Op-Ed: Why this World Cup will be remembered as Morocco's after all

A Moroccan player is hoisted on his teammates' shoulders at the World Cup.

By Safwan M. Masri

Dec. 15, 2022 Updated 5:31 PM PT

Morocco’s recent victories over Belgium, Spain, and Portugal — the first time an Arab or African country reached the semifinals in the World Cup — before losing to France 2-0 on Wednesday, has riveted the world in general and the Arab world in particular.

But what, exactly, is “the Arab world”? Does Morocco’s extraordinary performance in the World Cup represent a victory for the 450 million strikingly diverse “Arab” inhabitants of the Middle East and North Africa? Or is it a win for the African continent? Or just for Morocco?

The answer, seemingly, is all of the above.

But it isn’t quite so simple. Because the so-called Arab world is in fact many worlds. Arab identity has always been a fraught affair, as Arabs’ notions of themselves have been forged by sharply contrasting genealogical, political, social, cultural, commercial, religious, and linguistic traditions. Not to mention colonial histories, stark geographic and demographic diversity and transience. Much of the Arab world was invented a century ago essentially from scratch — after the British and French carved up the provinces of the former Ottoman Empire at the conclusion of World War I.

Yet despite their vast differences, Arabs have this in common: On the global stage, they have historically been cast either as villains or victims.

But at this World Cup the Arabs are the unequivocal heroes — for once in a story of their making. And Arabs, rightly, are relishing this new and wholly unexpected stardom. That the World Cup is hosted in Qatar, an Arab country, and that Arab teams have performed spectacularly well — Saudi Arabia defeating Argentina, Tunisia beating France, and now Morocco ascending to the semifinals — has engendered enormous pride among Arabs.

For Arabs and Africans, the most glorious moments perhaps came in watching the Atlas Lions vanquish three former colonizers: Belgium, Spain and Portugal, before losing to Morocco’s former colonial occupier, France.

But while Arabs are claiming Morocco’s strong showing in the World Cup as a win for Arabs everywhere, Moroccans have been a bit cagey. When asked if the team’s win over Spain was a win for the Arab world, the Atlas Lions’ coach, Walid Regragui, replied “I am not here to be a politician. We want to fly Africa’s flag high just like Senegal, Ghana, Cameroon. We are here to represent Africa.”

No wonder. Morocco is not typically “Arab”; the nation is a spicy stew of Arab, Muslim and African, where 4 in 10 people self-identify as Amazigh, or Berber, the ethnic group indigenous to the Maghreb region of North Africa — Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia. And many of the biggest stars on the Moroccan team, who are Amazigh, were not celebrated and acknowledged as Amazigh; instead, they were claimed as Arabs.

That Morocco — located in West Africa, hardly the center of the Arab world — was claimed by all Arabs reflected the desperate hunger of the peoples of the region for a win. A yearning for something, anything, to celebrate. Arabs everywhere essentially proclaimed “we are all Moroccans now,” though Arabs of the East have historically looked suspiciously on those on the opposite side of the Mediterranean, considering their cultural and social norms aberrant and mocking their vernacular, which borrows from Tamazight (the language of the Amazigh), French and Spanish.

Until now.

Arab pride was also expressed in the outpouring of support across the region for the Palestinian cause at the games. Palestinians — who on the global stage are mostly rendered invisible, contained within the four walls of “Israel-Palestine” — have been eminently visible in Doha. Palestinians routinely denied travel visas have been welcomed as visitors by the Qatari state. A significant Palestinian diaspora already resides in Qatar. And Palestinians and their supporters have leveraged the platform of this World Cup to draw attention to their struggle. Palestinian banners have been conspicuous inside stadiums and in apartment windows, and are waved on street corners alongside Moroccan flags.

The nations of the North African Maghreb, in particular, have a deep and abiding connection to Palestinians. In 1982, after the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was driven out of Lebanon, it was Tunisia that welcomed him. Today, at Tunisian football matches, Palestinian national songs are sung.

When in 2021 Algeria won the Arab Cup, also hosted in Qatar, the team dedicated its victory to Palestinians. And last week, the Moroccan team posed for its victory photo with the Palestinian flag after defeating Spain. This despite Morocco having been a party to the Abraham Accords, the treaty signed in 2020 that established diplomatic relations between Israel and Morocco, along with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Sudan. It’s interesting to see the widening gulf between government officials, who are normalizing relations with Israel, and street-level responses championing the Palestinian human rights cause.

Morocco’s victories in the World Cup are, first and foremost, Morocco’s to claim, but they also represent a win for the colonized world. The Moroccans burst into a gilded and, until now, impenetrable club: the winner’s circle. Morocco’s goalkeeper, Yassine “Bono” Bounou, summed it up when he said to a reporter, “This feeling of inferiority, we have to get rid of it. The Moroccan player can face any in the world.”

Safwan M. Masri is dean of Georgetown University in Qatar and the author of “Tunisia: An Arab Anomaly.”