Today (December 14, 2025), representatives of the Kabyle people are expected to proclaim the independence of Kabylia, a mountainous region in northern Algeria. Kabylia is home to around 3.5 million inhabitants, with its own language, culture, and historical identity. The declaration, taking place in Paris, will be largely symbolic: Kabylia does not control territory, and no major power has endorsed its claim.
Yet symbolism matters.
The Kabyle people are part of the Amazigh (Berber) civilization, indigenous to North Africa long before the Arab-Muslim conquests of the seventh century. Like the Jews, they possess a distinct language, collective memory, and continuous attachment to their ancestral land. And like the Jews, they have long struggled against Arab conquest and Muslim imperialism.
What makes Kabylia’s case stand out today is its method. The independence movement, led by the Movement for the Self-Determination of Kabylia (MAK) and its government-in-exile, explicitly rejects violence. It advances its claims through political organization, international law, and appeals to democratic norms, not through terrorism or armed struggle.
In a world where violence often attracts attention and legitimacy, this distinction should matter.
From a narrow diplomatic perspective, Israel has little to lose. Algeria is already among Israel’s most hostile adversaries and maintains no diplomatic relations with it. Silence brings Israel no benefit.
From a strategic standpoint, however, Kabylia fits within Israel’s historic periphery strategy: the idea that Israel should cultivate ties with non-Arab, non-Islamist peoples on the margins of the Middle East and North Africa who share an interest in pluralism, secular governance, and resistance to authoritarian Arab nationalism and political Islam. This logic once guided Israel’s engagement with Kurds, Maronites, and others. Kabylia belongs in that same category. Ignoring it out of reflexive caution reflects not realism, but strategic inertia.
There is also a political reality Israel should acknowledge. Ferhat Mehenni, the president of Kabylia’s government-in-exile, has repeatedly and publicly expressed support for Israel, including at moments when doing so carried real personal and political risk. Such clarity is rare in North Africa. Israel often laments the absence of voices in the region willing to defend its legitimacy openly. When such a voice exists, it should at least be recognized.
Kabylia also exposes a broader double-standard in international politics. The same international community that overwhelmingly supports Palestinian statehood despite the Palestinians’ weak historical case, lack of political cohesion, and longstanding use and glorification of terrorism, largely ignores the Kabyles. The contrast is stark. The Palestinians are rewarded diplomatically despite decades of violence. The Kabyles are sidelined despite pursuing their aspirations through peaceful, legal, and democratic means. Israel, more than most countries, understands how damaging this inversion of norms has been.
Israel’s response to Kabylia must take regional dynamics into account, particularly Morocco, with which Israel enjoys a special and growing relationship. Morocco does not officially support Kabylia’s independence, nor has it recognized any Kabyle political entity. Like most states, Rabat formally upholds the principle of territorial integrity.
At the same time, Morocco has deliberately raised the Kabyle issue in international forums as part of its rivalry with Algeria, especially in response to Algeria’s support for the Polisario Front in Western Sahara. By highlighting Kabylie, Morocco has sought to expose what it sees as Algeria’s double standards: supporting separatism abroad while suppressing it at home.
This position is best understood as strategic signaling, not endorsement. For Israel, that distinction matters. A carefully framed Israeli stance, grounded in principles, not recognition, would not contradict Morocco’s position and should be coordinated with Rabat, not avoided altogether.
Leadership does not require Israel to recognize Kabylia today. International stability and alliances matter. But leadership does require moral clarity.
Leave a Reply