I know MM, but you also know that I like dicussing heat topics

Toddy, your history article of the Perejil Island is accurate, but is intentionally incomplete. I really don't mind if the island is moroccian or spanish at last. What I mind is that both countries knew it was a disputed territory, and that they had an agreement for which none of them would place troops on it (which Morocco obviously broke).

Something of what is missing in that article is for example that the island was occupied until 1964 by spanish troops, and that from then it was never occupied again. And that it was considered a territory of the city of Ceuta when the democracy came.

To be brief, Toddy, you have readen the statement of the spanish government, saying that an agreement was achieved and thanking the intervention of Collin Powell.

The moroccian statement was as follows: "The spanish government retired the spanish troops from the moroccian island Turah, also called Leila, thanks to the successful contacts did by His Majesty the king Mohamed VI."

Instead of cooling things down they insist on provocation by stating the island is moroccian, and they said nothing of an agreement eased by Colling Powell. Also, it is ridicolous they behaving on this issue about the name of the island. They first called it Perejil (which means Parsley, and which it is said it was the historical name), since it is spanish, they quickly changed to Leila (which is a deformation of "La isla" made by the local population), when this has been demonstrated, they check ancient maps and found that the moroccian name is Turah or Torá. It lacks of importance, but is one more thing which demonstrates their intentions...

Fernando

Actually, Leila: ليل؛ in Arabic means "night", so it's not an adaptation of Spanish.

It is also a common woman name, but that doesn't mean it is the correct name in arab for tha island. Even if that is the name, it is clear that they didn't know how the island was called (because they switched from Perejil to Leila, and then to Turah).

Fernando

Although I live in Saudi Arabia, my knowledge of Arabic is little. However, could it be that the name Leila for the island Perejil came about because there is no letter or sound for the letter P in the Arabic alphabet? The charts I have seen don't show such a sound. Perhaps someone more knowledgable with the Arabic alphabet can shed more light.

Here are some comments from Charles Krathammer of The Washington Post (www.washingtonpost.com) which touch on many of the postings made on this subject:

"...After Morocco's non-accidental "invasion" of Perejil, everybody got into the act. The European Union declared "its full solidarity with Spain." NATO, which could not even use this worthless rock for target practice, weighed in on Spain's side, too. The Arab League predictably lined up with its fellow Arabs, declaring Perejil "a Moroccan island."

Not exactly "The Guns of August," although the way far-flung allies, who had not even heard of this misbegotten rock till last week, lined up instantly behind one or the other of the aggrieved parties had an eerie, ghostly echo.

Now, Morocco will hardly go to war over Parsley Point. For one thing, Morocco is no match for Spain. For another, the timing of the whole stunt, during the three-day wedding of the Moroccan king, Mohammed VI, turned the invasion into a cheap, if bizarre, wedding present to himself and the nation.

Nonetheless, this comedy holds some serious lessons. Europe berates the United States for holding on to primitive notions of sovereignty at a time when the sophisticated Europeans are yielding sovereignty to Brussels, adopting the euro, wallowing in Kyoto and, most recently, genuflecting to the newly established International Criminal Court. Yet here they are lining up in lockstep to defend Spanish sovereignty over a piece of worthless rock that only dubiously belongs to Spain, by supposed attachment to the other dubiously claimed Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla, that in turn are little more than colonial anachronisms on the coast of North Africa. This same Europe heaps scorn on the United States for defending an infinitely more serious sovereign claim -- to democratic legal jurisdiction over its own citizens and soldiers rather than yielding it to the arbitrariness of the new criminal court.

Even more important, however, is that the War of Parsley Point reminds us of the corrosive irredentism for Islamic lands long ago taken by the sword and then lost to the sword. We forget Islam's astonishing early successes. From a standing start in the early seventh century, it conquered Arabia, North Africa and Spain within 100 years. Muslims have not forgotten. The later loss of Spain, to say nothing of European colonialism in the Arab world (including what remains of Spanish sovereignty in Morocco), still burns. After all, how did Ayman Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's deputy, begin that first post-Sept. 11 celebratory videotape? By invoking the loss of "Andalusia" -- southern Iberia, lost to the Christian infidel the year Columbus sailed the Atlantic. For many in the Islamic world, it happened yesterday.

Much of the conflict in the world today -- the Philippines, Kashmir, Chechnya, the West Bank, Sudan, Nigeria and now on this ridiculous little rock in the Mediterranean -- represents the Islamic world, once expanding, long contracting, pushing out once again to reclaim its place in the sun.

As Samuel Huntington has written, the borders of Islam are bloody. At least in the War of Parsley Point, no one has been killed and no one is likely to be. It will all end with the game's being called on account of silliness. The game goes on everywhere else, however, not as farce but as tragedy."

© 2002 The Washington Post Company

Interesting article, but yet simplist. To say that the "arab" countries are a block is the same that saying that all America is a block, or all european countries are a block with the same interests and problems.

Philippines is not an arab country, but catholic (but has an important muslim community). Sudan is a muslim country, but it is not arab, the same as Niger.

Algeria and Morocco are arab countries (well, with different tribes, as the alauis, berebers, who descend directly from germanic populations, saharauis,...) but they are not friends, but have a sour relationship. See also Iran and Iraq, or Kuwait and Iraq, Abisinia and Etiopia,...

And the article is also incorrect. Ceuta and Melilla have never been moroccian (I repeat: never), and Al-Andalus was an independent caliphate, emirate or kingdom when 70,000 arabs invaded the Iberian Peninsula, conquering the 17 million inhabitants who were and remained in general christians.

Fernando

The name "Leila" is not a dropped b, parsley in Arabic is "baqdoons" or something like that as I can remember, vaguely. Regardless of what the stupid island is called, the name in Arabic is not an adaptation of Spanish.

Arabic in principle has no p, but it has been included as people don't really run around drinking "bebsi cola" or "doctor bebber."

And the Washington Post is a reactionary rag.

Here's to hoping that the Moroccan army, now with nothing to do and leftover ammunition, comes over to my place and puts a bullet in my head so I don't have to continue to audit "HIS 256: N.African Silly Conflicts of the 21st Century: An All-too In-depth Analysis".

Sitting thousands of kilometers away everything seems stupid, including the "silly" Parsley Island (even if I have explained why it has some importance). I guess the most easy is to minimize this issue, say that this is another spanish "cachondada" where we have overreacted.

And I still fail to see what is that funny when a neighbour country menaces your own fellow citizens... (as the moroccian representatives are doing every day).

Could someone explain it to me please?

Fernando

So...... Fernando, what you're saying is that Spain does not claim the island anymore? Hah, Spanish PP pride would never have it!
Please don't mislead!