Moroccan security forces take position in response to a demonstration by young people demanding reforms in the health and education sectors in Rabat, on Oct. 2, 2025. (Credit: Abdel Majid Bziouat/AFP)
It's Thursday, Oct. 2, and Casablanca feels strangely empty. The Arab League Park — one of the few green spaces in a city choked by traffic and car horns — has lost its joggers, strollers, and the kids who usually play football between the coral and flowering trees. Yasmine Square, home since June to an Africa Cup of Nations village ahead of the upcoming continental tournament in December, is silent. The wooden stalls are shuttered, as are many shops in the center of Morocco’s economic capital.'Free kel shee'However, the emptiness here is merely the shadow of a movement unfolding just a little farther down the street. A crowd of people who look barely 20 years old are chanting and holding up signs with what have become familiar slogans on this sixth day of protests: "We want hospitals, not stadiums," "Freedom,...
It's Thursday, Oct. 2, and Casablanca feels strangely empty. The Arab League Park — one of the few green spaces in a city choked by traffic and car horns — has lost its joggers, strollers, and the kids who usually play football between the coral and flowering trees. Yasmine Square, home since June to an Africa Cup of Nations village ahead of the upcoming continental tournament in December, is silent. The wooden stalls are shuttered, as are many shops in the center of Morocco’s economic capital.'Free kel shee'However, the emptiness here is merely the shadow of a movement unfolding just a little farther down the street. A crowd of people who look barely 20 years old are chanting and holding up signs with what have become familiar slogans on this sixth day of protests: "We want hospitals, not stadiums,"...
