“First of all, there is unemployment, and agriculture, drought,” he replied. “There is the fight against poverty. I could talk about this endlessly: poverty, misery, illiteracy.”554
Ever since, the king has taken a series of positive steps to boost Morocco’s economy and increase national wealth and individual wages. In addition to providing political stability and taking strong measures to prevent terrorists from driving away tourists and investment, he has also privatized state-owned businesses, reduced taxes, and encouraged diversification from an agriculture-based economy to more manufacturing and technology-related industries.
Though there is still a long way to go, progress has been noticeable. In 1999, the gross domestic product was $108 billion, or about $3,600 per person, and there was absolutely no growth that year. Over the next few years, the economy grew between 4 percent and 8 percent a year. By 2007, the GDP was $125 billion, or about $4,100 per person. Annual foreign direct investment has more than quadrupled. There is a construction boom under way in Casablanca, the country’s commercial capital. And unemployment has fallen from 14 percent in 1999 to just 10 percent today.555
Step 9: Let the Voiceless Speak
One of the most distinctive reforms the king has pursued is creating a national forum to allow those Moroccans who suffered injustices at the hands of judges, generals, and security officials under his father the right to be heard, to be valued, and to be compensated. In 2004, victims of past government oppression were actually invited to testify on live national television about what happened to them, and they were provided with financial reparations as a sign of goodwill.
“It was striking,” Layadi recalled, and it sent an unprecedented message of change in an Islamic nation. “I mean, it was the new way of government in Morocco. Everybody knew that these things had happened. So why not talk about them? Why not have a real catharsis? Why keep them quiet like something that you are ashamed of?”
“It was the king’s way of saying he did not agree with the previous generals, judges, and others who were responsible for the oppression,” Abaddi told me.
Obviously, the harm could not be undone. But at least it was no longer hidden, and people could begin to reclaim some sense of dignity by telling the nation what they had experienced, why it was wrong, and how they felt about it.
Step 10: Build and Maintain Strong Relations with the Jewish Community
The current king, like his father, has been second to none in the Middle East in terms of honoring and respecting Jews and treating them as equal citizens. Few people understand this remarkable relationship better than Serge Berdugo, a man who holds a unique place in the Islamic world. From 1993 to 1995, he served in government as Morocco’s minister of tourism. Yet since 1987, he has also served as the secretary-general of the Council of Morocco’s Jewish Communities.
That’s right—Berdugo is Jewish.
When I visited Casablanca and Rabat in the fall of 2005, I had the privilege of meeting Berdugo in his home, and he gave me some fascinating insights. He noted that the first thing King Mohammed V (the current king’s grandfather) did when he returned from exile in 1956 and led his country to independence from France was to declare that “Jews are equal citizens.” From 1956 to 1961, the king made a point to install at least one or two Jewish leaders into senior-level positions in each cabinet ministry. The king also allowed Jews to freely emigrate when they wanted, and there are now around six hundred thousand Moroccan Jews living in Israel.
Berdugo also told me it was King Hassan II (the current king’s father, who came to power in 1961) who initiated a relationship with Israel in the late 1960s through a series of top secret meetings with Yitzhak Rabin and Moshe Dayan, then two of Israel’s leading defense officials.
By 1984, the king had decided to make such contacts public. He invited fifty Jewish and Israeli leaders to Rabat for an interfaith conference. As expected, this sparked controversy in the region. The Syrian government under then president Hafez al-Assad was particularly vocal in their outrage—so vocal that King Hassan decided to push back. He ordered that the entire senior leadership of the Moroccan government, including the crown prince, attend the conference’s gala dinner. The following year, the king helped create the World Council of Moroccan Jews. In 1986, he invited Israeli prime minister Shimon Peres to Morocco for a highly publicized visit, a move that stunned most of the rest of the Muslim world.
King Mohammed VI has certainly continued in this remarkably positive tradition. One of his most senior foreign policy advisors is a Moroccan Jew by the name of Andre Azoulay. After the 2003 bombings in Casablanca, the king personally blessed a series of candlelight vigils and later a rally in which one million Moroccans, including more than a thousand Jews, marched in unison to denounce the radical jihadists and called for peace. “We were applauded as Jews,” Berdugo told me. “We were kissed. People came up to us and said, ‘You are our brothers.’ It was extraordinary.”556
A few years later, several Moroccan officials confirmed to me rumors swirling about in the Arab press that the king had been quietly laying the groundwork with Israeli and Palestinian leaders to hold a new round of high-level peace talks as soon as the climate is right. “This king is a new generation,” one official who requested anonymity told me. “He is ready to help make peace between the Israelis and Palestinians. The deal is easy to do. We are now in a supermarket, not in the souk. We all know the price of peace. There is no more need to haggle. It is time to get the deal done.”557
Step 11: Reach Out to Evangelical Christians in the West
To his enormous credit, the king launched an initiative in late 2004 to build a “bridge of friendship” to evangelical Christians in the U.S., despite long-standing sensitivities about Islamic-Christian relations throughout the Arab world. Abaddi and his colleagues have established ongoing dialogues with prominent evangelists and church leaders such as author Josh McDowell, Richard Cizik of the National Association of Evangelicals, and Rob Schenck of the National Clergy Council. They have invited evangelical pastors, business leaders, and authors to visit Morocco and meet with Muslim leaders. They have even organized a series of concerts in Marrakech where Christian and Muslim rock bands have performed together for tens of thousands of Moroccan young people.
“Why is the king doing something so few leaders in the Islamic world are doing?” I asked Abaddi during his first visit to my home.
“The king knows the real America is not Hollywood and the pornography industry but people of faith,” he told me. “Historically, it has been the Christians who have held America together. Anyone who traces the history of America knows that evangelicals are behind it.”
“But why would Morocco specifically reach out to evangelicals when one of our central goals is to evangelize, a practice frowned upon in the Muslim world?”
Abaddi told me he feels evangelicals are “gentlemen” who can be trusted. “We are trying to reach out to the real America. Evangelicals are serious people, helpful people.” Abaddi acknowledged that the idea of Muslims converting to Christianity is a very sensitive subject in his country. But he also told me that he has written and spoken about the importance of encouraging religious freedom within Islam, including ensuring that “Muslims have the right to change their religion” if they so desire. “Islam cannot be a prison,” he stressed when I saw him in Rabat. “People shouldn’t feel trapped, like they’re in jail and they can’t get out. What kind of religion is that?”
These were remarkable steps, and they should be lauded. Hopefully the king and his court will take other positive steps in the years ahead. Among them: hosting major conferences (perhaps nationally televised) in Morocco where prominent evangelical and Muslim leaders discuss areas of theological agreement and disagreement in an open, kind, and candid manner; inviting Western evangelicals as well as Moroccan believers to freely publish books, DVDs, and other material inside the kingdom; and having His Majesty address major evangelical gatherings in the United States,
including the annual National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C., as Jordan’s King Abdullah II did in February 2006.558
However, it must be noted that since the publication of the first edition of this book, the government of Morocco has taken some deeply disturbing steps in the wrong direction. In 2010, some one hundred American and European Christian workers were unfairly and inexplicably expelled from Morocco by the government, accused of being ”missionaries.” What’s more, an accredited American school in Casablanca was legally attacked by a parent of a sixth grade boy enrolled in the school, accused of trying to convert minors.
Regarding the expulsions, I was amazed and disappointed that so many followers of Jesus Christ could be so hastily deported or refused entry to Morocco without due process of any kind. It appeared that Morocco’s own immigration laws were not even respected. This action sent shock waves into the American business community, raising concern over doing business there if due process is no longer respected in Morocco. It certainly also sent shock waves through the American Christian community, as it suddenly appeared that evangelical Christians—particularly those running orphanages and doing other humanitarian relief work among the poor and needy—were no longer welcome in Morocco.
In regards to the court case, here is the background: several sixth-grade classmates shared their Christian faith with a Moroccan Muslim boy, and the boy decided to put his faith in Jesus Christ as his Savior and Lord. The legal complaint stated the names of fourteen people associated with the school and accused them all with “shaking the child’s [Islamic] faith.” The problem is that only a few of the fourteen people cited had ever even met the boy. The only evidence the lawyer provided was that these fourteen people have membership in Christian churches and organizations and are in some way connected to the school. At one point, the lawyer cited that a certain individual made charitable contributions through a well known Christian foundation. The lawyer cited an “army of evangelists” in Morocco from “extremist denominations” (Baptist, Community Church, United Bible Society, etc).
It was noteworthy that the lawyer representing the boy was also the parliamentary leader of the Muslim fundamentalist political party in Morocco (PJD). He was turning the decision of one young boy into a political debate pitting Christians against Muslims. This has potentially far-reaching implications and reminded me of the largest complaint of al Qaeda dating back to 1991. Osama bin Laden was incensed at the time because there were hundreds of thousands of “Christian” soldiers in Saudi Arabia. This was the rallying cry that led to most of the terrorist attacks leading up to September 11, 2001. Are the members of the Moroccan PJD party now bringing this same logic to Morocco? Do they want to rid Morocco of all evangelical Christians? Do they want to turn the tolerant Muslim kingdom into a new Iran or Saudi Arabia?
Were these developments anomalies, or did they represent a new policy for the Moroccan government? It appears the king and his government are at a crossroads. They have been reaching out to Christians in the West and seeking to promote the Moroccan model. But if they continue expelling foreign Christians who love Morocco and refusing to allow back in those Christian workers they have already expelled, they will be reversing course and tragically undermining the progress they have made in recent years. If they furthermore convict people of shaking the faith of a Muslim—even those have never even met that person—it will be clear that merely holding the evangelical faith would be a crime in Morocco. Let us be watching and praying.
Step 12: Counter the “Hollywood Stigma”
Finally, Morocco has decided not to whine and complain about Hollywood’s unfair depiction of Muslims and Arabs. Instead, they are actively encouraging Western directors to come to Morocco to shoot major motion pictures that deal with Islam fairly and respectfully.
They are not looking for “puff pieces” or hagiographies. Rather, they are looking for a little balance. Officials in Rabat do not expect to see lots of scripts coming across their desks that tell the story of Muslim Reformers. But at the very minimum, the kingdom does look for scripts that have examples of Muslims being mistreated by the West, and have examples of Muslims working with the West to hunt down the Radicals.
Among the recent films that have been shot in Morocco are Black Hawk Down (the story of America’s fight against the Radicals in Somalia); Charlie Wilson’s War (the story of America’s assistance to the mujahadeen against the Soviets in Afghanistan); Kingdom of Heaven (about the European Crusades against the Muslims); The Bourne Ultimatum (in which, in part, former CIA agent Jason Bourne chases an assassin through Tangier, Morocco); and Body of Lies (the story of a CIA operative who hunts down a terrorist in Jordan).
Reflections
Bottom line: I have been impressed in recent years by the Moroccan model and by the king and his team who have set it into motion. The jury is still out on whether these steps will turn Morocco into a full-blown Jeffersonian democracy over time, or whether Morocco will continue moving in the right direction. If they do choose to continue bravely going down this path, it remains to be seen whether other Muslim leaders or nations will embrace the model as their own. I am praying for the king and for the future of this wonderful country that my family and I love so dearly. I hope you will join us in praying as well.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“Islam Is Not the Answer, and Jihad Is Not the Way; Jesus Is the Way”
Who are the Revivalists, and what do they want?
Tass Saada was a killer.
He and his friends murdered Jews in Israel. They murdered civilians and soldiers alike. They attacked Christians in Jordan. Sometimes they tossed hand grenades at Christians’ homes. Other times they strafed houses with machine-gun fire. They once tried to assassinate the crown prince of an Arab country. They nearly succeeded. And they did all this willingly. They did it eagerly. Saada certainly did. His nickname was once Jazzar—“butcher.” It was a moniker he relished.
Born in Gaza and raised in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf in a world of radical Islam and violent Palestinian nationalism, by his teenage years Saada was a cauldron of seething, roiling hatred. His family was close to the Saudi royal family. He once met Osama bin Laden. He became personal friends with Yasser Arafat, a man he long regarded as a hero and in whose name he happily killed. He served as a sniper in the Palestine Liberation Organization and for a time was Arafat’s driver and one of his bodyguards.
But in 1993, God gave Tass Saada’s life drama a second act.
After marrying an American and moving to the United States—a country he had long hated—this jihadist found Jesus. This violent Radical was one day radically transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit. This killer became a man of peace and compassion.
“Jesus, Come into My Life”
Saada was not expecting to become a follower of Jesus Christ.
To the contrary, when an evangelical friend tried to share the gospel with him, he became enraged. When his friend encouraged him to read the New Testament for himself, every fiber of his being resisted.
“I must not touch that book!” he said.559
“Why not?” his friend said. “It’s just paper.”
“No!” Saada replied. “It’s God’s Word!”
The two men just stood there for a moment. “Do you really believe that?” his friend asked in shock.
“Yes, I do,” Saada replied, hardly understanding the words that were coming out of his mouth. As a Muslim, he had not been raised to believe the Bible was God’s Word. He certainly had not been trained to believe that as a Radical. But he soon heard his friend saying, “Well, if you believe that, then let me read you what the Bible says about Jesus Christ. Fair enough?”
Saada nodded.
His friend began reading from the book of John, chapter one, verse one: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
The moment his friend said, “Word,” Saada began to shake. He suddenly flashed back to a line in the Qur’an that said,
“The Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, was . . . the Messenger of God, and His Word that He committed to Mary, and a Spirit from Him.”560
“Hearing the Bible say essentially the same thing, that Jesus was the Word of God, struck deep to the core of my being,” Saada would later recall. “Before I knew it, I was on my knees. I didn’t consciously decide to kneel. It just happened. I lost all awareness that my friend was in the room. A light came into my field of vision—a talking light. Now I know this sounds really odd, but this is what happened that Sunday afternoon, March 14, 1993. The light said to me, ‘I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.’ I didn’t know at that moment that those words were what Jesus said during the Last Supper [in John 14:6]. As far as I was concerned, they were a message from Jesus solely for me.”
Suddenly, Saada said, he just knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that the triune God—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit—existed. He knew with certainty that this triune God loved him. And sobbing with shame at his sin and with thankfulness for God’s mercy, he cried out, “Oh, Jesus, come into my life! Forgive me and be my Lord and Savior!”
“I felt as if a heavy load went flying off my shoulders,” he said. “A sense of peace and joy rushed into my heart. The presence of God was so real it seemed I could almost reach out and touch it.”
His friend was in shock. He too was in tears. To be sure Saada really understood what he was doing, he explained the gospel in some detail. And then, to be sure Saada was really committing his life fully and completely to Jesus Christ, he led Saada in the following prayer:
Lord Jesus, I am a sinner, and I am sorry for my sins. I ask you to forgive me and wash away my sins by your precious blood. Lord, I can’t save myself. I can’t take away my sins, but you can. You are the Savior of the world—the only Savior—and I want you to be my Savior. I ask you to forgive me and come into my life. Change me and give me a new heart. I will forever love you and follow you. Now I thank you for hearing my prayer and saving my soul. I know you have, because you promised you would. Now I am yours, and you are mine. I will serve you the rest of my life.
Inside the Revolution Page 40