[6] In April 2000, Le Journal "crossed a political redline" by printing an interview with Muhammad Abdelaziz, leader of the Saharawi separatist movement Polisario Front that was fighting for the independence of Western Sahara from Morocco.
A Ministry spokesperson stated that the reasons for the papers' banning were "excesses in [their] editorial line concerning the question of Morocco’s territorial integrity" and "collusion with foreign interests".
In November, however, the paper reprinted a letter implicating that a number of socialist politicians, including then-Prime Minister Abderrahmane Youssoufi, had participated in a 1972 plot to assassinate Hassan II.
At the January 2001 Congress of the International Federation for Human Rights in Casablanca, Jamaï took the podium to announce to the applause of the delegates that he would go on a hunger strike until his papers were unbanned.
[8] Following another round of international protest—including a question about the banning from German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder on the occasion of Youssoufi's state visit to Germany—the government relented, and the papers were once more allowed to print.
[7] Reporters Without Borders immediately called for the Moroccan Justice Minister to overturn the verdict, asserting that "Fines should not be used by the authorities with the aim of halting the appearance or publication of a media".
[11] The press freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) described the trial as "politically motivated and unfair", and said that it could prove a "fatal blow" to the weekly magazine.
[7] In 2010, the World Association of Newspapers awarded him its Gebran Tueni Prize, established in honor of the assassinated Lebanese editor and press freedom advocate of the same name.