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For some reason, I found myself today reading a column by a Washington Times columnist who was furious that former CIA Director James Woolsey had suggested that profiling Muslims might not be the answer to airline security. Granted, I am not an expert on security or counterterrorism, although in light of the fact that our experts do things like posting their security procedures manual on the Internet, perhaps anyone is qualified to bring a little common sense to the issue. For the sake of argument, let's leave aside the quaint notion that Muslims are fellow human beings who deserve the same dignity and respect as anyone else, and focus purely pragmatic reasons why a policy of profiling might not be a good idea:

1. Bigotry does not equal security. Stereotyping all Muslims because a tiny fraction have been involved in acts of terror against the United States is both a lazy and ignorant way to cope with the problem of terrorism. Lazy because it relieves one of the necessity for analyzing the problem. Ignorant because it makes an assumption that in the vast majority of cases is untrue and unwarranted. We've been here before: we made the same mistake with the Nisei in World War II.
2. Humiliating people does not make us safer. Treating Muslims like cattle, particularly in countries like Iraq that we are trying to "help," has been proven to undermine our counter-terrorism efforts. There is nothing like an Abu Ghraib to recruit people to Al Qaeda. So why should we adopt a policy that humiliates and discriminates against Muslims generally?
3. Profiling all Muslims is radically overinclusive. When approximately one in six people on earth is a Muslim, and a de minimis number of them pose a threat, then it is highly inefficient to try to screen all Muslims in order to uncover the few who may be terrorists.
4. Profiling all Muslims is radically underinclusive. Two words: Oklahoma City. Profiling Muslims does nothing to catch the Timothy McVeigh's of the world. There are lots of people who hate us who are not Muslims.
5. It's impractical and inefficient. Much as we like to think we have infinite resources in the United States, in point of fact there is no way we are going to be able to keep track of a billion people.
6. It misjudges the threat. If Flight 93 had reached its destination, I might well have died in my office a couple of blocks from the White House on September 11, 2001. As it was, I left the office shortly after Flight 77 smashed into the Pentagon across the river. My brother in law watched the twin towers fall in New York. Despite the unprecedented carnage and the shocking effect of an assault on American soil, however, there was never an existential threat to the United States. Unlike Japan or Germany in the Second World War, Al Qaeda had no ability to follow up. Before we turned the tide in the Pacific, Japan had not only bombed our main naval base but asserted control over a good part of the Pacific and invaded China. Germany, meanwhile, reigned supreme over the rubble of Europe, where England was a beleaguered holdout. While I agree we should treat the threat from Al Qaeda seriously and pursue it relentlessly, lest it develop the capability to do us greater harm, I do not think that our values, our liberty, and our privacy should all be mindlessly sacrificed in pursuit of the terrorist menace. Frankly, at present the average American is far more likely to die in an automobile accident than to be a victim of airline terrorism. And yet our cynical and cowardly public officials harp on our irrational fears and prejudices to the benefit of their own power and position.
7. It's not the most effective use of our resources. Where is Osama bin Laden and why is he at large? A more effective pursuit of Al Qaeda (rather than the sideshows in Iraq and Afghanistan, and now Yemen?) and a reexamination of the brutal Realpolitik that drives American foreign policy would, in my opinion, do more to reduce the terrorists threat than profiling every last Muslim could ever accomplish.

In every endeavor, there are certain people who achieve a level of excellence that clearly separates them from the ordinary participant. Such people need not be a world champion -- a Lance Armstrong, Mohammed Ali, or Michael Phelps -- but nevertheless they demonstrate a grace and proficiency that sets them apart.

For me, a handful of blogs that I read integrate words, pictures and presentation in such a skilful manner that they are truly set apart -- and, of those, one is written by an acclaimed Moroccan-American novelist. Among the rest, My Marrakesh stands out for elegant design, exquisite taste, gorgeous photography, and crisp, whimsical prose.

Part of what makes My Marrakesh so attractive is its thematic unity. The author, an expatriate American building an elegant guesthouse in cosmopolitan Marrakesh, couples a deep love of Moroccan artistry with an engaging sense of humor over the incessant minor obstacles that repeatedly arise to frustrate her would-be avocation as a hotelier. Occasionally, as in her recent photo montage of Afghan men, she permits a glimpse of the grittier life she leads professionally as an international consultant.

Mostly, however, My Marrakesh is a celebration of simple pleasure and daily beauty -- snapshots of family life, interviews with both Marrakeshis and visitors, accounts of shopping trips in Marrakesh's rich and varied markets. It presents a picture of a life varied and fulfilled, in which one can escape, though not forget, the world's troubles through an appreciation of beauty as seen by the eye of a connoisseur.

For all these reasons, it is easy to see why My Marrakesh again has my vote for Best African Blog in the 2010 Weblog Awards, and I urge anyone who visits the 2010 "Bloggies" to cast a vote for My Marrakesh.

Although perhaps only 5,000 Jews remain in Morocco, the country's rich Jewish heritage and well-preserved "heritage sites" continue to draw Jewish tourists, many of them looking to discover their roots.[Ottawa Citizen]

The View from Fez point to the cure for what ails you at Morocco Therapy.

(It does look as though the therapist needs to cure one or two bugs.)

Karima in Fez has a short series of striking photos of the old city.

The death of Rabbi Sherwin Wine, a prominent fixture of the Detroit area for many years, in a taxi in Morocco is a grim reminder that there are too many deaths on the roads in Morocco — and in the United States.

One of the things I have always liked best about Robert B. Parker's mystery stories is that urban(e) tough guy Spenser is regularly cooking some delicious gourmet dish when he is not out roughing up the bad guys. Parker is quite detailed about the mouth-watering meals that Spenser cooks up and then usually washes down with good beer, so much so that one could almost imagine doing the cooking oneself.

So it is that I try new food as much as I can; life should be a culinary adventure. Finding myself in Puerto Rico a little more than a week ago for a conference, I escaped from the lavish Rio Mar resort long enough to sample "Mofongo," a mashed plantain dish, with octopus and conch at a local restaurant. Much to my surprise, I was the only person in the restaurant, a fact compensated for by a magnificent view of the island.

The beauty of the island was in stark contrast to the rather grim reading I brought along. After much searching, I had obtained a copy of Mohammed Choukri's For Bread Alone, and I read it in the evenings after seminars. Choukri recounts his brutal upbringing in a novel that is also very much about food, because there is never enough of it. In one vignette, Choukri jumps off the pier in the harbor to retrieve a crust of bread discarded by a fisherman, only to discover that he is swimming in a sea of shit. (Milan Kundera would no doubt find the novel vulgar but not kitschy.) Choukri's novel counterpoints between desire and disgust, the torments of appetite in a world where there is never enough of anything and a cruel and ignominious death hovers constantly in the background.

Maryam of MyMarrakesh holds forth on video on the organic nature and continuing evolution of Moroccan design, as well as the impact — positive and negative — of ongoing foreign investment.

Sometimes it is hard to remember one's first time in Morocco — or any foreign country with which one has become somewhat familiar, for that matter. Becky Ryan describes her first visit to Tangier with an enthusiasm undimmed even by the mob of faux guides that greeted her and her two friends upon their arrival. Her description is a reminder of how enchanting and how offputting Morocco can be for a first-time visitor, and how striking the difference between reality and one's preconceptions can be.

Morocco and Spain are engaged in serious discussions of the possibility of digging a channel tunnel or "chunnel" under the Straits of Gibraltar in order to connect Morocco and Spain by 2025, according to the Washington Post. After reading of the desperation with which immigrants try to cross the Straits clandestinely by boat now, one wonders what the implications for immigration would be, but certainly it would help to draw Europe and North Africa closer.  Of course, any improvement in the Moroccan economy as a result of more developed infrastructure can only have a positive effect on the number of desperate sea crossings.

MESSAGE CENTER - washingtonpost.com

Two American women report that as tourists, they were treated much better in Tunisia than in Morocco:

Most of all, women travelers are well-treated there. As two women traveling together, we were courteously treated wherever we went: in villages as well as Tunis, in outdoor eateries, in the markets, on the streets. This was in stark contrast to our unpleasant experience in Morocco a year before, where we felt uncomfortable at outdoor cafes and men in the streets made snake noises at us.

I am curious as to whether this experience is typical, and, if so, why it might be. Unfortunately I do not know enough about Tunisia to do more than speculate, although I wonder if there is a difference in the degree of government control over the population. I get the impression that Tunisia offers an antiseptic welcome to foreign tourists because the government would crack down on anyone who gave foreigners a hard time. I do not know, however, and I would welcome any more informed commentary.

Plane Prayers - washingtonpost.com

The Washington Post is critical of U.S. Airways for its decision to force six imams from boarding an aircraft last week after they unrolled prayer rugs and said their prayers before boarding the aircraft. The Post concludes, correctly, that "America can't become a country so locked by fear that those who unfurl a prayer rug automatically become suspects."

The Post also notes that there are reports of other suspicious behavior by the imams that may have justified expelling them from the aircraft. In cases such as this, I believe the pilot ought to have near absolute discretion to decide who boards his airplane. However, if the imams were denied passage not because of suspicious behavior but because they prayed, or were Arabs, or were Muslims, then they should sue the airline blind. Discretion, yes; discrimination, no.

Thanks to Crossroads Arabia. See also BlackProf.com.

C�rdoba Adds to Its Allure - New York Times

With the establishment of a new hotel and better tourist infrastructure, the ancient capital of the Andalusian Caliphate — once the largest metropolis in Europe and the continent's intellectual center — has attracted new interest.

One of the first things I did on my first arrival in Morocco was to climb Mount Toubkal, the second highest mountain in Africa. In some ways, this feat is less impressive than it sounds, since the ascent is for the most part little more than a strenuous walk. It is quite high, however. According to the New York Times, the people of Imlil, at the foot of the mountain, are now offering a few more amenities, proceeds from which go to finance improvements in the town. From the Times' description, it sounds like a nice balance between preserving the character of the countryside and generating tourist revenue for the people.

A very attractive set of photos from Morocco is posted at Murmures..

Liosliath points to the Morocco FAQ. Well worth a vist.

Carnival band leader Gloria Cummins would rather be in Agadir, the Guardian reports. Personally, I have never seen the attraction, but then I have never been to the Paradiso Valley, either.

Morocco: Here's Looking At You, Girlfriends

The Washington Post reports on the good times some local women had on their trip to Morocco. Lowlights were people on the street shouting "Fish and Chips" at them in Marrakesh; a highlight was the hammam.

create your own visited countries map

Thanks to David Kearns.

In the Heart of Paris, an African Beat - New York Times

The Washington Post's review of Moroccan restaurants in Paris has everything to do with wealthy Parisian chic and almost nothing to do with North Africa. No wonder people of North African descent are alienated in Paris.

The Post describes the scene at the restaurant 404 as follows:

"She" is a young woman in black who is celebrating a birthday in official 404 fashion: by gyrating on top of the bar with her shirt halfway raised in an attempt at belly dancing. Throughout the stylish restaurant-lounge - a perennial hot spot done up with casbah-cool d�cor - tables of media and fashion types abandon their bottles of Algerian Ch�teau Tellagh red wine, take out their digital cameras and mount the banquettes.

The "Arabian" scene in Paris sounds like nothing so much as post colonial French self indulgence.

In Morocco, One Man's Oasis Is Another's Watering Hole - New York Times

The Sahara, the world's second largest desert (after Antarctica), covers 3.5 million square miles, nearly the size of the United States. Only one quarter of it is sand; the rest is rocky plains, steppes and volcanic mountains. I wanted to experience not just the desert's moonlike isolation - Saharan dunes can rise to a thousand feet and stretch hundreds of miles - but also its lush aberrations: oases.

A Times reporter takes a trip to a desert oasis but returns disillusioned by the local tourism business.

The Morocco Foundation is looking for people to transport wheelchairs to Morocco.

Peace Corps Writers reviews former Morocco Peace Corps Volunteer Jeffrey Tayler's , about his travels through the Sahel to the south of Morocco.

I have just finished reading . Ibn Batuta's tale of his travels first to Mecca and then to the exotic East, with a brief coda on his voyage to Mali, provides a glimpse into a world far removed from most of our experience.

In the first place, Ibn Batuta's voyages, though often fraught with peril in the form of shipwrecks and attacks by pirates and bandits, are enveloped with an air of privilege. He travels from one sultan's court to another, where he is invariably showered with presents and frequently appointed to a state office. He leverages his experience in one court at the next by impressing each successive sultan by his intimacy with his previous host. His prestige reaches its apex when the Sultan of Dihli (Delhi) appoints him ambassador to China.

For protection on the road, Ibn Batuta typically travels with an armed escort or in a merchant caravan. In addition to being well provisioned, these caravans enable Ibn Batuta to bring his retinue, including a number of slaves male and female, with him on his journeys.

The society that Ibn Batuta describes centers around a series of royal courts, generally presided over by a sultan. In attendance on the sultan are one or more viziers and any number of princes. Ibn Batuta encounters a number of Sufis and other Islamic holy men along his route, and even withdraws from the world and embraces an ascetic life at one point until he is once again seduced by the pleasures of the court. Ibn Batuta was by birth a shaikh and by training a qadi, or Islamic judge, and various sultans appoint him to judgeships in the course of his travels. Merchants are mentioned, but mostly in paasing to explain how the court is provisioned, there is little description of them in terms of individuals. Finally, one gets the impression that the courts that Ibn Batuta visits are maintained by a veritable army of slaves.

Ibn Batuta's world is also clearly one of male privilege. As mentioned above, he usually travels with several slave girls, whose main purpose is evidently his sexual gratification. He even mentions at one point that one of his slave girls bore him a child. In addition, at any given court at which he stays for any length of time, he takes up to four wives (the maximum number that the Koran allows). When it is time to move on, he simply divorces them, a practice that in some cases was enjoined by a ban on women's traveling. In one instance he returns to India to look for a son that was born to him twenty years earlier, but the boy has died in the interim.

The Travels are punctuated with savage violence. In addition to the brigandage en route, the usual means by which one Sultan succeeds another seems to have been by murdering his predecessor, who is often a member of his own family. In addition, such offenses as picking up a piece of fruit lying on the public highway are in some kingdoms a capital crime, and the hapless offender is impaled and crucified as an example to others. Ibn Batuta appears to take such punishments as a matter of course.

Ultimately, the Travels portray a rich mosaic of sophisticated cultures throughout the Islamic world in the 14th century, when it was arguably at its zenith, and for that reason alone are well worth reading.

morocco holiday, morocco tour, holiday in morocco: morocco pictures

The commentary on this holiday site is a little inane, but the pictures, while amateurish, are worth seeing.

Fes - Morocco

Six colorful photos of the medina in Fes.

Where the Moors Held Sway, Allah Is Praised Again

"GRANADA, Spain Muslims are back in this ancient Moorish stronghold, the last bastion of Islam in Spain before the 15th-century emir Boabdil kissed King Ferdinand's hand and relinquished the city with a legendary sigh."

Wafin: Morocco in North America

"On visiting Moulay Idris, however, I realized I was in a unique expression of Islamic culture. I arrived in the afternoon, when sufi chants were being sung by a group of devotees; women, men and children sat in the sahn, and then sometimes entered to the hall of the tomb where they sought blessings, prayed, or simply meditated. The shrine conveyed an intense religious feeling, perhaps only equaled in my experience with the Dome of the Rock and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Moulay Idriss is an expression of Islamic piety unique to the devotion of Morocco. Not only the dialect but the devotion was distinctly “Maghribi.” The more I learned about these “saints,” the more I could understand the tensions of early modern Moroccan history between the makhzan/government and the sufi lodges."