Published February 20th, 2007 by Future Atlas
Morocco: Iraq’s long reach
The Washington Post reports today on the effect of the Iraq war on the other end of the Arab world, Morocco.
The most salient points:
- Moroccans are being recruited to go off to Iraq by terrorist groups. Extremist recruiters look for men who are particularly outraged by events there and in Palestine.
- Extremist groups across North Africa, from Morocco to Tunisia are finding common cause, partly based on events in Iraq.
- According to a Moroccan expert, “Al-Qaeda has the same strategy as the United States: it wants to win in Iraq so it can transform the whole region. They are fixated on Iraq.”
So al-Qaeda benefits from continued American presence in Iraq. It might also benefit from a withdrawal, if the “few thousand” foreign fighters can play a meaningful role in the aftermath of such a withdrawal.
Either way, every Arab country will be dealing with returning militants who have been trained by the Iraq war, potentially adding to instability.
A.E. Says
Yes, “jihad university” has been in session for a long time in Iraq. I shudder to think about the skill sets they picked up–all going to be used on the people in their home countries.
Feb 21st, 2007 at 5:34 am