefulness in advancing the Western/Zionist agenda.

Hasan, born on July 9, 1929, succeeded his father, king Mohammed V, in 1961. He died of pneumonia on July 23, 1999, aged 70. His eldest son was proclaimed king Muhammad VI the following day. Notorious as an international playboy, it is reported that he was secretly married within hours of his father’s death in order to fulfil the tradition that Moroccan kings must be married. His first decree was to declare 40 days of mourning in the country.

King Hasan was clearly high up on the west’s list of favourite puppets. None of Hasan’s bloody record of political assassinations, the ‘disappearance’ of dissidents and political foes, and the persecution of the families of those who offended him, was evident from the wholesome official tributes paid to him. US president Bill Clinton called his death a great loss to the region, and French president Jacques Chirac said he felt great pain at the news. Both attended the funeral.

Perhaps only Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Husain of Jordan occupied a higher position in the west’s pantheon, Sadat for recognising Israel in 1977, and Husain for his lifelong service as a US/zionist agent. But Hasan was also up there in dealing with the zionists. Geography rather than history denied him the kind of recognition that went to the other two traitors.

Despite being chairman of Al-Quds Committee of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference - ostensibly to work for its liberation - Hasan was a key figure in Arab rulers’ secret contacts with the zionists over decades. It was in Rabat that Moshe Dayan, the former Israeli army chief of staff, secretly met Sadat’s emissary Hasan Tohami to plan the Egyptian’s visit to Israel in 1977. Israeli leaders were frequent visitors to Rabat to confer with king Hasan. He welcomed them, and wined and dined with them, to the applause of his western masters. Shimon Peres, the former Israeli prime minister, was a close friend of Hasan’s. Upon hearing the news of his death, Peres said: “I’m really shocked and I feel a deep loss... He was a man of great warmth and personal involvement.”

Hasan’s relations with Israel were publicly admitted in 1983, when he officially hosted an international zionist conference in Rabat which was attended by, among others, 11 members of the Knesset (Israel’s parliament), 25 civic leaders and journalists, and numerous rabbis. Yitzhak Shamir, then prime minister of Israel, described the conference as “one more expression of the growing acceptance by the Arab world of the independent existence of the State of Israel.”

In return for this service, the west was happy to turn a blind eye to Hasan’s brutality against his own people and his personal corruption. Hasan also made a fortune from drugs, especially hashish. Together with Omnium Nord-Africain, a conglomerate involved in phosphate mines, banks, agro-business, and distribution, which was considered “his private property,” he amassed a personal fortune totalling “around US$1.6 billion,” revealed Abdelmounen Diouri in his book, Who Owns Morocco? His properties included a large chateau set in spacious grounds just outside Paris, according to the French daily Le Monde, which claimed Hasan invested much of his wealth abroad in real estate in New York, agriculture in California and firms such as Siemens. His amoral personal lifestyle - his well-known liaison with actress Elizabeth Taylor was only one of many - is also well established.

Disgusted by his behaviour, military officers repeatedly attempted to overthrow him, notably in 1971, 1972 and 1983. The 1983 coup, planned for July 23, to coincide with the anniversary of Gamal Abdel Nasser’s Free Officers’ coup in Egypt (1952), was foiled when the CIA, which had been watching general Ahmed Dlimi, commander of the army’s southern forces, caught his plotting on camera. The general was tortured under CIA direction (in Hasan’s own palace) and then killed. A number of other officers were also executed.

Meanwhile, Hasan’s prisons overflowed with political detainees. Although the existence of political prisoners is still denied, some 800 were released on direct orders of the king in the early nineties. Last year he brought the veteran socialist opposition leader Abderrahmane el-Youssoufi into government by appointing himprime minister. However, Hasan, who called himself Amir al-Mu’mineen (Commander of the Faithful), retained most powers in his own hands.

It is one of the tragedies of the Ummah that the most corrupt and subservient rulers take on Islamic titles which the Muslims revere. The Saudi ruler Fahd calls himself Khadim al-Haramain, Husain of Jordan claimed to be the defender of Al-Quds, while Hasan called himself Amir al-Mu’mineen. All three have been of dubious moral character, known to drink, gamble and womanise, yet they project themselves as champions of Islam. Their subservience to the west and their immoral behaviour demean the most sacred titles, sites and institutions of Islam.

Two of these puppets have recently left this world; the third is likely to follow soon. Fahd is virtually paralysed and largely incoherent, yet he refuses to formally relinquish power. Much given to superstition, he spends most of his time in Jeddah rather than the capital because a clairvoyant has told him that he will die in Riyadh, evidently believing it possible to escape the appointed hour.

The Muslim world will undoubtedly be better off without these established agents of the kuffar running their affairs; but their departure alone will not solve the problem. The real change can only come when the Islamic movements in these countries transform these nation-States into Islamic States through total revolutions.

Muslimedia: August 1-15, 1999