Supporting Polisario Front: A new Iranian way to shi’itize the Arab Maghreb  

Mohammed Al-Dabouli

A dangerous relationship is what the Iranian-Moroccan relations can be described. The first party is exploiting this relationship on only one basis which is the dissemination of the Shi’ite doctrine in the Arab Maghreb. That causes the failure of relations with the second party, which is adopting the Sunni doctrine.

In early May 2018, Morocco’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Nasser Bourita, announced that the Kingdom of Morocco had decided to sever its relations with Iran because of the military support of its ally, Hezbollah, to the Polisario Front, opening the door to further questions about the Iranian role and influence In the Arab Maghreb region in general and in Morocco in particular.

Rabat had earlier severed its ties with Iran twice. The first one was following the outbreak of the Iraq War when former King Hassan II gave his full support to Iraq during the Arab Summit in the Moroccan city of Fez in 1982. In return, Iran recognized the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic.

Relations between the two countries returned in the early 1990s, driven by the arrival of the reformists to power in Iran. Iran then adopted policies that would in their turn uproot the obstacles before restoring the relations. It decided to freeze its relations with the Polisario Front in the early 1990s.

However, relations deteriorated again in 2009 on the backdrop of Rabat’s rejection of Iranian official statements offensive to Bahrain as an Iranian province, as well as the participation of members of the Iranian Embassy in Morocco in systematic campaigns to shi’itize Moroccan citizens.

However, relations between the two sides returned again in 2016, in a move that some saw as a blow to Saudi-Moroccan relations. At the time, Saudi Arabia was involved in Yemen against the Houthi group and was somehow involved in the Syrian file.

Two years after the restoration of relations, they were severed again in 2018, but for various reasons this time which is Hezbollah’s support to the Polisario Front. That has opened the door for further questions about Iran’s motivation to support the Polisario Front and the effects of this support on the stability of Arab Maghreb province. This comes especially as Algeria is the main supporter of the Polisario Front, and Iranian support cannot be done without Algerian facilities, which we will try to answer.

Firstly: Developments of the Polisario crisis:

The roots of the problem date back to the 1970s when the Frente Popular para la Liberación de Saguia el-Hamra y de Río de Oro (OPLI), the Polisario, was formed to demand liberation from Spanish colonialism. In 1975, however, after the exodus of the Spanish colonization, the Front demanded the declaration of the Saguia el-Hamra and Wadi el-Dhahab as an independent republic under the name of the Sahrawi Arab Republic. That was rejected by Rabat, where the two regions are considered an integral part of the Moroccan territory that was under Spanish occupation.

In the face of the dispute between the two parties, Morocco intervened militarily in 1975 in the Sahara region to establish its sovereignty. This led to the outbreak of a long war between the Moroccan army and the Polisario forces, until a cease-fire was agreed in 1991.

Algeria was the first supporter of the Polisario Front, leading to the severing of relations between Morocco and Algeria in 1976. Relations between the two countries were only restored in 1988 and in the face of Algerian support for the Polisario Front. In 1980, Morocco built a separation belt along the Moroccan-Algerian border to prevent attacks and raids Polisario forces on Moroccan military positions. The length of the separation belt spans about 2,700 km and is about three meters high.

The crisis in the Moroccan Sahara since 1991 has suffered from a political and military stalemate caused by the failure of all diplomatic solutions. However, recently, the file has become hotter after Morocco accused the Polisario Front of committing many violations and infiltration into the buffer zone. It also sent a message to the Algerian government, saying that Rabat would intervene militarily to stop Polisario violations of the buffer zone.

Umbrella of Resistance and re-igniting the crisis

Moroccan newspapers last week tackled a new training plan by the Polisario Front militias under the name of “Umbrella of Resistance”, which is training the Front’s fighters on guerrilla warfare against the Moroccan army in anticipation of the failure of the lull and diplomatic efforts to resolve the crisis.

The plan is that the fighters of the front develop a number of tunnels under the buffer zone on the Algerian-Moroccan border and provide them with all means of ventilation, lighting, monitoring and control as well as the storage of weapons and missiles.

Moroccan newspapers have also confirmed that these tunnels will be used to change the demographics of the region’s inhabitants by pushing 10,000 African mercenaries and refugees to live in the regions of Bir Lahlou and Tifariti in order to change their Moroccan identity and population composition.

The Moroccan reports revealed that Iran and Hezbollah are playing a major role in implementing this plan through providing Hezbollah with more trainers who would train the Front’s fighters to prepare and develop tunnels on the one hand and train them on guerrilla warfare in addition to provide the front with the necessary weapon. Accordingly, Rabat took a decision to sever relations with Tehran.

Secondly: Iranian motives to destabilize relations with Morocco:

In a previous statement, the former Iranian ambassador to Rabat, Wahid Ahmadi, confirmed in February 2009 that his country had frozen relations with the Polisario in the early 1990s after it admitted it in February 1980, but recent events clearly indicate the falsity of Iranian claims about freezing its relationship with the Polisario.

Iran has many motives and advantages in supporting the Polisario at the moment and corrupting its relationship with Morocco, including for example:

The restoration of the Fatimid heritage: The Fatimid Caliphate is considered the only Shi’ite caliphate in Islamic history. The Fatimid represented the peak of glory and the Shi’ite tide. It dominated North Africa, Syria, Palestine, and Hejaz. So Iran, which considers itself the heir to the Fatimid state, seeks to regain it by extending its influence in this region, and even to destabilize it in order to win an opportunity to impose its control over that region.

The geostrategic importance of the Western Sahara: The Western Sahara possesses great geostrategic importance for Iran for a number of reasons, the most important of which is its supervision of the depth of Morocco, which makes it a powerful Iranian pressure tool against Morocco. The Sahara may also play a turning point for the Shi’ite centers in West Africa, especially Nigeria, Senegal and Ghana. This is in addition to the Sahara’s overlooking of the Atlantic Ocean, which may allow in the future the presence of an Iranian military working to threaten Western targets.

The existence of the crisis industry: This is a strategy followed by Iran since its revolution in 1979, and is based on its presence in any region by provoking crises in order to destabilize and restructure it in accordance with its interests. This happened in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Nigeria.

Defining the policy of supporting the oppressed: One of the most important principles in Iranian foreign policy is “supporting the oppressed”. On the basis of this principle, Iran supported most of the rebel and separatist movements under the pretext that they are underdogs and should be supported, but in fact Tehran has made this principle a cover for spreading its political and religious shi’itism.

Morocco has already established strong relations with the Gulf countries. Morocco has severed its ties with Iran in 2009, violating the latter’s right to the Kingdom of Bahrain. Moreover, Rabat is one of the most important supporters and participants in the Arab coalition forces, which is working to end the Houthi coup supported by Iran in Yemen. So, Iran may resort to export and create crises affecting the depth of Morocco in order to pressure it and turn it away from the multi-Iranian-Gulf crises.

Thirdly: The repercussions of severing relations between the two countries:

It is certain that the process of severing relations between Morocco and Iran will lead to more repercussions, whether at the level of relations between the two countries, or at the level of regional security (Maghreb) or even at the level of Arab-Arab relations, including for example:

Destabilizing the Arab Maghreb region: Algeria is certainly the first and main supporter of the Polisario front. Iran will not be able to provide any support or facilities to the front without Algeria’s consent, because the Front takes the camps of the Algerian state of Tindouf as a starting point. Therefore, the crisis may take a more radical perspective in the future of relations between Algeria and Morocco against the backdrop of recent events.

Deepening the isolation of Algeria: The Algerian policies towards Arab issues during the recent period were characterized by isolation and self-sufficiency. For example, it did not drift to participate in the Operation Decisive Storm or mark Hezbollah as a terrorist group, which caused a standstill in the Arab-Algerian relations.

But recent developments represented in Iran’s support for the Polisario may bring more Arab accusations to Algeria by facilitating Iran’s presence in the region and allowing it to destabilize Morocco starting from Algerian territories, prompting them to impose political isolation on Algeria.

Arab alignment: One of the most important repercussions of the recent crisis is a unified Arab alignment in support of the Moroccan decision.

Repercussions on Qatari-Moroccan relations: The recent events in Morocco may prompt Morocco to take stricter positions towards the Iranian axis in the region, of which Qatar is one of the main pillars. It is known that Morocco did not participate in the boycott with Qatar. However, Moroccan monarch Mohamed VI visited Doha with some considering such a visit a Moroccan support to the Qatari position. Hence, events may push Morocco to move away even slightly from Qatar in the hope of getting Gulf support in the new crisis with Tehran.

Finally, the Moroccan-Iranian relations have ranged over the last 10 years between estrangement and cautious return, revealing the extent of Iranian expansion in that important region of the Arab world. Iran is serious in establishing its presence in this region through various means and waysd, since it represents an important figure in the Iranian strategy.