Word: qaeda
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Hollywood isn't alone in wanting to turn Morocco into Iraq. Al-Qaeda, and a small but virulent band of loosely associated jihadis, would also love to make their mark in this nation of 34 million. They see corruption, spreading slums and 15% unemployment as fertile ground to sow their extremism. Similar conditions in neighboring Algeria gave rise to an ongoing civil war between security forces and armed Islamists that has left 150,000 dead. Morocco is next in the jihadis' crosshairs...
...Salfi knows the Koran by heart and is prepared to do battle with the Islamic extremists on their turf - in prisons and in shantytowns where sometimes the only escape from despair is through the fumes of glue or hashish or a DVD of an al-Qaeda sermon extolling the pleasures that await a martyr in paradise. "If I found someone who wanted to blow herself up," says al Salfi, "I'd recite a verse from the Koran telling her that in Allah's eyes, suicide is the road to perdition...
...wake-up call arrived in May 2003, when al-Qaeda suicide bombers killed 45 people and wounded dozens of others in Casablanca in explosions outside a luxury hotel, a Jewish center, a Spanish restaurant, a social club and the Belgian consulate. Since then, Morocco has been rocked by scattered acts of terrorism, and in February police arrested 38 people who were allegedly members of an extremist gang suspected of pulling off robberies in Europe in the mid-1990s to bankroll a plot to assassinate Moroccan ministers and police chiefs. "We also know that Moroccans are feeding into the pipeline...
...Between 2004 and 2007, al-Qaeda in Iraq had "controlled the city", says General Ra'ad Jassim Mohammed, one of the lead Iraqi National Police commanders in Samarra. Today, the city is witnessing a slow but shaky revival. Two months ago, the central market re-opened; a university - the city's first - is now under construction; and even the rubble of the ancient shrine, which was bombed again in 2007, is being prepared for a momentous rehabilitation. A city that had come to symbolize Iraq's sectarian schism may yet play a key role in national reconciliation. That...
...change. The police walled the city in, leaving only three entrances, to prevent infiltration. The city's 800 policemen, planned to grow to a force of 1,500, have also dealt effectively with sectarian tensions, says deputy police commander General Adnan al-Saadi. "When we first came here, al-Qaeda spread rumors that we were here to occupy the city, and that we are [Shi'ite] and were going to treat [the residents] badly. But then the people started to realize that we were dealing with them in a professional way," he said. Attacks in Samarra have dropped 95% over...