The killing of the Polisario Front's police chief, Addah al-Bendir, supposedly by a Moroccan drone in April marked a further test of the uncertain 30-year-old cease-fire between Morocco and the Polisario Front, which has come under increasing strain since November 2020 when an armed dispute over a vital roadway between Morocco and the independence group threatened to turn one of the world's oldest cold wars hot.
Precise details of Bendir's death are hard to pin down, only agreeing that he and an unspecified number of other Polisario officials were killed as a result of a possible Moroccan drone strike to the east of Morocco's 1,700-mile-long sand wall that runs across Western Sahara. Depending on who you believe, he was either retreating after being confronted by Moroccan troops before an attack or returning victorious from a successful strike when the drone struck.
