Israel-Morocco Normalization Deal Condemned Online

Trump also announced that the United States was to recognize the contested Western Sahara region as part of the North African kingdom.

Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser, confirmed that recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara is linked to the kingdom’s normalization with Israel.

Many Moroccans took to Twitter to reject the deal and to reiterate their support for the Palestinian people after Morocco became the sixth Arab state to officially recognize Israel, the Middle East Eye reported.

Morocco follows the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Sudan, who all signed normalization deals with Israel earlier this year.

Using the hashtag “Moroccans Against Normalization”, many people online blasted the deal as a loss for Sahrawis - the inhabitants of Western Sahara - and Palestinians alike.

The US recognition of Western Sahara as a Moroccan territory has been viewed as a blow to autonomy for those in the former Spanish colony, where Sahrawis have been fighting for independence and continuously calling for a referendum, promised by the UN in 1991, on the territory’s future.

The Polisario Front, the Sahrawi independence movement, blasted the US decision in an official statement, stating that its struggle for autonomy "will continue".

“The stance… is a blatant violation of the United Nations Charter and the resolutions of international legitimacy,” the group said.

The White House said Trump and Morocco’s King Mohammed VI had agreed that Morocco would “resume diplomatic relations between Morocco and Israel and expand economic and cultural cooperation to advance regional stability”.

In the besieged Gaza Strip, Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem said, “This is a sin and it doesn’t serve the Palestinian people. The Israeli occupation uses every new normalization to increase its aggression against the Palestinian people and increase its settlement expansion.”

Hanan Ashrawi, an outgoing member of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s executive committee, branded the deal “sinister and ugly”.

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