Approximately 80,000 Moroccans fought in Franco’s Rebel army during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). The Rebels (who strategically dubbed themselves “the Nationalists”) cast the war as a “Holy Crusade,” which pitted together Christians and Muslims against the “godless” Republicans. Throughout the war and for most of his dictatorship, Franco sought to burnish Spain’s image as a friend of Islam and as the standard-bearer of the Muslim civilization of al-Andalus (medieval Muslim Iberia). This multifaceted Francoist initiative was not just a discursive project; it also involved the construction of mosques in Morocco and Spain, diplomatic outreach to Muslim countries, and the sponsorship of Moroccan pilgrims traveling to Mecca for the hajj. My paper will examine the first pilgrimage to Mecca sponsored by Franco, which took place in 1937, less than a year into the Spanish Civil War. At the center of my paper will be a fascinating but neglected source: al-Rihla al-makkiyya (The Meccan Journey), written by Ahmad al-Rahuni, one of the most important Moroccan historians of the first half of the twentieth century. Franco chose al-Rahuni to lead the Moroccan delegation of pilgrims to Mecca, and al-Rahuni’s account of the journey was published by the Franco Institute for Hispano-Arab Studies in 1941. Under al-Rahuni’s leadership and Franco’s sponsorship, the Moroccan pilgrims first traveled to southern Spain, where they visited the monuments of al-Andalus. They then traveled by boat to Jeddah, making a stop in Tripoli, Libya, which was, at the time, under Italian colonial rule. After the pilgrimage to Mecca, the Moroccan pilgrims made stops in Rome and Spain, before returning to Tetouan, the capital of the Spanish Protectorate. Al-Rahuni’s text offers a multidirectional view of Mediterranean history in the 1930s, highlighting understudied aspects of modern North African and European history. First of all, the text bears witness to the collaboration between Spanish Fascists and the intellectual elite of northern Morocco. Second, the pilgrims’ tour of southern Spain, as guests of Franco’s army, illustrates the Francoist use of Andalusi history as a tool to justify its colonial presence in Morocco. Finally, the pilgrims’ stops in Tripoli, Saudi Arabia, and Rome offer al-Rahuni opportunities for transnational and transcolonial reflection. The Moroccan scholar reflects on the differences between Libyans, Saudis, and Moroccans, and between Spanish colonialism and Italian colonialism.

At the height of the Spanish Civil War, Francisco Franco explained why he viewed the continuing colonization of northern Morocco as beneficial to both sides: “the Moroccans’ love for the Spanish national cause,” declared the generalíssimo, “is not a circumstantial fact, but has deep roots.” In 1938, emboldened by this vision of a harmonious utopia of Hispano-Arab cooperation, the Tetuan-based Resident-General Juan Beigbeder sent several dozen young students to Cairo, where they resided in the Spanish-financed Bayt al-Maghrib and pursued their higher education at various Egyptian universities. Hoping to raise the status of Fascist Spain in the Arab world and thus alleviate its increasing international isolation, the Spanish authorities put a lot of hope on this mission, which they viewed as a cornerstone of their colonial oeuvre. Instead of producing a well-trained and loyal native elite, though, the Bayt al-Maghrib quickly turned into a quagmire characterized by embezzlement and permanent infighting, thus causing the Spaniards serious headaches instead of bringing forth the desired results. However, even more interesting is the fact that several of the students began to engage in nationalist activities in the Cairo by meeting Egyptian politicians, publishing in local newspapers, and joining rallies for the liberation of Palestine. Thus, instead of contributing to the greater glory of Fascist Spain before the Arab world, the young Moroccans brought their case for independence to the attention of the Egyptian public for the first time, and created networks of support that would prove pivotal for the course of the nationalist struggle during the post-WWII period. Ultimately conceding the colossal mistake Spain had made, the Cairo-based ambassador Carlos de Miranda angrily exclaimed in the spring of 1943: “the only fruit of these missions is to spur on Moroccan nationalism (…) There are a few fanatic [students], but they are all nationalists.” In conclusion, based on Arab and Spanish language sources, this project studies the internationalization of the Moroccan struggle for independence, analyzing how false ideological assumptions in combination with serious political miscalculations directly contributed to the establishment of anti-colonial nationalism in the Spanish zone. Moreover, it incorporates the Moroccan nationalist movement into contemporary academic debates on transnational political activism and thereby challenges the locally restricted focus of the historiography on this topic.

The folklore and popular music that developed around emigration from Nador, Morocco to Western Europe from the 1950s to the1980s spoke to anxieties of separation; the travails of the crossing; and the difficulties of adjusting to migrant life abroad. From the 1990s to today themes have expanded to include the desire to marry a European Muslim as well as the difficulties of making it in newer southern Europe destinations now favored by Nadori emigrants. This presentation will focus on one popular narrative that combines elements of anxiety about separation with adoration for the successful migrant in Spain. Cross-generational conflicts and struggles between the old gender social order and the new intensify the strains caused by the pull of family back home versus the requirement that the young leave in order to succeed. The tale climaxes in a violent confrontation between the family patriarch and his migrant son, thus illuminating the contradictions at the heart of Nadori migration. The narrative is one of fifty migration narratives collected during seven months of anthropological fieldwork in Nador, Morocco in 2013.