What the minister has done!

JAMAL-ELABIAD

05/31/10

The scandal, in brief, broke out when a policeman arrested the week before last Moroccan Minister of Communication Khalid Naciri’s son for assaulting and stabbing a motorist in front of the parliament building in Rabat. Soon after learning of his son’s arrest, the communication minister showed up personally at the scene. "Are you going to let the boy go, or should I do my work?" is the threat, according to eye witnesses, the minister used to force the policeman to release his son. As a result, the policeman had no choice but to set Naciri’s son free in disapproval of the citizens who observed the incident. For more details, watch the video.
Right after I finished watching the video, I came to the following conclusions.
What the communication minister has done shows beyond doubt that all Moroccans are equal, but some Moroccans are more equal than others.
What the communication minister has done means that Moroccans whose family members are ministers or senior officials are above the law.
What the communication minister has done is a clear sign of the fact that something is rotten in the kingdom of Morocco.

Why I Can’t Boycott Al Jazeera?

JAMAL-ELABIAD

05/18/10

“I’m no longer a viewer of Al Jazeera for several reasons, one is that Al Jazeera is a lion with the Arabs and a lamb with Qatar.” replied a close friend of mine when I lately asked him whether he listened to the testimonies of Mohamed Ben Said Ait Idder on Shahedon Ala Al-Asr, one of Al Jazeera’s weekly programs presented by Ahmed Mansour.
I’m sorry to say that my friend, like many others, is a victim of many rumors the opponents of Al Jazeera have circulated so as to make it lose popularity. Arab governments, needless to say, are among those who feel threatened by Al Jazeera TV channel, and who have vainly turned to the weapon of rumors in order to tarnish its image around the Arab world.
The other rumors that my friend didn’t mention, and that surely led him to stop watching Al Jazeera are that Al Jazeera is a mouthpiece of Al Qaeda, and both the CIA and the Mossad are the real forces behind it.

The Exception That Proves the Rule

JAMAL-ELABIAD

01/10/10

“In Europe, I found Islam without Muslims, while in Egypt I found Muslims without Islam.” said the Egyptian thinker Muhammad Abduh (1849-1905).

Muhammad Abduh’s statement came to my mind soon after I read that a British court issued recently a warrant for the arrest of Tzipi Livni, former foreign minister of Israel. Frankly, the news story about Livni made me remember how much I laughed when I was told that some Moroccan human rights activists were planning to hold a mock trial for her!