Western Sahara: A people denied their rights

The recent article “The War Both Morocco and Algeria Fear to Win” presents a provocative argument: that the Polisario Front survives because both Morocco and Algeria need the conflict to justify their political systems.

As a Sahrawi who has lived the reality of this conflict, I believe the analysis misses the most important element: the people themselves.

Western Sahara is not a geopolitical puzzle maintained by rival regimes. It is an unfinished decolonization process, recognized as such by international law.

The Sahrawi people are not a prop, nor a political invention. We are a nation whose right to self-determination has been reaffirmed repeatedly:

• UN General Assembly Resolution 1514 (1960): independence for all colonized peoples.
• International Court of Justice (1975 Advisory Opinion): no sovereignty ties linking Morocco to Western Sahara.
• Court of Justice of the European Union (2016, 2018, 2021, 2024): Western Sahara and Morocco are “separate and distinct territories,” and no agreement may include the territory without the consent of the Sahrawi people.

These are not political interpretations. They are binding legal facts.

1. The original article’s fundamental mistake: it erases the Sahrawi people

The article argues that Morocco cannot end the conflict because doing so would weaken the monarchy, while Algeria cannot end it because it would expose its own political vulnerabilities.

But this framing turns the conflict into a psychological drama between two regimes.
This narrative is not only incorrect — it is historically misleading.

The conflict did not begin as a Morocco–Algeria confrontation:

• The Polisario Front was founded in 1973 as an anti-colonial movement against Spanish rule.
• Morocco and Mauritania entered the territory in 1975 through the Madrid Tripartite Agreement with Spain, despite the International Court of Justice having already established that no sovereignty ties linked Morocco to Western Sahara.
• Tens of thousands of Sahrawis fled under bombardment, not because Algeria “needed a cause,” but because Moroccan forces advanced into the territory.

Reducing all this history to a rivalry between Rabat and Algiers erases a people who resisted colonial rule long before 1975, and ignores the heavy price the Sahrawi population has paid — from displacement to bombardment to occupation.

2. The Sahrawi struggle is sustained by Sahrawis — not Algeria

For five decades:

• Sahrawi refugees have survived in one of the harshest desert environments on Earth.
• Activists in the occupied territories have endured imprisonment, torture, and enforced disappearances.
• A new generation — born after the ceasefire — has carried the struggle politically, legally, and diplomatically, not because of any “regional programming,” but because they inherited a national cause that remains unresolved.

Since the 1970s, political imprisonment in Western Sahara has been a direct expression of Sahrawi rejection of Moroccan occupation — carried out by Sahrawis living under military control and far removed from any form of external dependency. The long list of Sahrawi political detainees reflects a grassroots refusal of occupation, not the agenda of any regional actor.

Similarly, the 2005 Independence Intifada and the Gdeim Izik protest camp in 2010 were not isolated events, nor products of external influence. They were political uprisings that expressed the lived reality of Sahrawis under occupation, symbolizing a collective demand for dignity, freedom, and the right to self-determination.

To imply that Sahrawis “exist politically” only because Algeria hosts refugees is profoundly disrespectful to a documented history of resistance, suffering, and legal recognition.

3. The conflict persists because Morocco rejects a democratic solution

There is no symmetry here.
Only one side is obstructing the UN process.

Morocco refuses any referendum that includes the option of independence — the very solution agreed upon in the 1991 ceasefire and guaranteed by the UN.

MINURSO was created for one purpose: to hold a referendum.
Morocco has blocked that referendum for more than 30 years.

And Morocco’s ability to defy international law cannot be understood without acknowledging the protection it receives from powerful global actors. Support from France and Israel — both within the UN system and in Western capitals — strengthens Morocco’s capacity to reject a lawful, democratic process of self-determination. Lobby networks in Europe and the United States, including some with Jewish-affiliated backgrounds, form part of a broader strategy to obstruct any solution rooted in international law.

France has also provided Morocco with direct military support in the conflict against the Sahrawi people, while Israel has bolstered Morocco’s surveillance and intelligence capabilities through advanced spyware programs. Today, both countries continue to shield Morocco diplomatically and through well-connected lobbying networks across Europe and the United States, enabling Rabat to resist international legal obligations.

By contrast, Algeria’s support for the Sahrawi people is rooted in a liberation context, not geopolitical manipulation. Algeria hosted tens of thousands of Sahrawis fleeing bombardment — including napalm strikes such as those in Um Dreiga — providing refuge to civilians escaping death and mass displacement. This support aligns with the internationally recognized right of colonized peoples to resist occupation, rather than any intention to instrumentalize the conflict.

4. The author is right about one point: both regimes fear peace — but for very different reasons

• Morocco fears peace because it fears a democratic, verifiable referendum.
• Algeria fears regional destabilization if the conflict reignites.
• Sahrawis fear only one thing: that the world will continue ignoring them.

Conclusion: This conflict needs truth, not psychological metaphors

The Western Sahara conflict is not:

• a Moroccan myth,
• an Algerian invention,
• nor a “pressure valve” for authoritarian regimes.

It is a colonial question pending decolonization, recognized by the United Nations, international courts, and major legal institutions.

Sahrawis are not asking Europe, Africa, the Arab world, Asia, or the Americas to take geopolitical sides.
We ask for one thing only:

Let international law apply to us — the same way it applies to every other occupied people.

The article published in The Times of Israel analyzes the fears of regimes.
But it overlooks the hopes — and the rights — of a nation.

No analysis of Western Sahara is complete without the Sahrawi voice.