In investigative journalism, the line between a scoop and fabrication lies in the rigor of the evidence. When a major newspaper turns shaky hypotheses and self-serving statements into truths about a state, journalism gives way to fiction. That is precisely what emerges from a cross-examination of the article published by journalist Ketty Garat in the Spanish daily ABC, the “corrections” posted on X by journalist Ignacio Cembrero, known for his hostility toward Morocco, and the methodical dismantling of the story by Moroccan academic and lawmaker Lahcen Haddad.
ABC’s Narrative: When Fiction Overtakes Reality
Under Ketty Garat’s byline, the conservative daily ABC published what it presented as an “exclusive” with major geopolitical implications, under the headline: Former No. 2 in Moroccan Intelligence Leaks ‘Sensitive Information’ to Jabaroot Hackers. “ABC has obtained exclusive access to Mehdi Hijaouy’s identification document within the secret services, the man behind the security breach that exposed 70,381 Moroccan spies,” the article reads. Hold your breath.
The article casts Mehdi Hijaouy, a fraudster wanted by Interpol, as the central figure in a state conspiracy, attributing to him the hacking of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s phone. Nothing less. “Morocco does not know his current whereabouts and is desperately searching for the man who was the ‘comptroller general’ [...] of the DGED, the agency that directed the espionage operation against European leaders and infected the mobile phones of Pedro Sánchez and Emmanuel Macron using Pegasus spyware,” the journalist writes.
Read also : Inside the imposture: the Hijaouy-Jerando leaks lay bare the machinery of fake news about Morocco
To lend credibility to this profile, Ketty Garat presents the international legal proceedings against Hijaouy as little more than an act of retaliation. “The regime’s official press tried to conceal his role in the secret services by portraying him as an ordinary criminal posing as a spy. That is why the identity document revealed today by ABC is so important.” The article goes so far as to attribute to him possession of some of Europe’s most confidential data, from Qatargate to Moroccan state secrets: “He is said to possess material extracted from phones hacked with Pegasus spyware and data relating to clandestine corruption operations in the European Parliament.”
The Illusion of Cembrero’s “Corrections”
Following the publication of the article, hack journalist Ignacio Cembrero weighed in on X with what he regarded as technical corrections. “Only Morocco’s domestic intelligence agency (DGST) had access to Pegasus, which it used extensively. [...] The foreign intelligence agency (DGED) did not touch the malware, although it may have indicated targets to spy on. Mehdi Hijaouy was the DGED’s No. 2 until 2014. The DGST began using Pegasus in 2017...” Casting himself as the expert, Cembrero points to an institutional and chronological inconsistency while maintaining the broader implication of the intelligence services on the basis of publications by the Forbidden Stories consortium.
Far from reconsidering her claims, Ketty Garat responded by brushing aside her colleague’s reservations. “Correction to the correction. It’s all in the article. Mehdi Hijaouy was an adviser to the monarch from 2017 to 2022 and had access to this information. We cite those media outlets and, specifically, you. ABC is publishing previously unseen documents that no media outlet had obtained,” she replied on X.
This line of defense, substituting the prestige of a “previously unseen document” for the requirement of proof, was nevertheless about to run into a factual demonstration.
Exposing the Flaws in ABC’s Story
Taking to X in turn, Lahcen Haddad published a detailed analysis in which he dismantled ABC’s narrative construction point by point.
Garat’s thesis is that Hijaouy’s professional badge proves both his status as the agency’s “No. 2” and his ability to possess state secrets in 2024. Haddad’s reminder is precise. “The ‘previously unseen document’ published by ABC is a professional ID card that expired in 2014. Even if it were authentic, at most it would establish a former affiliation and rank within the DGED. It does not demonstrate that he was the No. 2 of the entire service, that he continued to have access to operational information years later, or that he leaked data to Jabaroot,” he writes.
Garat refuses to budge and insists that Hijaouy directed the infection of Pedro Sánchez’s phone. “To bridge this institutional and chronological gap, Cembrero writes that the DGED ‘may have indicated targets.’ Precisely: ‘may have.’ That is a possibility, not evidence. Claiming that Hijaouy subsequently held an advisory position does not resolve anything either. It would have to be demonstrated that this role gave him access to the DGST’s operational system, to data extracted through Pegasus and, specifically, to the contents of Sánchez’s phone. No published technical record, document, message or independent testimony establishes that,” the Moroccan academic responds.
Read also : Hijaouy case: Ex-wife’s denial deals a major blow to defense’s Paris surveillance claims
For Garat, Hijaouy’s and Morocco’s involvement in hacking the Spanish executive is an established fact. This overlooks the fact that “the Audiencia Nacional closed the investigation without having been able to identify the perpetrators. [...] Four entirely different claims must be distinguished: the consortium attributes access to Pegasus to a Moroccan user. That attribution does not automatically prove every operation attributed to Morocco. It has not been judicially established that the DGST, the DGED or the Moroccan state infected Pedro Sánchez’s phone.”
As for the crude conceptual distortion surrounding the Jabaroot group leak that supposedly revealed the identities of 70,381 Moroccan secret agents, Haddad explains that it is “misleading to turn a database of 70,381 records, mainly linked to DGSN personnel, into a list of ‘70,381 spies.’ The DGSN is a vast police administration. Not all its police officers, civil servants and administrative employees are spies. Moreover, the full authenticity of the database, its single origin and the exact function of each person listed have not been verified,” Haddad explains.
Confusing a Collection of Conjectures With Proof
For Garat, citing multiple sources and journalistic investigations is enough to validate ABC’s headline. Yet, the academic responds, “citing 14 media outlets does not turn an inference into evidence. Those media outlets worked collectively from the same sources. Fourteen publications do not constitute 14 independent confirmations. Here, we start with an ID card that expired in 2014, add anonymous sources, a ‘may have’ and several conditional formulations, and ABC ends up asserting in its headline that Hijaouy ‘infected Sánchez’s phone.’ Between the document actually published and that spectacular conclusion, every essential link is missing. This is not a demonstration. It is a chain of hypotheses turned into certainty by a headline.”
By giving a platform to an individual facing fraud charges and interpreting an expired professional ID card as evidence of state involvement, ABC has fallen into the trap of sensationalism. Lahcen Haddad’s analysis brings an elementary rule of journalism back into focus: a string of conditional formulations, expired ID cards and second-hand testimony can never substitute for material evidence. By pushing its headline far beyond what its sources could establish, the Spanish daily delivered a spy thriller where rigor demanded a factual investigation.
