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RABAT: The first Israel-Morocco direct commercial flight landed in the North African kingdom on Tuesday to mark the latest US-brokered diplomatic normalisation deal between the Jewish state and an Arab country.
US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and White House adviser Jared Kushner was on board along with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s National Security Adviser Meir Ben Shabbat.
The US-Israeli delegation was welcomed at the airport by Moroccan officials, ahead of a programme that includes a meeting with King Mohammed VI at the royal palace, and a visit to the grave of Mohammed V.
The trip was aimed at showcasing the Trump administration’s achievements in Middle East diplomacy, weeks before Trump is replaced at the White House by President-elect Joe Biden.
Morocco became the third Arab state this year, after the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, to normalise ties with Israel under US-brokered deals, while Sudan has pledged to follow suit.
Speaking at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport before his departure, Kushner said Israel’s recent string of breakthrough deals marked a step towards a more normal co-existence between Jews and Muslims.
“The state we have lived in for the last 75 years, where Jews and Muslims have been separated, is not a natural state,” he said before getting on the plane which was painted with the Hebrew, Arabic and English words for “peace”.
Both sides were expected to sign agreements paving the way for direct air links, and on water management, connecting their financial systems and on a visa waiver arrangement for diplomats, said an Israeli official source.
Morocco has North Africa’s largest Jewish community of about 3,000 people, and Israel is home to 700,000 Jews of Moroccan origin. Until now, up to 70,000 Israeli tourists a year have visited Morocco, but they have had to travel via third countries.
As part of the Morocco-Israel deal unveiled earlier this month, Trump fulfilled a decades-old goal of Rabat by backing its contested sovereignty in the disputed region of Western Sahara.
The move infuriated the Algerian-backed pro-independence Polisario Front, which controls about one-fifth of the desert territory that was once a Spanish colony.
Negotiations included pledges to open a US consulate in Western Sahara, and for US investment which Moroccan media described as “colossal”. Israel and Morocco are meanwhile due to reopen diplomatic offices.
Morocco closed its liaison office in Tel Aviv in 2000, at the start of the second Palestinian intifada, or uprising.
Mohammed VI has said Morocco will remain an advocate for the Palestinians. Alongside the announcement of the resumption of ties with Israel on Dec 10, the king assured Palestinians of Morocco’s “continued and sustained commitment to the just Palestinian cause”.
Published in Dawn, December 23rd, 2020
