Relations with Israel “were normal” even before the agreement

Cord: Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita said Sunday in an interview with the Israeli daily “Yediot Aharonot” that relations between Morocco and Israel were “already normal” before the normalization agreement announced on Thursday by US President Donald Trump. .

“From our point of view, we are not talking about normalization because the relations were originally normal, we are talking about a resumption of relations between the two countries as before, because the relationship has always existed. “.

On Thursday, outgoing United States President Donald Trump announced his country’s recognition of Morocco’s sovereignty over Western Sahara, the disputed former Spanish colony, and an agreement to normalize relations between Morocco and Israel, which it was also well received by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Since Saturday, the United States adopted a “new official map” for Morocco that includes Western Sahara, whose sovereignty has been disputed for decades in Rabat, and the Algerian-backed Polisario Front separatists.

Morocco, which established formal relations with Israel in the late 1990s after the Oslo agreement between the Palestinians and Israelis, is the fourth Arab country this year to announce an agreement to normalize relations with the Hebrew state, after the United Arab Emirates. States, Bahrain and Sudan.

In the interview, Bourita stated: “The relations between Israel and Morocco are distinctive and cannot be compared with the relationship between Israel and any other Arab country.”

He added: “Morocco has an important history with the Jewish community, a special history in the Arab world. The king … and previous kings, including Hassan II, used to respect and protect Jews. Relations between Morocco and Jews they were distinguished relationships that cannot be found in any other Arab country. ” .

While the Israeli political class and press welcomed the agreement between Morocco and Israel, which provides for the establishment of a direct air route between the two countries, the Palestinians condemned it.