Magazines

The intellectual discourse of Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan has been advanced by the most influential leader by means of his books. Abdessalam Yassine’s writings provide a coherent ideological framework for the members of the group. His books supplied the organization and the reader in general with coherent analyses to the major issues pertaining to Moroccan politics and society and thus they constitute a great strength.

Islam constitutes the basic framework of reference.

Wilayat Al-Faqih (the guardianship of the jurisconsult).¹²² By this treatment, he implicitly criticized the institution of monarchy as an aberration from Islam.

In March 1980, the regime banned issue 4 of Al-Jama’a and became concerned anew about the threat of Islam-oriented movements, since some Moroccans were allegedly directly involved in the take-over of the Grand Mosque in Mecca. In July 1982, Al-Jama’a published Risalat Al-Qarn FI Mizan Al-Islam (the Letter of the Century in tin thehe Light of Islam) in the pages of the tenth issue on the occasion of the coming of the fifteenth Islamic century. This letter tackled many issues in a strong and unexpected tone.

Abdessalam Yassine’s critique was directed to the king and to the official Ulama.

According to Abdessalam Yassine, the Ulama have abandoned the role they have played in public life during the Islamic history. He also recommended that Qur'an should replace the current constitution as an alternative to the historical and “civilizational” decline in all aspects of life, including the economic, scientific, military, cultural and political.

By establishing his periodical, Abdessalam Yassine could not achieve his initial objective by bringing other Islam-oriented groups under one organization. However, the magazine Jama’a, functioned from the very beginning as a central organizing tool. Al-Jama’a initiated not only the Islamic media but also Islam-oriented political movements. It can be concluded that Abdessalam Yassine’s organization grew up around Al-Jama’a.

Through this magazine, Abdessalam Yassine published his ideas and principles to a limited public.

In 1982, Abdessalam Yassine attempted to launch the newspaper As-Sobh (The Dawn). The mission behind this new publication was, as the name suggests, heralding the promising future of Islam and the near collapse of the regime. On December 27^th, 1983 Abdessalam Yassine was arrested after the publication of the first issue of his newspaper and was sentenced to two-year imprisonment in May 1984 and 4,000 Dirhams (Tozy, 1999: 189). The motive of the charge was the religious content as well as the strong political and social positions postulated in the first issue of As-Sobh. The second issue was also confiscated and banned.

Under such heavy restrictions, Abdessalam Yassine decreased the intensity of his attacks against the regime. While the regime insisted that Abdessalam Yassine’s publications should be tightly controlled, the later launched Al-Khitab (The Discourse) in

122 Yassine indirectly criticized Khomeni’s theory of Wilayat al-Faqih as a new notion that has no antecedent in the Islamic political history.

January 1984, which was confiscated in the publishing house.¹²³ This evidences the regime’s determination to implement rigid media restrictions against Abdessalam Yassine and his publications.

Being aware that mass media frame public opinion, Abdessalam Yassine and his cohort continued to publish the periodical Al-Jama’a, which maintained its critical stand vis-á-vis the regime. Fearing the proliferation of such kind of newspapers, the regime banned it in July 1984, after its sixteenth issue, Al-Jama’a.

During the early 1980s, repressions against Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan’s magazines were severe, common and ruthless. Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan was the subject of tremendous aggressiveness from the regime. It was the foremost target of the regime. Following the January riots in 1984, the regime severely limited the channels of political communication of Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan.¹²⁴ The regime tightened its grip over the organization’s activities and publications. In an effort to silence the voice of Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan, the regime had obstructed its channels of political communication by a multiple of measures. The regime launched several arrest campaigns against the organization’s members and prevented its congregations in mosques. In its political and religious struggle with Islam-oriented movements, the regime sought to crack down the organization’s publications; and by the end of 1984 all operating Islam-oriented periodicals were doomed to be banned. This harsh policy resulted in the absence of any Islam-oriented periodical for four years in the media scene in Morocco.

The successive attempts to launch a paper or a magazine reflected the importance Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan imparted to the mass media. After the harsh experience, Abdessalam Yassine and his cohort became fully aware that the regime would not allow an Islam-oriented publication that has a militant orientation and a strong tone. Under such harsh conditions it was difficult to develop their own communication voice in the Moroccan media system, and thus, Abdessalam Yassine and his cohort decided to stop defying the regime by publishing any paper.¹²⁵ In addition, Abdessalam Yassine’s energy was exhausted in defying the regime. As one leader said, Abdessalam Yassine’s disengagement from the media realm meant that he directed his efforts to build his organization.

123 http://www.aljamaa.com/ar/archives.asp?Page=2&idRub=27.

124 Several preachers were accused of exploiting mosques for political purposes. The Ministry of Religious Affairs and Endowments controlled mosques.

125 During the five years of its existence, Yassine could publish about 16 issues.

As a result of the political change of power in the late 1990s, the print media was greatly transformed. This transformation was marked by the appearance of an avalanche of new publications, including general newspapers and special interest magazines. Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan re-entered the media scene by launching a weekly magazine for its youth organization, Risalat Al-Futuwa, in March 1999. This magazine was edited by journalists, students and young scholars. The editor-in-chief is a journalist by profession. The emergence of this new magazine should be understood in the context of growing conflict between secular-influenced students and Islam-oriented students at Moroccan universities.

Risalat Al-Futuwa was founded to report the activities of the Union of Moroccan Students from an Islamic perspective and to fill a lacuna in the Islamic media.¹²⁶

From the early issues one can clearly witness the high degree of intensity of Risalat Al-Futuwa. It published extracts from other Islamic newspapers and periodicals and republished a number of Abdessalam Yassine’s articles. The weekly published reports dealing with domestic and local political issues. It focused on problems pertained to Islam-oriented students. The paper presented Islam not as a mere religion but rather as a valid ideology capable of solving the current social, political and cultural problems of Moroccan society. The magazine adopted a firm anti-regime line in political and religious matters.

After Risalat Al-Futuwa, Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan began its daily on June 30^th, 2000, under the title Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan. Its name was suggestive, since it adopted the name of the organization¹²⁷. Its declared role was to publicize the positions, viewpoints and opinions of the organization and to promote Islamic ideas to fight secular ideas and ideologies. This community newspaper presented itself as the centre organ of the organization.The magazine stand thus at strong defiance of the official religious discourses about Islam. For instance, Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan advanced strong political, social and religious positions. Most articles of the first issue criticized in direct ways the existing social injustice and corruption.

Despite the difficulties, they managed to print offset the second and last issue in December 2000.¹²⁸ Against this background, the second issue featured a special section on the situation of human rights in Morocco. Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan suspended the publication of this daily and the newspaper was under a de facto ban.

126 Abdusamad Fathi, editor of the weekly Risalat Al-Futuwa, personal interview with the author, May 11, 2001, Casablanca, Morocco.

127 This strategy was used by the Socialists, who named their daily paper in 1981 after the party to make it popular among Moroccans.

128 This method involves a multiple of difficulties.

Nearly all of Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan new publications that were established during the period of democratic transition became casualties of the regime. Since the publication of the first issue, the magazine had been frequently banned. Fearing the wreath of the censor, Risalat Al-Futuwa dealt with some topics and let others untouched. Despite these cautious editorial tactics, the weekly was a subject of regime’s restrictions. During May 2000, the issue 18, dealt with human rights abuses made against the organization during the past years, was seized. The regime seized thousands of copies of the 34^th issue dated 2 April 2001 and thus the weekly was technically banned on April 6^th. The 36 issue was also seized during the night of May 22^nd, 2001 on the premises of the distribution company.

In 2001, the regime adopted other measures: strong pressure on printing houses.

Risalat Al-Futuwa was forced to change four printing houses within one year because the printing firms refused to print the weekly under the regime’s threat and reprisal. The regime had threatened and pressured a number of printing firms not to print the magazine.¹²⁹ Three printers stopped printing Risalat Al-Futuwa on orders from the regime.

Consequently, the weekly was forced to reduce the number of its pages. Following pressure on these printing houses, the weekly began printing offset.

The regime has developed and employed unofficial and subtle strategies of intervention when it attempted to force Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan to comply and align with the regime’s interpretation of Islam by threatening of permanent shutting down. Al-Adl Wal-Ihsan’s newspapers and magazines were forced not to differ much from the official ideological leanings. How the regime treated the Islam-oriented newspapers and magazines relies on the movement's acceptance of the religious and political agenda as set by the regime.