Former Mossad Official: Morocco Initiated Israel Ties in 2018 Over Western Sahara Issue

In a statement to The Time of Israel, Ram Ben Barak revealed that the Moroccans launched the normalization process in 2018. "It comes from a Moroccan official who turned to me. [...] He reached out and asked if there was a possibility of receiving our help to influence the Americans to help them with their Sahara problem," said the former senior Mossad official.

"I said it was possible, but Israel must also get something in return: the normalization of relations," continued Ben Barak, calling on the Moroccans to publicly support Donald Trump’s Deal of the Century. "After a week, he came back to me and said, ’We’re ready,’" he added. Subsequently, the former senior Mossad official said he contacted "a friend in Washington" who had worked alongside George Bush. He put him in touch with Jason Greenblatt, a trusted man of Donald Trump.

The lobby gets to work. Ben Barak and the Moroccan official go to the United States. Normalization is the subject of discussions at the White House. Jason Greenblatt approves the idea. A meeting with Ben Barak, US State Department and White House officials, as well as the Minister of Foreign Affairs, African Cooperation and Moroccans Residing Abroad, Nasser Bourita, will take place a month later. It was then decided that a meeting would take place between the former Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu and the Moroccan Foreign Minister two days later on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. This is how the process, says the former No. 2 of the Mossad, continued through official government channels until the materialization of the Morocco-Israel rapprochement.