The Morocco-Algeria rivalry is remaking Europe’s North Africa policy
This month, three high-level visits within the space of six days showed how the rivalry between Morocco and Algeria is increasingly shaping the policies of European governments in the Maghreb. On July 15 and 16, French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu led a large ministerial delegation to Morocco, consolidating the rapid rapprochement between Paris and Rabat. At almost the same time, Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune was in Berlin seeking to deepen Algeria’s partnership with Germany. Four days later, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez arrived in Algiers, continuing efforts to repair relations strained by Madrid’s shift towards Morocco. The principal fault line in the rivalry is Western Sahara. Morocco controls most of the territory and has made support for its sovereignty claim, or its autonomy proposal, a central test of its foreign partnerships. Algiers backs the Polisario Front’s demand for independence and has responded sharply when European governments endorse Rabat’s position on the territory. Both countries possess significant leverage. Morocco offers intelligence and counterterrorism cooperation, help in managing migration, investment opportunities and access to its economic networks in Africa. Algeria has major natural gas reserves, a substantial domestic market and considerable influence over security and diplomacy in the Maghreb and the Sahel. European governments cannot therefore manage the two relationships in isolation. Decisions that strengthen ties with one can reshape their diplomatic, economic and security cooperation with the other. France provides the clearest example. In 2024, President Emmanuel Macron backed Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara and described Morocco’s autonomy proposal as the basis for resolving the conflict. The decision helped end a prolonged period of tension between Paris and Rabat, but triggered an immediate crisis with Algeria, which recalled its ambassador. Lecornu’s visit showed that France does not regard its 2024 shift as a limited diplomatic concession. It is building a wider strategic partnership with Morocco around it. The two governments advanced cooperation on energy, investment, security, migration, education and infrastructure. They also discussed a direct electricity link that could bring renewable energy from Morocco to France and continued preparations for a future bilateral treaty. For France, Morocco offers a relatively stable partner at a time when French influence has declined across much of the Sahel. Several governments in the region have expelled French troops, downgraded relations with Paris or sought alternative security partners. Morocco, by contrast, has expanded its economic and diplomatic presence in West Africa through banking, telecommunications, construction and religious and security cooperation. Rabat therefore offers Paris a means of preserving influence in Africa while developing new commercial, energy and security projects. In return, Morocco gains investment, diplomatic prestige and further international support for its position on Western Sahara. The depth of France’s commitment is perhaps clearest in what Paris appears prepared to overlook. As Lecornu visited Morocco, new reporting reinforced allegations that Moroccan intelligence had used the Israeli-made Pegasus spyware against senior French officials, including Lecornu while he was serving in government as minister of local authorities. Morocco has repeatedly denied acquiring or using Pegasus. The allegations did not disrupt the visit. The two governments publicly celebrated their security cooperation and continued preparing a broader strategic partnership, demonstrating the importance Paris now attaches to its relationship with Rabat. This choice has carried costs. France’s relations with Algeria were already burdened by disputes over colonial history, migration and security. Macron’s Western Sahara decision deepened those recurring tensions into a broader strategic rupture. Security cooperation stalled, French companies faced growing obstacles and French wheat was largely excluded from Algerian import tenders. Paris and Algiers have since cautiously reopened dialogue, but France has shown no willingness to reverse the policy that caused the crisis. Algeria did not force France to change its position. But it demonstrated that alignment with Morocco could reshape France’s economic, diplomatic and security relationship with Algeria. Spain encountered the same pressure after making a similar choice. In 2022, Sanchez’s government abandoned Spain’s previous neutrality and described Morocco’s autonomy proposal as the most serious, realistic and credible basis for resolving the Western Sahara conflict. The decision helped Madrid repair a damaging dispute with Rabat, but provoked an immediate backlash from Algeria. Algiers recalled its ambassador, suspended its two-decade friendship treaty with Spain and halted most non-gas trade. Spanish exports to Algeria collapsed, although Algeria continued honouring its gas contracts. Once again, Algeria could not compel a Western government to reverse its policy. But it could force that government to adjust its wider regional diplomacy. Spain has since tried to repair relations with Algeria without sacrificing its renewed partnership with Morocco. Sanchez’s July 20 visit to Algiers marked the clearest sign yet of this recalibration. The two governments agreed to revive high-level bilateral mechanisms and deepen cooperation on energy, investment, migration and security. The challenge for Madrid is that both relationships are essential. Algeria remains a major gas supplier, while Morocco is crucial to Spanish trade, counterterrorism and migration policy. Madrid also remembers the 2021 Ceuta crisis, when Morocco appeared to relax border controls during a diplomatic dispute, allowing thousands of people to enter the Spanish enclave. The breakdown with Algeria, meanwhile, damaged trade and complicated energy diplomacy. Sanchez is therefore attempting a difficult balancing act: preserving Spain’s rapprochement with Morocco while rebuilding the cooperation with Algeria that this rapprochement severely damaged. Tebboune’s simultaneous visit to Berlin illustrated Algeria’s efforts to widen its European partnerships. Germany and Algeria discussed deeper cooperation on energy, investment, industry, migration and security, including the potential including the potential export of Maghrebi hydrogen to Europe. The German-Algerian relationship has its own economic and strategic foundations and cannot be reduced to the rivalry with Morocco. But closer ties with Berlin broaden Algeria’s European options beyond France. Morocco and Algeria are no longer merely competing for Western support. Through energy, migration, security cooperation, market access and regional influence, they are increasingly shaping how European governments organise their relationships across the Maghreb. France has made Morocco a central pillar of its regional strategy. Spain is rebuilding ties with Algeria without abandoning its rapprochement with Rabat. Algeria
Trump threatens to bomb Iranian bridges, power plants over ship attacks
Iranian official says Tehran would retaliate by targeting ‘energy facilities in which the United States has interests’. President Donald Trump has warned that the United States military will target Iran’s civilian infrastructure each time Tehran’s forces fire at a vessel in the Strait of Hormuz. If the warning, issued on Wednesday, materialises, it would represent a major escalation in the conflict, which is already spiralling across the region. Recommended Stories list of 3 items list 1 of 3US Secretary of State say Iran is in ‘a lot of trouble’ list 2 of 3Iran war’s $37bn price tag: Why does the Pentagon want $67bn more? list 3 of 3‘Just want to go back’: Lebanese await return as army enters ‘pilot zone’ end of list “From this point forward, any time the Islamic Republic of Iran shoots at a ship in the Strait of Hormuz, whether it be by Missile, Rocket, Drone, or any other device or weapon, the United States will bomb and destroy ONE BRIDGE OR POWER PLANT, including those located next to, or in, the Capital City of Tehran,” Trump wrote in a social media post. “Thank you for your attention to this matter!” Trump has previously said the US would bomb Iran’s bridges and power stations, going as far as threatening to wipe out the country’s civilisation, but Wednesday’s statement is more specific than his previous threats. Iran’s semiofficial Tasnim news agency cited an Iranian military source as saying that Tehran will retaliate in kind if the country’s infrastructure is attacked. “If the Americans target a bridge or power plant in Iran, Iran will reciprocate by hitting infrastructures and bridges in the region, including energy facilities in which the United States has interests,” the source said, according to Tasnim. The official added that passage through Hormuz is safe for ships, but it must be coordinated with Iran. The US and Iran have been exchanging attacks for the past 12 days as the memorandum of understanding (MoU) that was supposed to end the war between the two sides got derailed over the fate of the Strait of Hormuz. Iran has claimed sovereignty over the strategic waterway, arguing that the MoU gives Iran the authority to manage the strait. The Trump administration, however, has insisted that the Hormuz must return to its pre-war status as an international, free passageway. The hostilities restarted after ships that crossed the strait on the Omani side without coordinating with Iran were targeted. The US military has been striking military targets in Iran as well as civilian ports and bridges, killing dozens. Tehran has retaliated with barrages of missiles and rockets on bases housing US troops across the region. Iranian attacks have killed at least four service members in Jordan and Iraq this month and injured several others. Late on Tuesday, the Pentagon identified 28-year-old Angel Rampersad as the third fatality of an Iranian missile strike in Jordan. Rampersad was missing in the immediate aftermath of the attack. Trump is set to attend the arrival of the bodies of the service members in the US – known as dignified transfer – at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware on Wednesday. He said Iran will “pay a big price” for killing US troops. “They’re getting decimated,” Trump said as he departed for the airbase. Renewing the war has sent oil prices soaring once again after a brief reprieve during the ceasefire. The average price of one gallon (3.4 litres) of petrol in the US has surpassed $4 after dropping to around $3.80 from a high of $4.50 during the truce. Adblock test (Why?)
Elon and the Other Gaza
People & Power How the world’s richest man helped trigger an HIV crisis in one of the world’s poorest countries. When Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, was made head of Trump’s newly created Department of Government Efficiency, he took a knife to foreign aid spending. He claimed billions were being lost to corruption within USAID and wasted on useless and absurd programmes, including $50m on buying “condoms for Hamas” in Gaza. But he was talking about the wrong Gaza. Mozambique’s Gaza province suffers one of the highest rates of HIV in the world and depended heavily on USAID for treatment and prevention. When Musk closed the agency down, it set off a chain reaction, putting the lives of millions of people at risk. Al Jazeera travelled to Gaza province to witness the real-life consequences of Musk’s ruthless cuts. Published On 22 Jul 2026 Adblock test (Why?)
France becomes first EU country to officially ban social media for children
NewsFeed France will ban social media for under-15s from September 1, following the UK and Australia’s moves toward blanket restrictions. However, the approach remains highly contested, with research suggesting such bans may be ineffective as young users learn to bypass restrictions. Published On 22 Jul 2026 Adblock test (Why?)
Palestine weekly: Ahead of elections, Israel doubles down on attacks
On July 17, hours after Israel’s parliament formally dissolved itself and set an October 27 election date, an Israeli drone struck a funeral procession outside Ahmad Yassin Mosque in the Nuseirat refugee camp, killing at least eight mourners as they buried a man killed hours earlier. The UN human rights office said Israeli attacks have killed at least 57 Palestinians, including six children and eight women, between July 13 and 20, warning that the pattern “raises concerns of continuing violations of international humanitarian law, war crimes and other possible atrocity crimes in Gaza”. Recommended Stories list of 3 items list 1 of 3US defence chief Hegseth puts Iran war cost at $37.5bn so far list 2 of 3How will Khalil al-Hayya’s leadership shape Hamas? list 3 of 3Can mediators broker a truce between the US and Iran? end of list In the same week, Israel’s military carried out daily killings, ministers raced to pass legislation before parliament dissolved, the Civil Administration issued demolition and land-seizure orders, and settlers attacked Palestinians with near-total impunity. All of this points towards an unrelenting few months of violence and dispossession before elections take place. A mass-casualty week in Gaza Beyond the Nuseirat funeral strike, the week’s Gaza toll included a string of air attacks on homes and displaced families. On July 15, an Israeli helicopter attack killed Omar Sami Abu Qassem, his wife Asmaa Ghazi and their six-year-old daughter Habiba in Deir el-Balah; their three-year-old son was the only survivor. On July 18, an Israeli warplane struck a residential building in Gaza City’s Nassr neighbourhood without warning, killing Adham Nasman, his wife Marwa and three of their children; a third child survived only because he was not home. Israel claimed that Nasman was a Hamas commander – the group has not issued a statement confirming that. A day later, Rida Abu Asr was killed by Israeli artillery shelling in Zeitoun, one of several people killed in the neighbourhood that day as tanks advanced towards Dawla Junction, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa. Israeli strikes also killed seven police officers, including the director of Jabalia’s police station, in an attack on a checkpoint on July 14, and repeatedly hit tents sheltering displaced families in al-Mawasi throughout the week, according to Wafa. Then, an overnight Israeli air attack on July 21 killed Firas al-Masri, his wife Salsabeel and their four children as they slept in Gaza City, according to medical officials. Amid this string of mass-casualty attacks, Israel’s Defence Minister Israel Katz told Channel 14, while touring northern Gaza, he felt satisfaction from the scenes of destruction, which he said resulted from a deliberate Israeli policy. He added that Israel was studying the establishment of three military-style settlement outposts in northern Gaza. Katz’s statements coincided with a march on Sunday by the Nachala settler movement to the Gaza border fence, in which right-wing Israelis – accompanied by more than a dozen ministers and legislators, including National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, and endorsed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party – called for the re-establishment of settlements inside Gaza. On the other side of the fence, the Israeli-controlled “Yellow Line” has continued expanding westward, with new blocks placed near al-Qarara and reaching the Abu Miri roundabout east of Deir el-Balah, forcing hundreds more families to flee Israel’s advance, according to local sources. Amid such developments, the humanitarian picture in Gaza, laid out in the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs’ (OCHA) July 16 situation report, continues to deteriorate. Sixty-three percent of households in Gaza now access less than six litres of drinking water a day, while 60 percent live within 10 metres of exposed sewage. Livestock feed imports have been blocked for more than a month, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) confirmed, tripling barley prices and threatening a die-off in August that would reverse the modest herd recovery recorded between October 2025 and May 2026. Israeli settler roads open – and Palestinian gates close The escalation in Gaza parallelled a sharpening campaign to create “facts on the ground” across the occupied West Bank. This past week, the Israeli security cabinet approved 1.3 billion shekels ($426.3m) to establish 34 new illegal settlements. On July 15, it approved an additional 1.075 billion shekels ($352.5m) for settler road infrastructure, Wafa reported, which will support much of the new settlements and outposts reaching far-flung areas of the West Bank. Smotrich called the decision a “settlement and security revolution”, aiming to establish more than 100 settlements and 160 agricultural and pastoral outposts. That funding framework provided the context for this week’s wave of demolitions, whose stated purpose has moved beyond permit enforcement to clearing land for the proliferating settlement infrastructure campaign. Israel’s Crimson Thread barrier project continued with the systematic destruction of Palestinian water infrastructure in the northern Jordan Valley, with Israeli forces and settlers destroying three artesian wells near Atuf, confiscating pumps and generators, and severing roughly 800 metres of pipeline serving 4,500 dunams (4.5 square kilometres) of farmland, according to the Atuf Village Council. In Masafer Yatta, the Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission has tied a wave of demolition and stop-work orders in Ad-Deirat and Ar Rifaiyya directly to a planned settlement road to run alongside Route 356 – a project that puts three of five local schools serving 700 children at risk, including Ar Rifaiyya’s, which lost a court appeal against demolition on July 8. Israeli authorities also issued a military order seizing land in Jaba, north of occupied East Jerusalem, for what Palestinian officials say is another settlement road linking Route 60 to the Nabi Yaqub settlement – the latest in a string of military seizure orders used to facilitate settlement infrastructure. The same infrastructure drive has increasingly shaped the geography of violence in the occupied West Bank, including in al-Mughayyir, northeast of Ramallah, where 17-year-old national youth football player Fadi al-Naasan died on July 18 of wounds from a settler-and-army raid on July 11 –
More than 140 dead, missing on refugee boat stranded off Mauritania
UN says a boat carrying refugees and migrants from Africa drifted for 25 days before arriving at a port with dead and living on board. At least 143 refugees and migrants are dead or missing from a single boat off the coast of Mauritania that was trying to reach Europe, the United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, says. The agency said on Tuesday that it was “extremely saddened” by the deaths, which came despite three rescue operations off Mauritania between July 14 and 18 that pulled 387 people to safety from other stranded boats. Recommended Stories list of 2 items list 1 of 2‘We can’t go out’: Migrants hide as Mauritania presses deportation campaign list 2 of 2EU-backed migrant crackdowns in Mauritania fuel fear and deportations end of list The vessel had set off from Bafuloto in The Gambia and was rescued on July 18 after 25 days adrift, carrying bodies and 38 survivors when it reached the port of Nouadhibou, the UNHCR said. “Among the survivors of… that ship were two children who have lost all their family members during the journey, and they are recovering in hospital,” UNHCR spokesperson Matt Saltmarsh told reporters in Geneva. Another person died on another vessel that disembarked in Mauritania on July 14. The dead were from sub-Saharan African countries, he said, without giving details of how they died. Mauritania’s coastguard put the number missing at 122, saying the boat ran out of fuel after leaving The Gambia with 160 people on board. The UNHCR called the route to the Canary Islands “one of the world’s deadliest”, citing long distances and overcrowded, unseaworthy boats, and urged more access to education and jobs to offer alternatives to the crossings. Mauritania is a major departure point on the Atlantic route, where tens of thousands attempt to reach the Canary Islands, part of Spain, each year. Arrivals have fallen sharply under a European Union-funded crackdown, in which Mauritanian authorities have deported thousands of asylum seekers and migrants and pushed departures to longer, deadlier journeys from further down the coast. Adblock test (Why?)
‘There is no safe place’: Israeli attack kills family of six in Gaza
Israeli forces launch regular attacks on Gaza despite a US-backed ‘ceasefire’ agreed in October. An Israeli air strike has killed a man, his wife and their four children in Gaza City in the latest of Israel’s frequent deadly attacks on Palestinians in the devastated enclave, which have continued despite a US-backed “ceasefire” signed more than nine months ago. The strike hit the al-Masri family home in the Sabra neighbourhood on Tuesday, killing Firas and Salsabeel al-Masri and their three daughters and son as the family was sleeping, health officials said. Recommended Stories list of 4 items list 1 of 4MSF demands Israel release detained Palestinian healthcare workers list 2 of 4‘We just want to live’: Palestinians in Gaza react to Hamas election list 3 of 4Five Palestinians killed in fire after Israeli attack in Gaza list 4 of 4Can AI systems make moral decisions in war? end of list The deaths add to a toll of more than 1,150 Palestinians, mostly civilians, killed by Israeli strikes since the “ceasefire” was agreed. The truce has halted full-scale fighting but not the near-daily Israeli strikes that have continued since. The Israeli military confirmed the strike, saying it was targeting a Hamas member and was still looking into the results of the attack. A video obtained by the Reuters news agency showed rescue workers struggling to put out fires in the house and bring out bodies in white shrouds. Firas al-Masri’s father, Abu Yusuf al-Masri, told Reuters the explosion took place as the family was asleep. “We were unable to save our grandchildren and children from the flames and the devastation. Around five or six were martyred, most of them children and women, without mercy and without any prior warning,” he said, standing outside the family house. “There is no relative calm, and there is no safe place at all,” the grey-bearded man added. Mediators – including Egypt, Qatar, Turkiye and the United States – have been trying to advance US President Donald Trump’s plan for ending the conflict in Gaza, which calls for Hamas’s disarmament and Israeli withdrawals, but there has been little sign of progress. The United Nations has condemned the ongoing Israeli strikes on Gaza. “Nine months after the announcement of a ceasefire, still nowhere is safe for Palestinians in Gaza,” UN human rights office spokesman Thameen Al-Kheetan told reporters in Geneva on Tuesday. Israeli attacks have killed “at least 57 Palestinians, including six children and eight women,” from July 13 to 20, he said. The figures did not include the al-Masri family. “The killing of civilians in these attacks raises concerns of continuing violations of international humanitarian law, war crimes and other possible atrocity crimes in Gaza,” Al-Kheetan said. “Under international law, deliberately attacking civilians is a war crime.” Adblock test (Why?)
Clashes between police and people protesting Italy arrest death
Clashes between police and people protesting Italy arrest death NewsFeed Clashes broke out between Italian police and protesters in Bologna during a demonstration held after a Moroccan-born man died in police custody on Monday. 42-year-old Abderrahim Fakir died while being held down by two police officers. Published On 21 Jul 2026 Adblock test (Why?)
India tunnel collapse at a hydropower project kills 10 as 17 remain missing
Rescue teams have been struggling to reach the 17 people trapped because of hazardous conditions inside the tunnel. At least 10 people have died and 17 others remain missing after a suspected gas explosion triggered the collapse of a tunnel under construction at a hydropower project in India’s northeastern state of Sikkim, officials said. The blast ripped through the tunnel on Monday at Samardung village, near the border with Bhutan and Tibet in the Himalayas, officials said. Recommended Stories list of 4 items list 1 of 4At least six feared dead after bridge collapses in northern India list 2 of 4Police attack Cockroach activists as thousands march on Indian parliament list 3 of 4‘Now or never’: Students defy Delhi lockdown to march on India’s parliament list 4 of 4Data breach reportedly targets India’s Kudankulam nuclear power plant end of list Multiple workers were carrying out construction projects on the 500-megawatt project for the state-owned National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) on the Teesta River. Survivors told authorities they heard a loud explosion before debris came crashing through the tunnel, trapping dozens inside. NHPC said in a statement that a sudden burst of gas suspected to be methane trapped or embedded in rocks in the tunnel caused the blast. As news of the accident spread, six officials from the NHPC entered the tunnel to assist in rescue efforts but became trapped themselves, officials said. “We have recovered 10 bodies so far, and 17 others are feared trapped,” local police chief Sonam Dolma said. Rescue teams, including the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), have been struggling to reach those trapped because of hazardous conditions inside the tunnel, where toxic gases have accumulated. “We found toxic gases such as methane, carbon monoxide and hydrogen sulphide inside the tunnel,” NDRF official Nitin Kumar told reporters at the scene. He said rescuers were using specialised breathing equipment as they tried to search for survivors amid dangerous air conditions. Construction accidents are not uncommon in India, especially in the Himalayan region, where seismic activity and unpredictable underground conditions make tunnel projects especially risky. In 2023, 41 workers were trapped for 17 days before being rescued after a section of a tunnel in northern Uttarakhand state collapsed. Experts told AP that the Teesta River basin, where the hydropower project is being built, lies in a seismically active region marked by young, fragile rock formations riddled with fractures and underground pockets that can trap and accumulate gases, triggering explosions. Adblock test (Why?)
Chaos in India as ‘Cockroach activists’ march on parliament
NewsFeed Chaos erupted outside India’s parliament as thousands attempted to storm the building, amid growing protests challenging Modi’s government. The ‘Cockroach Janta Party’ began as a satirical online movement. Now it’s become something far bigger. Al Jazeera’s @avawarrinerr explains. Published On 20 Jul 2026 Adblock test (Why?)