Zawaya

Maghreb unity is the only way for the region to face the threat of terrorism

By: Salah Zeghidi

Arab summit meetings take place with the same pace, and implement the same technical, organizational and media mechanisms. The latest of these “historic” dates was held in the Libyan city of Sirte. The surprising thing about this session is that it was held in a country whose leader had said two or three years ago that the Arab League has absolutely no use at all; he even decided to withdraw his country from anything related to “Arabism”, especially since he discovered that his country is first and foremost African, and decided that the real scene with which his country should merge is the African one.

So what made Kadhafi retreat to Arabism, and lead the summit of the Arab League that he convened in his country?

Kadhafi declared that the summit would give considerable attention to the issue of Jerusalem in order to unite the Arab capitals’ positions regarding the Israeli attacks and abuses in East Jerusalem and several surrounding areas in the last few weeks.

Observers consider that despite the slight improvement seen in recent months in inter-Arab relations, they are still divided by deep differences; and talking about a common policy to deal with the events in the region lacks all seriousness… Therefore, Maghreb leaders do not really believe in the so-called joint Arab action, and do not clearly see what their countries can do to resolve the chronic problems raised in the Middle East…

Some Maghreb leaders think that the Arab League and Middle Eastern States should realize that the leaderships in the great Maghreb are preoccupied by the threats of the Islamic terrorist groups on the region and the stability of the very fragile regimes…

Maghreb leaders took the initiative of exposing this concern to the summit meeting held in Libya, considering that the Levant countries have to provide the Maghreb countries with the help needed in order to completely eliminate the armed religious groups…

Intelligence services are undoubtedly the field where the Levantine countries, particularly Egypt, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Sudan, can effectively coordinate with the countries targeted by religious terrorism…

But this seems hard to achieve. All these countries are also busy confronting the terrorist threat: Saudi Arabia has recently arrested a huge number of members of dormant cells of al-Qaeda, Sudan has become a breeding ground shared by rival ethnic groups especially in Darfur, while President al-Bashir seeks to stay in power after the elections scheduled for the coming weeks, and Syria is preoccupied by its borders issue with Iraq, following the Iraqi government’s charges that a number of terrorists cross the Syrian borders towards Iraq, to actively engage in acts of sabotage and murder in a number of sites in Iraq, such as Mosul, Kirkuk, Baghdad, Fallujah, etc. As for Egypt, the country is going through a critical period with multiple problems and issues: the tunnels between Egypt and the Gaza Strip and the confusion surrounding it that was greatly exploited by the Muslim Brotherhood, the Palestinian internal reconciliation, in addition to Egyptian domestic issues…

All these conditions could convince the Maghreb leaders that it is of utmost importance for them to immediately seek reviving the Maghreb unity on all levels, and that the prerequisite of this lies in restoring trust between them (especially between the Algerian and Moroccan leaders). Therefore, confronting religious terrorism would become a common issue of substantial importance to the countries of the Maghreb region.