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Critical Coverage of the Middle East Since 1971

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North Africa

The MERIP Podcast

The MERIP Podcast Episode Ten: Raouf Farrah

On the Sumud Convoy, the Gaza Flotilla, and North African Solidarity

James Ryan, Raouf Farrah • 1 min read

'Undesirables' and the Mediterranean Graphic Novel — The cover of Aomar Boum and Nadjib Berber’s book “Undersirables.”A 2002 political cartoon by Nadjib Berber sharply criticizing IMF policies in Algeria. The man in the suit says, “With the IMF, my motto is… if the Algerians don’t want to drop their pants, they have to tighten their belts.” To which the other man replies, “The problem is we have neither one nor the other.” Courtesy of Susan Slyomovics.

Current Analysis

'Undesirables' and the Mediterranean Graphic Novel

Aomar Boum on tracing the holocaust to North Africa through his new graphic novel with Nadjib Berber.

Aomar Boum, Elizabeth Perego • 12 min read

Remembering Jamila Debbech Ksiksi—An Interview with the Late Tunisian Lawmaker and Anti-Racist Activist — Jamila Debbech Ksiksi, 2014. Photo courtesy of Ennahda party.Jamila Debbech Ksiksi with some of her colleagues in Ennahda, September 2014. Photo courtesy Ennahda party.Mahmoud Rassaa, Jamila Debbech Ksiksi and Shreya Parikh on November 30, 2022, during their interview.

Current Analysis

Remembering Jamila Debbech Ksiksi—An Interview with the Late Tunisian Lawmaker and Anti-Racist Activist

On migrant's rights and the legal struggle against racism in Tunisia.

Shreya Parikh • 11 min read

Animating Sudanese History—An Interview with Leila Aboulela, Author of River Spirit — The cover of Leila Aboulela’s new book, River Spirit.Leila Aboulela in 2019. Photo by Judy Laing (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Current Analysis

Animating Sudanese History—An Interview with Leila Aboulela, Author of River Spirit

Historian Marie Grace Brown speaks to Leila Abouleila about her new novel, River Spirit.

Marie Grace Brown, Leila Aboulela • 14 min read

The Maghreb’s Peripheral Centers in Permanent Crisis — Bottles of smuggled fuel for sale on the side of the road in Oujda, Morocco, near the Algerian border, 2013. Fadel Senna/AFP via Getty Images

MER Article

The Maghreb’s Peripheral Centers in Permanent Crisis

Informal trade in the Maghreb's borderlands.

Max Gallien • 8 min read

Settler Colonialism in the Middle East and North Africa: A Protracted History — An 1837 watercolor depicts French forces advancing across cliffs and through a breach in the wall of the fortified city of Constantine in Algeria. Artist possibly Jean-Louis Gaspard of the 31st Regiment of Infantry. Anne S.K. Brown Military Collection at the Brown University Library/Library of CongressThe governor of Italian Libya, Italo Balbo, welcomes arriving Italian colonists in Tripoli in 1938. Courtesy of State Treasury of Poland, image in the public domain.

MER Article

Settler Colonialism in the Middle East and North Africa: A Protracted History

Settler colonial studies developed as a distinct field of research to address the particular circumstances of settler societies. Since its advent in the 1990s, this field has only marginally considered the Middle East and North Africa, focusing instead on the Anglophone settler societies of North Am

Lorenzo Veracini • 13 min read

The Sub-Saharan African Turn in Moroccan Literature — Moroccans protest against racism in front of the country’s parliament building in Rabat, September 2014. Stringer/Reuters

MER Article

The Sub-Saharan African Turn in Moroccan Literature

With the increasing presence of sub-Saharan African migrants in North Africa over the past decade, public discussions of race and prejudice are losing their taboo. Moroccan writers are encouraging a broader awareness of structural racism by including more Black characters in their novels and by depi

Brahim El Guabli • 9 min read

MER Article

Maghreb From the Margins

This issue of Middle East Report on “Maghreb From the Margins” addresses the evolving challenges that the peripheries are posing to power structures in Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Tunisia and the Western Sahara.

The Editors of Issue #298 • 6 min read

The Sub-Saharan African Turn in Moroccan Literature — Moroccans protest against racism in front of the country’s parliament building in Rabat, September 2014. Stringer/Reuters

Current Analysis

The Sub-Saharan African Turn in Moroccan Literature

With the increasing presence of sub-Saharan African migrants in North Africa over the past decade, public discussions of race and prejudice are losing their taboo. Moroccan writers are encouraging a broader awareness of structural racism by including more Black characters in their novels and by depi

Brahim El Guabli • 9 min read

Current Analysis

North Africans Go Long-Distance Shopping

George Trumbull’s recent blog entry [http://www.merip.org/seven-places-you-didnt-know-were-part-middle-east] about Middle Eastern outposts in other parts of the world rightly mentioned Marseille and the Italian islet of Lampedusa [http://www.merip.org/mer/mer261/lampedusa], with its now closed migra

David McMurray • 3 min read

Current Analysis

North African Commonalities (part two)

Bill Lawrence is director of the North Africa Project for the International Crisis Group. He is a former Peace Corps volunteer (Morocco), Fulbright scholar (Tunisia), development consultant (Egypt), State Department official, Arabic translator and filmmaker (Marrakech Inshallah, Moroccans in Boston)

David McMurray • 7 min read

Current Analysis

North African Commonalities (part one)

Bill Lawrence is director of the North Africa Project for the International Crisis Group. He is a former Peace Corps volunteer (Morocco), Fulbright scholar (Tunisia), development consultant (Egypt), State Department official, Arabic translator and filmmaker (Marrakech Inshallah, Moroccans in Boston)

David McMurray • 9 min read