ABSTRACT
Popular demonstrations and uprisings of the so-called “Arab Spring”, while leading in the Maghreb region to the toppling of Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia, and to the overthrow and killing of Muammar Qaddafi in Libya, opened up new challenges and prospects in the relationships of North Africa with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) member states. The GCC tried to adapt to the transformations sweeping across the Middle East and the Mediterranean, by reformulating its strategic goals and by assuming a major unprecedented role in regional and global affairs. Such a role has been increasingly founded on assistance programs and donations and, when possible, on political mediation efforts. Tunisia, Libya and Morocco in North Africa on the one hand, and Yemen in the Arabian Peninsula on the other, well exemplify this new Gulf Arab pro-activism largely motivated by the political willingness to promote stabilization.1
