The Establishment of Rights for Jews in Morocco (1956-1961)

 

The contribution of World Jewish Organizations

to the Establishment of Rights for Jews in Morocco (1956-1961)

 

Yigal Bin-Nun

Université de Paris VIII

 Journal of Jewish Modern Studies 9:2, Oxford 2010 p. 251-274, 

  

The history of the three-way relationship between Israel, the Moroccan government and Moroccan Jewry could be entitled the "catastrophe that didn’t happen." Carlos de Nesry put it well: "The Jews of this country bring to mind the person who was saved from an explosion and is after­wards surprised to discover that he is healthy and whole. During the days of the protectorate, it seemed to them that independence would be a dramatic revolution with unpre­dictable results. In the end, they saw it as a sort of apoca­lypse in which the peace and quiet, which they knew un­der the French government, could be destroyed forever. The severity of the omens justified this fatalistic fear. When independence was achieved, they learned that it was not all that terrible."

The subject of Jewish emigration from Morocco, or as it has been coined by both parties, the right to freedom of movement, troubled the leaders of the Jewish community regarding difficulties the authorities were creating for Jews seeking to obtain pass­ports. This issue was no less troubling for the leaders of the World Jewish Congress, the government of the State of Israel, the Jewish Agency, and the agents of the Misgeret who worked secretly on behalf of the Mossad in Morocco. Liberal circles within the Moroccan leadership rejected the idea of Jewish emigration because with the advent of Moroccan independence, they wished to create the appearance of a progressive country in which all of its citi­zens—regardless of their religion—enjoyed equal rights so that none would have any desire to leave. Liberals also op­posed emigration because of the concern that if Jews left the country, the economy would suffer. Pan-arabists in the conservative wing of the Istiqlal, for their part, were unhappy that wealthy Jews from Morocco would immi­grate to Israel, thus strengthening the Zionist forces there against Arab nations.

t: -.1pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 14.2pt;">The history of the Jewish community during the early years of Moroccan independence is one of a continuous worry regarding an unclear future and the possibility of impending disaster. During this period, the Jewish community was forced to address several critical questions, which would ultimately determine the future of Moroccan Jewry as well as the future of individual Jews in the community. While the struggle for independence had been waged without much involvement on the part of the Jewish community, the withdrawal from colonialism presented each Moroccan Jew with fateful options, whether to seek personal and communal success within a democratic progressive country or to escape from the country out of fear of a possible disaster.

The Moroccan monarchy also had to choose between continuing its connection to France, the democratic West and its culture and language, or aligning Morocco with the countries of the Middle East, who had pan-arabist policies and as a result negative relations with their own Jews. At the time, the future of the country’s government and the fate of the Jews’ legal status in Morocco were not at all clear. The Jewish community as a whole had a decision to make. It could, on the one hand, demand the rights of an ethnic minority and receive the isolation that went along with such a status. This would mean experiencing life as a state within a state, while preserving their separate ethnic identity. Alternatively, it could permit itself to be absorbed by the new society, its culture and its language, to the point of total assimilation, as was the case of the Jewish communities of Western Europe. The first option was not very popular, because its potential backers simply preferred to go to Israel. The second option was preferable for only a relatively short period of time among the educated Jewish class. This group was soon forced to deal with an unpleasant truth, as it quickly became clear that what was true for the Jews of France after the French Revolution and, subsequently, for all of Western Europe’s Jews, did not apply in the reality of a new Arab-Muslim state in the twentieth century, even one that had just emerged from a period of French colonial control that had lasted for little over forty years. Most of Moroccan Jewry chose a path, which was midway between a search for complete communal autonomy and an attempt at cultural assimilation. This “golden mean” was most strongly supported by the community’s official leader of that period, David Amar.

Despite many public declarations that they were being fully integrated into Moroccan politics, society and to a certain degree its culture (which was itself in the middle of being formulated), most of the community’s leaders chose to preserve the clearly ethnic public institutions which went beyond any religious function and were more connected to the social, educational and cultural spheres. These were the kind of institutions, which give a community an ethnic identity different from that of the general population. The Jews of Morocco thus had a triple set of loyalties – their first being formal loyalty to the Moroccan homeland, the country in which their fathers had lived even before the advent of Islam, along with faithfulness to its language, society and royal palace. At the same time, the Jews preserved their Jewish identity, not just in religious terms, but with regard to ethnicity and culture as well, and this brought along with it a hidden emotional connection to the state of Israel and a certain pride in its successes. Along with these two national and ethnic loyalties, the Jews of Morocco continued to develop their connection to French cultural, educational and linguistic values, all of which were a guarantee of social advancement.

Three principles guided the leadership of the State of Israel in their relations with the Jewish community in Morocco, and they determined the basic guidelines of the Zionist understanding of the situation: first, that antisemitism is timeless and universal, next, that the ingathering of all of Diaspora Jewry in Israel must eventually be accomplished in order to defeat this eternal antisemitism, and finally, that Israel must take the responsibility for having the Jews brought to Israel preemptively in order to overcome the demographic fear stemming from the regional situation and to strengthen the Jewish base within it. After the Holocaust in Europe, the Jews of North Africa and especially the community in Morocco became the most important Jewish bloc in the world for American Jewry, which wished to mark the tradition of maintaining Jewish existence in the face of the danger of assimilation. They were also an important group for the Jews in Israel, who were interested in this area as a source of emigration and as a potential supplier of human resources for the strengthening in Israel of the economy, and for its industry, agriculture and defence.

 

The Jewish population of Morocco and emigration after 1948

In the two years following Israel’s declaration of independence a total of 22,900 Jews left Morocco for Israel. Between 1948 to the independence of Morocco, 108,243 Jews immigrated to the young state at an average rate of 3,000 Jews per month. During all of the years in which the Jewish Agency’s Qadima organization functioned in Morocco, approximately 110,000 Jews left the country and about another 120,000 had left by 1961. Altogether, almost 237,813 Jews came to Israel from Morocco in the years 1948-1967.

A census held in November of 1957 showed that the Moroccan Jewish community as a whole numbered 164,216 people, who made up 1.8% of the general popula­tion, and that seventy-five percent of them lived in 12 cities or villages. The remaining Jews (a group which numbered at varying times approximately 80,000 people in total) lived in smaller groupings in over 150 communities. In 1956, most of the Moroccan Jewish community lived in cities, with only 40,000 Jews living in 145 small villages. Families were large, and the population was relatively young - the average Jewish family had six family members and children under the age of 16 made up 50.7% of the Jewish population. Only 10.6% of the community was elderly. The Jews were mostly in the cities of Casablanca, Fès, Marrakech, Meknès, Rabat, Tanger, Sefrou, Qenitra, Oujda, Tétouan, Midelt and Erfoud. 

The situation three years later was not much different, although the size of the Jewish community had already begun to shrink. In July of 1960, the official Moroccan Ministry of the Interior’s first census was completed, and the Jewish population was given at 160,032, making up only 1.4% of the general population. 71,175 Jews lived in Casablanca alone, where the general population numbered 965,000. Half of the Jews were under the age of 20 and most of the Jewish population was urban. The Jews made up only 2% of the actual population, but they constituted 8% of the country’s industrial workers and artisans, ten percent of all merchants and 5% of the members of the free professions and of those employed in managerial positions. Thirty percent of the general Moroccan population worked in modern industries, while 99% of Jews were employed in such fields. By June 30, 1963, 60,017 Jews had come to Israel from Morocco, which is why it is as­sumed that 110,000 Jews remained in Morocco as of that date. 

Between 1957 and November of 1961, when the government began to permit Jews to leave under collective passports, 29,472 Jews left legally or through various paths of illegal emigration organized by the Israeli security services. If those leaving in 1957 are discounted – a year in which most Jews left the country with legal passports – it appears that the number who left in the context of Misgeret, the Israeli Secret Service’s illegal immigration program, came to a little less than 10,200 Jews. From November of 1961 through the end of 1963, more than 72,500 Jews left Morocco legally. By 1964, when the Yakhin campaign ended, a total of 83,707 Jews had left. In 1965, 55,000 Jews remained in Morocco, but by 1972 no more than 30,000 were living there. By 2003 the commu­nity numbered under 5000. Because of the limitations created by Israel’s policy - adopted in 1953 - of only allowing “selected” Moroccan Jews to emigrate, there was a nega­tive balance in terms of immigration to Israel during the year of the policy’s adoption: the number of Jews who returned from Israel to Morocco was greater than the number who immigrated to Israel.

*

One anti-Jewish incident which more than any other had left its mark on the Jewish community took place on June 7, 1948 – three weeks after the establishment of the state of Israel and the beginning of its war with the neighboring Arab states. A few days after the declaration of Israel’s establishment, on May 23, Sultan Mohammed Ben Youssef understood what the results might be of a Jewish-Arab war in the Middle East for his country and he ap­pealed to the country with a reminder of his undertaking to protect his Jewish subject. He addressed the Jewish com­munity as well with a plea that they not engage in displays of Zionist solidarity with the new Jewish state. Despite the messages to the Moroccan people from the Sultan, anti-Jewish riots broke out the eastern city of Oujda and in a neighboring town (located 46 kilometers away) Jerrada.

These riots remained strongly etched in the general mem­ory of the population for many years, and they were espe­cially significant because in those days, Oujda served as a transit station for Jews who left Morocco on their way to Israel through nearby Algeria. Since these events took place in 1948, while the Moroccan revolt against the French occupation was already taking place, the Muslims had attacked the French authority’s Jewish "partners" as revenge for Israel’s war against the Arabs. Four Jews were killed in Oujda and a Muslim who attempted to protect them was killed as well. In Jerrada, 36 Jews were mur­dered, among them the community’s rabbi – Moshe Cohen. In May already, the head of Oujda’s Jewish com­munity – Obadia – had notified the French authorities of agitation against the Jews in the city, but the regional co­lonial governor of the city had left the place one day be­fore. This fact gives rise to a suspicion that the French authorities were involved in planning the attacks on the Jews in order to create friction between different groups within the population. In this aspect as well, the motiva­tion for the attack was connected to Israel and the general Middle East situation and not to local factors.

Another anti-Jewish incident took place on August 3, 1954 in the town of Sidi Qassem (Petit Jean), in which six Jewish merchants from Meknès were killed. This incident had no connection to the Arab-Israeli conflict. No more than approximately 50 Jews lived in this town, and Jews from nearby Meknès also came there to trade. The reason for the massacre was connected to the demand by the Na­tionalist Moroccan Movement to close stores on Fridays, and the opposing pressure from the French authorities who wished to have the stores open, despite the threats. Moroccan demonstrators affixed pictures of the exiled king to the front windows of stores, including those of Jewish businesses. A French policeman who tried to re­move the pictures was saved without being hurt but the mob vented its rage on Jewish merchants who were nearby and who were accused of breaking the strike. The bodies of the six Jews who were killed (after having been cruelly tortured) during the riots were burned by the mob. After­ward, Prosper Cohen, the secretary-general of the Zionist Federation was called in by the representatives of the pro­fessional unions in Morocco to intervene on behalf of those who had been arrested.

This tragic event was not mentioned in contemporary Israeli newspapers, even though the Foreign Ministry had received pictures and a report from the field. However, the political instability and uncertainty regarding the future and the administra­tion’s declarations of arabization, reminded many of the two events and pushed them to leave the country that could offer them no guarantees of security.

A conviction that a disaster was coming after the French left Morocco and independence was obtained was what fed the policies adopted by Israeli leaders and the activi­ties of its emissaries. Many Jews in Morocco also had a fear of an apocalypse that would damage the Jews’ status and their future in the country. But the disaster did not happen but the fear of it took its toll. Those who foresaw only the negative were convinced that the disaster had only been delayed for a limited time and that it would un­doubtedly still take place were forced to acknowledge that independence had not hurt the Jews but had only opened a new era for them that reminded some of the golden age in the relations between Jews and Muslims. Among the edu­cated classes, the euphoria was predominant. The mistakes made by the Israeli government and its emissaries burst this bubble and ended the social-political-economic flow­ering from which all the Jews were beginning to benefit. The Jewish community of Morocco was comforted by the fact that even though Israel had unintentionally upset their social advancement in the short run, it gave them a sense of security in the long-term and a clearer sense of their future.

The World Jewish Congress and the Moroccan Nationalist Movement

The relationship between the leadership of the Moroccan Nationalist Movement and the representatives of the inter­national Jewish organizations began long before the coun­try achieved independence. In June of 1952, the leaders of the World Jewish Congress had already held their organi­zation’s first North-African conference, the intention of which was to prepare the local Jewish leadership for the changes expected in light of the probability that the coun­tries of the region would soon be achieving independence.

The goal was to enable the North African communities to avoid the experience of their sister communities in Middle Eastern countries, where there had been considerable anti-Jewish oppression and even violence. According to the leaders of the World Jewish Congress, they were surprised to discover that the region’s community leaders had an un­reasonable sense of security and could not imagine the political changes that would, sooner or later, change their way of life. At this time, in 1952, Nahum Goldmann in­vited a group of young members of the Zionist youth movements in Morocco to a meeting in order to convince them to support the nationalist movement in their country. Meyer Toledano, Salomon Azoulay and their colleagues travelled to Geneva and heard Goldmann tell them of his forecast for the future in Morocco after it achieved inde­pendence. The French authorities were convinced that they would remain in North Africa for a long time. Goldmann was able to persuade the group of young Moroccan Jews, however, and upon their return to Morocco, they contacted activists within the nationalist movement and collected funds for them from the Jewish merchants in Casablanca.

Also beginning in 1952, the leaders of the WJC made a series of visits to Morocco and noticed that the situation there was more serious than that in Tunisia. Attacks car­ried out by the nationalist movement against the colonial authorities caused considerable unease and fear among many groups within the Jewish community, which in turn created pressure for increased emigration. The WJC lead­ers reached the conclusion that the Moroccan Jewish community had two options in order to prevent a disaster: to emigrate or to negotiate with the nationalist movement.

During the summer months, the WJC Coordinating Committee met to establish a policy regarding the com­munity’s fate. The goal was to establish the necessary conditions for a harmonious transfer from one historical period to another. At the time, it was not at all clear that the transfer would necessarily take place without violence and bloodshed. Nevertheless, the World Jewish Congress was the only organization that could envision a future for the Jews in Morocco. The rest of the Jewish organizations, in the United States, France and Israel, were indebted in various ways to the French authorities and therefore sup­ported its policies in North Africa. Despite this unique perspective, the World Jewish Congress’ leadership in­sisted that the French authorities should be notified of the direct contacts with the Moroccan nationalist movement before they took place. With this purpose in mind, Nahum Goldmann met with the French Foreign Minister Mendes-France and notified him and those of his ministers who were dealing with Moroccan and Tunisian affairs - among them Christian Fouché, Pierre July and Alain Savary - regarding his organization’s wish to establish contacts with representatives of the Moroccan nationalist move­ments. The goal the World Jewish Congress in doing this was to ensure the safety of the Jews, as well as to secure their status and emigration rights, without having the meeting with the nationalists interpreted as reflecting any anti-French feeling. Mendes-France assured him that the rights of the Jews and of all national minorities would be taken into consideration in any future negotiations. The French Foreign Ministry encouraged the representatives of the WJC to maintain contact with the nationalists, and prom­ised to update them regarding any developments.

In November of 1954, the Moroccan prime-minister designate, Mbark Bekkay, met with the representatives of the American Jewish Committee and indicated to them that he shared the position taken by writer André Chouraqui regarding the future status of the Jews in the as yet to be created independent state. This status was to be based on brotherly relations between the various groups within the country’s population. Bekkay’s declaration earned him considerable respect among the various Jewish organizations. Two months later, in January of 1955, the World Jewish Congress’ Action Committee met in the UNESCO building in Paris. After the French newspaper "Combat" published the WJC’s leadership’s declaration - which noted that while the Tunisian authorities treated their country’s Jews with respect, the Moroccans, in con­trast, had refused to make any statements regarding the status of Moroccan Jewry - the leaders of Istiqlal and the PDI (Parti Démocratique pour l’Indépendance) asked to meet with them. They complained that the Moroccan Jewish community had never supported their demands for independence. They stressed the democratic nature of their movement, which was based on the idea of granting free­dom and equality to all citizens regardless of religion or ethnic origin. Although no decisions were made at the first official meeting between the Moroccan nationalist leaders and the WJC, it did lead to a series of personal meetings in Paris, all of which were held at the initiative of the nation­alist movement.

Thus, thanks to Jo Golan’s contacts, Mbark Bekkay held a lunch meeting at the beginning of February at a Paris restaurant with the participation of leaders of the WJC, Istiqlal and the PDI, in order to discuss the issue of Moroccan Jewry. Jo Golan of Paris attended, as did Gerhart Riegner oof Geneva, the WJC’s legal counsel, Morris Perlzweig of New York, Alexander Easterman of London and Armand Kaplan of Paris. The participating Moroccans were Abderahim Bouabid, Mehdi Ben Barka, Mohammed Bouceta, Abdelqader Benjelloun and Ahmed Ben Souda. The WJC leaders asked the nationalist move­ment leaders to see to it that the commanders of the Lib­eration Army’s field units refrained from injuring innocent Jews. At the recommendation of Bouabid, a promise was given and the armed forces were sent explicit instructions to respect the Jewish population. On this same occasion, the Moroccan nationalist leaders announced their intention to appoint a Jew as a minister in the future government. Upon his return to Geneva, Riegner met PDI leader Mohammed Hassan Ouazzani and discussed with him the legal status of the Jews in a future independent Morocco.

On May 1, 1955, economist Felix Nataf called a secret meeting that was held in the home of Mohammed Dadi, one of the leaders of the "Amitiés Marocaines" movement. At the meeting, Nataf introduced a group of young Jews to Mehdi Ben Barka, one of the young leaders of Istiqlal. Participants included Meyer Toledano, Jacques Perez and Salomon Azoulay. During the negotiations with the French regarding Moroccan independence, the leaders of Istiqlal asked the representatives of the World Jewish Congress to use their contacts in the United States Congress to persuade President Eisenhower to put pres­sure on the French concerning their demands for independence. Easterman reported these conversations to Israeli Prime Minister Moshe Sharet on May 4, 1955. Sharet supported the maintenance of these contacts but conditioned Israeli assistance on the granting of freedom of emigration and equal rights for Jews in the future inde­pendent Moroccan state.

On the 15^th of August, Easterman met secretly with Ahmed Balafrej, the director of Istiqlal’s public relations and documentation office in New York. After this meeting, Balafrej published an announcement according to which there was no Jewish "problem" regarding Morocco at all: "The Jews need have no concern that they will suf­fer from any form of discrimination in an independent Morocco. The Jews of Morocco, like its Muslims, are both de jure and de facto citizens. They will enjoy the same rights and will be subject to the same obligations. Their religious faith will not be affected. The positive develop­ment that they will see will be their release from the bur­den of colonial control that exploited them as well. Morocco is their independent country and whoever helps the Jews of Morocco helps Moroccan independence as well."

Morocco’s "Conseil des Communautés Juives" (Council of Jewish Communities) took part in talks held with the French government in Aix-les-Bains on the 20^th of August - conversations in which representatives of the nationalist movement also took part - for the purpose of finding solu­tions to the "crisis in Morocco." In conformance with the French policy of separating the Jewish and Muslim popu­lations of Morocco, the Jewish delegation took part in these talks separately. The Jewish delegation even met separately with the French delegation. The French "Résidence" (The French government in Morocco) had approved the composition of the Jewish delegation, which included the President of the Jewish Community Jacques Dahan and his deputy Sam Nahon, the treasurer Joseph Berdugo and his deputy Albert Levi and Georges Benabou. The Commission agreed to add Dr. Léon Benzaquen to these representatives- on a "personal" basis - as well as Attorney Meyer Toledano, also to be included as participating "privately", with Easterman and Pierre Dreyfus-Schmidt taking part on behalf of the World Jewish Congress. The official Jewish delegation was not especially well supported by the nationalist movement. At the same time, the French authorities encouraged the Moroccan delegation to establish contacts with the World Jewish Congress. French Prime Minister Edgar Faure, who wished to consult with the delegation regarding Morocco’s future received the Jewish delegation from Morocco. At the end of the meeting, the delegation still did not see fit to express clear support for the claims of the Moroccan nationalists and preferred to use evasive lan­guage. After mentioning the community’s ancient roots in the country, the Jewish delegation added the following to their official public statement: "We hope that our country is able to escape from the serious crisis in which it now finds itself and that all political movements in Morocco are able to find a place for themselves to live in peace and in unity."

The heads of the community continued to give cautious support to the colonial government, but the World Jewish Congress delegation, in contrast, evoked positive responses from the Moroccans because it did not oppose their avowed intentions to achieve independence. Because of this supportive position, René Cassin invited Easterman and Riegner and asked them to explain their position. The two did not see fit to announce to the presi­dent of the "Alliance Israélite Universelle" that the French government knew of their contacts with the Moroccans. According to Riegner, Cassin’s deputy Jules Brunshvig admitted to him years later that the World Jewish Con­gress’ leaders' views were more correct in those days than were those of the Alliance’s leaders.

On September 2, Golan and Easterman organized a meeting between the leaders of the nationalist movement and the members of the Conseil des Communautés Juives in order to bring about a change in the Jewish communi­ties’ leaders’ position of not supporting the nationalists. The independence fighters accused the Jewish community leaders of lining up behind the French political authorities and supporting its traditional imperialistic policy of using the "divide and conquer" method to control the general population in its colonies. The president of the commu­nity, Jacques Dahan, denied the accusations and argued that the community had never made any statement against the Moroccan claims for independence. The Jews re­sponded to the accusation that they had never joined in the struggle for by pointing out that the restrictive Vichy laws had forced them to be extra cautious and to refrain from making any public statements regarding the issue. In re­sponse to comments published in the "Jewish Chronicle", the leaders of the PDI agreed to cancel all the existing legal restrictions imposed on the Jews after the country obtained independence, but the Istiqlal leadership did not get involved.

The secret agreement between the PDI and the leader­ship of the Jewish community led to a turning point in the relations between the community’s leaders and the colo­nial authorities. Beginning with the entry into force of this agreement, the Moroccan Jewish leaders began, in accor­dance with Meyer Toledano’s suggestion, to support the concept of a parliamentary monarchy in which the king would not actually conduct the affairs of state. In an article that Toledano published in "Le Monde" and re-published in the "Jewish Chronicle", the writer spoke of his vision of an independent state in which the religious element would no longer be determinative and which would be governed by a liberal democratic constitutional system, rather than by religious law. The state would provide the same serv­ices to Muslims, Christians and Jews.

As was the norm in his meetings with representatives of the Moroccan nationalist movements, Easterman was im­pressed by the high level of the representatives of the na­tionalist movement at the conference, by their perseverance and by the righteousness of their struggle. He appreciated the fact that the French government had invited them to talks and did not relate to them as primi­tive hotheads. According to him, even though the Jews had not taken part in the Moroccan nationalist struggle in the past, they had not supported either side and although they had not objected to French influence, they felt com­pletely Moroccan. Easterman called on the Moroccan leadership to look out for Jewish interests in the new Morocco.

In anticipation of the king’s return from exile in Madagascar, the "Coordinating Committee of the Jewish Organizations in Morocco" met in Paris on the 19^th of September. This committee included the Moroccan branch of the "Alliance Israélite Universelle", the organization of "Alliance" graduates, and the council of Moroccan Jewish communities. The World Jewish Congress representatives announced at this meeting that the Jewish question had been raised in talks that were held in Madagascar between Sultan Sidi Mohammed Ben Youssef and the prime min­ister designate Mbark Bekkay and Abdelqader Benjelloun. The sultan informed them that the new government would grant Jews rights equal to those of Muslim citizens, that there would be no limitation on emigration rights and that any citizen would be able to leave the country if he wished to do so. Benjelloun reported to Easterman regarding these talks with the sultan, and noted that the monarch had stressed that he would regret the emigration of every sin­gle Jew, but that he would not prevent anyone from leav­ing, as he would be taking into consideration the freedom of the individuals involved.

The heads of the World Jewish Congress, Golan, Easterman, Riegner and Jacques Lazarus reached Morocco on October 13. They stayed there for 12 days and at­tempted to persuade the official Jewish organizations to adopt the claims of the nationalist movement, in anticipa­tion of the expected independence. Their intention was to draft a charter to be signed by all the Jewish bodies, within the framework of the "Coordination and Research Com­mittee" which Dahan had initiated. The charter would include all the demands regarding the subject of the com­munity’s future status. Despite the efforts of the World Jewish Congress representatives, the language of the charter reflected the many doubts the community leaders had regarding the future that they anticipated for Morocco. This resulted from the position taken by the leaders of the "Alliance" in Europe, and especially from that adopted by its president René Cassin. Nevertheless, the fast pace at which political developments began to unfold, along with the Sultan’s return, led to the charter quickly becoming outdated.

While bloody attacks shook up the general Moroccan society during the process in which it obtained independ­ence and afterward, the Jewish community was hardly affected. The liberation armies, Jish attahrir in the various regions of Morocco and the various types of the Munaddama siriyya and the Hilal al-aswad (Black Storm) terrorist organizations were careful not to hurt Jews who had collaborated with the French colonial commission. They refrained from "punishing" such Jews, even though they executed Muslims who were suspected of similar collaboration. Paradoxically, even though the Jews gener­ally preferred to refrain from supporting the struggle for national liberation and even though their formal organiza­tions even coordinated their positions with the policies of the French Commission, the returning Sultan and the heads of the political parties did not hold a grudge against them. At every opportunity, the monarch declared that the newly independent Morocco needed the Jews’ talents in order to develop as a progressive state. It was not only the royal house that treated them in this fashion. A similar stance was taken by the leadership of the state, which opened its arms to the Jewish community with warmth - even to those who had collaborated with the occupying authorities. Thus began a period - which lasted several years - in which the Jews enjoyed a clear preference in obtaining government positions. Jewish doctors and law­yers were able to obtain preferred clients. This period of understanding, which marked the golden age of Muslim-Jewish relations in Morocco, became weaker as the politi­cal struggle between the palace and the parties strength­ened, as Jewish emigration came to serve as a tool in the ensuing political infighting.

The turnaround in the relationship of the community leadership with the future leadership of independent Morocco began only during the last days of the French presence. On October 30, 1955, the day after the Sultan Ben-Arafa gave up his thrown and escaped to Tanger, the leaders of the "Conseil des Communautés Juives" met in Rabat and made a sharp change n their declarations. Their first announcement expressed great joy at the return of His Excellency Sidi Mohammed Ben Youssef and of his exalted family members. The Jewish population was called upon to join their Muslim brothers in celebrating his return to the throne. On his part, the re-instated Sultan made significant efforts to allay the Jewish community’s concerns. After meeting with the heads of the Istiqlal and the PDI upon his arrival at Saint Germain en Laye, the king received several Jewish delegations. Prince Hassan served as a translator during the king’s talks with the Jewish groups. Mohammed V declared to Easterman, Golan and Riegner of the World Jewish Con­gress as follows: "I have always seen my Jewish subjects as completely free citizens, and as Moroccans who are completely equal to my Muslim subjects. This is the pol­icy that I will take in the future. All of my subjects will benefit from equal rights and share equal obligations, without regard to their religious beliefs. You can be cer­tain that my intentions will be fully carried out in practice upon my return to Morocco".

On the Moroccan side, the leadership’s various argu­ments against Jewish emigration reflect the differences in political culture that existed among the factions making up that leadership. Thus, there were several different reasons for their opposition:

-                The paternalistic-traditional approach, which char­acterized the King’s attitude, saw the Jews of the commu­nity as having been placed under the personal protection of the ruler. The monarchy saw itself as being obligated to “protect its Jewish sons” as it had done for generations. This approach involved a certain degree of sentimentality, which was of any realpolitik.

-                Another argument against emigration flowed from the view that the Jews’ exit from the country immediately upon its attaining independence would de-stabilize the country in terms of its public administration and com­merce and economics. This argument was based on the factual matter of the important economic and administra­tive role played by the Moroccan Jews as a group. Another version of this argument was one that emphasized that such a mass exodus of Jews would certainly be covered in the international media and would create the impression that the young state was collapsing economically. Fur­thermore, those putting forth this argument feared that such coverage would portray Morocco as a country gov­erned by intolerant rulers.

-                Others argued that allowing the Jews to leave en masse would expose Morocco to world public opinion as an undemocratic, non-progressive country whose govern­ment was unable to provide its non-Muslim citizens with the conditions necessary for proper integration into Moroccan society.

-                An additional reason given for opposing Jewish emi­gration was that most of the Jews would immigrate to Israel, and their departure from Morocco would therefore impact on Morocco’s relations with the Arab countries which it needed for the sake of stabilizing its political condition as its struggle against colonial France came to an end.

Finally, the argument was made that the massive emigration of young Jews to Israel would strengthen the Israeli Defence Forces in its war with Morocco’s fellow Arab countries

Jewish Delegations to Morocco during the late 1950’s

Against the background of the Middle Atlas rebellion and the struggles between the various power centers in the country, and while the Mossad was already smuggling the Jews out, Alexander Easterman and André Jabès came to Morocco on June 27, 1957, in order to meet with the Prime Minister Bekkay, with Minister of the Interior Driss Mhamdi and again with the head of the security services Mohammed Laghzaoui. This was the first time that Easterman had returned to Morocco after his five months stay during the previous year, when the subject had been the treatment of the Qadima transit camp.

Because of the socio-political situation in the country, and despite their many efforts, the World Jewish Congress representatives were unable to schedule the meetings for which they had hoped. An American Jewish Committee delegation, headed by Zacharia Schuster, also came to Morocco at this time, arriving on July 2 for a trip that lasted only 36 hours. Unfortunately for both delegations, an "unexpected bombshell" - as Easterman termed it - exploded just at that time. On the 30^th of June, the Misgeret organized a group of 500 Jews to be smuggled out of the country illegally. Those intending to escape were caught by the police in the city of Tanger on their way to Sebta (Ceuta) and British Gibraltar. The communities of Tanger and Tétouan had organized temporary shelter for the families who had already left their homes and sold their property. Approximately 70 people returned to their homes and the others stayed in the area to await trial.

It was obvious that in such an atmosphere, the delega­tions would have trouble speaking with the authorities about the granting of passports to Jews on the basis of promises that had been given to the World Jewish Congress representatives a year before. Easterman was angered by the "unorthodox activities" carried out by the Mossad, which he saw as serving only to enrage the authorities and undermine the various diplomatic efforts being made on behalf of the Jews’ emigration rights. Ac­cording to Easterman, activities of this type had increased over the course of the previous year and the Moroccan authorities were aware that they were going on. He was convinced that the country’s leaders would not believe that he had not taken part in these "unorthodox activities" and would reject his proposals for an agreement arranging the legal emigration of Moroccan Jews. He also felt helpless in terms of his ability to help the Jewish arrestees in Tanger. Despairing of the situation, he wrote an angry letter to Goldmann and told him that he had not choice but to leave the area quietly.

However, Israel’s ambassador to France Yaaqov Tsur did not concur with respect to Easterman’s feelings and argued that the concentration of emigrants in Tanger did not have to interfere with the representative World Jewish Congress, since the govern­ment of Morocco had itself failed to keep its promises, and Israel was therefore under no obligation towards the Moroccans. In the end, Easterman did not leave and on July 2 met with Ben Barka, Minister Bouabid, Minister Benzaquen and with Bensalem Guessous.

Because of the political tension and economic difficul­ties, Easterman noted that during the second year of Moroccan independence, the stress regarding the Jewish issue disappeared, and it was even possible to sense an atmosphere of less emotionalism, less demagoguery and less aggression. He appreciated the position taken by the authorities because despite the unemployment and the increase in the cost of living, the government did not at­tempt to distract the attention of the population from do­mestic problems through reference to foreign issues such as the Israeli-Egyptian war. The traditional leader of the Istiqlal, the pan-Arabist, even spoke moderately regarding Morocco’s relations with France. But the matter that sur­prised Easterman especially was the objective reporting he heard on the radio and read in the newspapers regarding the Israeli-Arab dispute. Despite the caution with which the Moroccans handled their relations with Egypt, the government and the palace both ridiculed President Nasser’s intentions of ruling the Arab world.

In the presence of Easterman and Jabès, the Postmaster-General Léon Benzaquen spoke bitterly about the gov­ernment’s policy regarding the granting of passports, which he saw as constituting government discrimination. He told his interlocutors about two Jewish students who had applied for passports. He had personally lobbied on behalf of one of them and received approval immediately. However, his friend was denied the passport, which both­ered the Minister. Easterman strengthened his sense of insult at the discrimination practiced against the Jews and the minister promised to raise the subject with the cabinet and with the king. When Easterman and Jabès met with Abderahim Bouabid the Minister of Finance promised to bring to the attention of the Minister of the Interior, Driss Mhamdi the facts and claims with which he had been pre­sented to the two Jewish representatives. On the one hand, he opposed discrimination against the Jews with respect to the granting of passports, and on the other hand, he also condemned the illegal emigration.

Bensalem Guessous was one of the Istiqlal leaders in Fès, the chairman of the economic committee of the advi­sory council and close to the liberal Minister Reda Guedira. He told the World Jewish Congress representa­tives that on the basis of an earlier conversation he had had with André Jabès and with the heads of the Jewish community in Fès, he had had a difficult conversation with Ben Barka and had criticized him sharply, telling Ben Barka that he could not "change Morocco into a prison for its citizens." During this conversation, Ben Barka did not deny that the Jews had been prevented from receiving passports, but he added that the issue was sensitive and complicated. Guessous responded to Ben Barka that pre­venting emigration was a negative move that would cause damage to the country, primarily in terms of foreign af­fairs, and Ben Barka had promised to raise the subject with the executive board of his party. The Istiqlal did in­deed hold a long discussion about the subject, and author­ized Minister Bouabid to bring up the subject for discussion within the cabinet.

The president of the Moroccan national Advisory Council, Mehdi Ben Barka, on his part, repeated to Easterman and Jabès, without enthusiasm, the well-known three reasons for the authorities’ objection to illegal emi­gration: the fear that Jewish capital would be leaving the country, the country’s need for the Jewish contribution to its economy and the objection to the departure of skilled manpower from Morocco to Israel - a country which was involved in a military dispute with the Arab countries. He advised his interlocutors to stop the illegal emigrants; about which the authorities were aware anyway, and promised that the Jews’ exodus from the country would resume upon the conclusion of the Arab-Israeli conflict. He asked the two of them to wait in Morocco for an addi­tional, longer meeting with him to be held on July 8, by which he would study the subject more intensively by reviewing additional information given to him by the World Jewish Congress representatives. Because of the rivalry that existed between the World Jewish Congress leaders and the representatives of the American Jewish Committee, the latter group avoided meeting with Easterman despite his efforts to contact them in their hotel, and they did not report to him about their meetings.

Ironically, in contrast to Easterman whose contacts with the Moroccan leadership were well-known, the American Jewish Committee delegation succeeded in meeting with the Prime Minister and even discussed with him the "bombshell" of the Jews who had been stopped in Tanger and the subject of illegal emigration in general. Without mentioning Israel, they argued that such phenomena were taking place precisely because the Jews’ freedom of movement was being denied. The Prime Minister used the opportunity to ask for their help in encouraging capital investment on the part of private American interests. The delegation also met with Finance Minister Bouabid and with Ben Barka. The two told the delegation that they would honor the Jews’ freedom of movement in accor­dance with the national economic interest, and stressed their sensitivity to American public opinion.

Easterman returned to Morocco for yet another round of talks in January of 1958. The second time Easterman’s delegation was going to collide with Zacharia Shuster’s American Jewish Committee delegation yet again but Shragay succeeded in preventing Shuster from leaving so that he couldn’t damage Easterman’s mission. As an alter­native to the meeting, the Committee’s representatives submitted a memorandum to Foreign Minister Balafrej. At Easterman’s meeting with Balafrej and Laghzaoui, the head of the security services differentiated between two types of passports the issuance of which would be handled in the capital city: regular passports and emigration pass­ports. The second type would be issued only upon instruc­tions from the government. The minister of finance Bouabid, as was his custom, was more generous and sup­ported the principle of issuing up to about 500 to 600 passports a month under the express condition that no centralized activity would be carried out to encourage mass emigration. The Prime Minister agreed to this pro­posal and promised to raise the issue with the cabinet quickly and to discuss the issue of the quota. The Istiqlal also supported a positive decision regarding this subject. The Israeli embassy in Paris had already agreed to an ad­ditional visit by Easterman in Morocco, which took place on the 7^th of March.

One can follow the frequent visits made by Easterman held in Morocco during the five months from May until September of 1956, and see that those in the Israeli em­bassy in Paris who sent him did not let up and asked him to continue to pressure the Moroccans and to meet the same people frequently and to make new claims in discus­sions with them. The Israelis believed that it was impor­tant that the pressure not let up, even if there was no chance at arriving at an agreement. After his visit on the 26^th of June in 1957, we find the wandering ambassador in Morocco around the 5^th of September on a visit that was described as a failure since he was not able to raise the issue of the recognition of the Jewish organization that was supposed to deal with emigration from within Morocco. Close to the 7^th of November, Easterman meet again Ben Barka and Bouabid. In anticipation of his meeting with Mohammed V in the United States, Easterman held another meeting close to the 26^th of No­vember - a meeting that was also defined as a failure after a conversation with Ben Barka. On January 10, 1958, Easterman returned to Morocco in order to apply for a fixed emigration quota and was able to obtain an agree­ment in principle. During April, in the middle of a gov­ernment crisis, he returned to Morocco to have the promise put into effect, at which time he met with Laghzaoui but returned without obtaining any results.

At the end of the Balafrej government’s term of office, in October of 1958, more than two years after independ­ence and after several hesitations, Morocco was prepared to join the Arab League, and afterwards, the office of the Arab boycott. The Balafrej government had concluded its term of office prematurely, after only six months. A short time before the 7^th of November 1958, Golan and Riegner came to Morocco for a round of talks. The two joined a representative of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, one of the founders of the intelligence community, Akiva Levinsky, who had arrived in Morocco on his Swiss passport. Easterman did not join the delegation because of a lengthy illness. Jo Golan, as was his custom, had entered Morocco on his Israeli passport. Apparently, this was the only case in which an Israeli was allowed to enter Morocco at that time, despite the fact that the authorities refused to allow Jews to return to Morocco after they had visited Israel, and even though Morocco had just joined the Arab League. Upon Golan’s intervention, his entry visas were stamped on the passports, and not on separate pages, as they had earlier been told would be done. Levinsky was impressed by Golan’s contacts with the Moroccan leadership and was also surprised that their movements were not followed at all while they were in Morocco.

The members of the delegation again strove to have the promise made in January regarding a quota of personal passports of approximately 600 Jews per month put into effect. They also wished to determine whether Morocco’s policy had changed after it had joined the Arab League and how the crisis of the Balafrej government - a sharp clash between conservatives and the leftist party - had impacted on the Jewish community. The delegation met with Jewish activists in the progressive branch of the Istiqlal - including Meyer Toledano, Marc Sabbah and David Benazeraf - as well as with the Secretary General of the "Conseil des Communautés", David Amar. They also met with Léo Toledano of the Finance Ministry, with Jacques Sabbah - the Director-General of the Postal Authority, and with the director of the Joint Distribution Committee in Morocco, Henry Kirsh. The latter was ac­cused more than once by Israeli sources of causing up to the authorities. According to Riegner, even though the struggle inside the Jewish leadership had calmed down, and most of the supporters of radical integration had modi­fied their positions and become more practical, the politi­cal tension in the country did not allow for the conduct of negotiations regarding the subject of the Jews. Neverthe­less, Riegner did not foresee any danger whatsoever for the Jewish community in Morocco. This conclusion led to a disagreement between the World Jewish Congress and the representatives of the Israeli Foreign Ministry.

At the time that the Golan-Riegner delegation met with Ben Barka and Bouabid in November 1958, there was significant tension between Balafrej and Allal Alfassi, on the one hand, who were accused of being too conservative, and between the younger leftists led by Bouabid and Ben Barka, on the other. The latter two informed the World Jewish Congress representatives that this was not the ideal time to resolve the Jewish problem, because of the crisis in the Balafrej government. However, according to them, Morocco’s membership in the Arab League would not change anything in terms of the authorities’ treatment of the fundamental rights of Moroccan Jews. The proof was that Meyer Toledano had been sent to Egypt to conduct negotiations. Ben Barka’s principles had not changed - every citizen must be granted the freedom to emigrate, but there was a concern that the Jews’ emigration would lead to their capital being taken out of the country, which would in turn weaken the country’s economy and have a negative impact on public administration. Even though the party representatives that they spoke to insisted that they all wished separate between the treatment of the Jewish community in Morocco and the general Arab policy re­garding the Middle East conflict, the WJC delegation was not convinced that a change could be expected in the pol­icy regarding the issuance of passports for Jews.

As expected, Golan and Riegner, this time joined by Levinsky, met with Laghzaoui as well in order to discuss his promise to issue 500 passports for Jews each month. This time, the head of the security services had more pleasant things to say. He pointed out that times had changed since the incident of the evacuation of the Qadima camp and that he could now act differently. He could now agree to certain matters those two years before he had absolutely ruled out. He justified this by saying that at that time, the government was still new and not in full control of the situation, and could therefore not accept the activities of the Qadima organization. The matter was likely to have led to complications. The special problem that required an urgent resolution was the fate of the 100 arrested Jews in Tanger who were waiting for a decision regarding their future; the problem of the Jews seeking to return to Morocco was also an issue. According to Laghzaoui, it was not a simple matter to prohibit the return to Morocco of anyone who had been in Israel. Difficult family problems would have to be resolved occasionally, and in effect, he no longer saw a visit to Israel as consti­tuting a crime.

To the surprise of his interlocutors, Laghzaoui had pre­pared a file for them regarding the subject of the selection of the Jewish emigrants and accused Israel of bringing in Moroccan Jews to serve as canon fodder. According to him, Morocco would not support this trend and would not allow young Moroccans to be drafted into foreign armies. Nevertheless, he assured the two that any Jew who sub­mitted an application for a passport and paid 1,600 francs would be allowed leave the country: "We will not hold up anyone […] you must understand that I am interested in only one thing: that there should not be any noise [about the emigration] and that there shouldn’t be any problems […] I have therefore opened the stream somewhat and I am closing my eyes [regarding the numbers of the emi­grants]. But everything has to be done in moderation." He promised to personally handle any incident of a passport not being issued that was brought to his attention, and he also instructed the border police not to detain anyone holding a passport. He told Golan, Reigner and Levinsky that he had charged those serving under him in the police to handle all Moroccans in an equal manner and not to distinguish between Jews and Muslims. He also told them that he did not wish encourage profiteering in passports or in causing anyone to suffer, although according to him, there were those who made money in this way during the days of Qadima.

Levinsky was impressed by the security forces’ direc­tor’s intellectual level and from his cleverness, but in his view, there was no substantial difference between the po­sitions held by the two Istiqlal factions regarding emigra­tion. It could be that the leftist leaders were more hostile due to the rise of their more conservative colleagues. Levinsky told his fellow Mossad agents in Paris that after Laghzaoui had announced to them that every Jew seeking a passport was entitled to receive it, the wind was taken out of the delegation’s sails. Riegner also acknowledged that he did not dare to bring up the issue of an organization that would work on emigration from within Morocco, a subject that was their undeclared goal, out of a concern that he would thus ruin the atmosphere that prevailed during their conversation. Levinsky added: "I was espe­cially shocked by the fact that after we had questioned tens of Jews, we could not find any incidents in which pass­ports had been denied. No one would actually point to such incidents. We didn’t receive any information regard­ing the subject. The representatives of the various com­munities always spoke about passport problems, but when they were asked, they were not willing to point to actual facts." Approximately 10 days after his meeting with Laghzaoui, Easterman sent him a letter summarizing the talks held with his colleagues, and promised him that he would soon return to Morocco.

In January of 1959, all groups dealing with the subject of emigration met in Jerusalem and in New York in order to encourage Easterman to again leave for Morocco. The aim was still to clear up the problem of the Jews who were collected in Tanger, which had turned into a miniature Qadima camp and used as a means of pressure against the authorities who were trying to minimize its importance. The emigrants were living in a garage and in three small hotels, under difficult and crowded conditions. A consul­tation was held in New York on the 19^th of January, in which Goldmann, Easterman, Perlzweig and Riegner and various Israeli embassy personnel - Avraham Harman and Shimshon Arad - participated. Those present asked Easterman to make his visit to Morocco on the first of February, in accordance with a message that had been given to the Moroccans by Golan and Riegner. The pur­pose of the visit was to "conduct negotiations regarding legal departures from Morocco" and regarding the estab­lishment of a permanent WJC legation in the country. Goldmann and Riegner preferred that Golan and Levinsky join Easterman in Morocco, but Easterman opposed this and asked that only André Jabès assist him in his meetings with the Jewish community.

Jews who had received passports was a proof that the Moroccan authorities were indeed complying with the principle of freedom of emigration for individuals. As Riegner noted: "The Moroccan authorities never denied the principle of freedom of emigration, but they opposed organized collective emigration. The difficulties were cre­ated at the lower levels." It should be noted that the Moroccans’ success in convincing their listeners that every Jew who wished to leave Morocco could do so forced the representatives of the World Jewish Congress to change the language of their appeals and to drop hints regarding collective departures as opposed to individual emigration, which did not solve the problem of the lower classes who were the main group who would be emigrat­ing. The groups dealing with emigration stopped using the principle of freedom of movement and the basic right to leave the country with a passport, and they gradually be­gan to hint about an external body that would organize emigration in Morocco in a collective fashion in accor­dance with agreed emigration quotas. Very delicately, they hinted to the authorities that such a body must be estab­lished in order to deal with the poor and uneducated Jews who wished to emigrate in a spontaneous fashion. The representatives of the Jewish Agency also changed their language and began to talk about "assisted individual emi­gration" as an interim measure. Those conducting the ne­gotiations quickly understood that passports could at most solve the problems of merchants and students, but this was not their goal. In order to take out the village dwellers in significant numbers it would be necessary to operate a system that would deal with them collectively. This, the authorities were not likely to approve, for reasons that were understood.

Without the Israeli embassy in France’s knowledge, a meeting was to be held with the Crown Prince on July 29, 1959 with Golan, Easterman and Jabès attending. The three of them intended to bring up various topics with him relating to continued Jewish life in the country, as well as the approval of the by-laws of the "Conseil des Communautés" and the re-opening of the World Jewish Congress’ office in Morocco. According to Goldmann, the Crown Prince refused to receive Easterman and Riegner, on the ground that he did not know them. He asked why Golan did not join them and when Easterman responded that Golan was ill, the prince asked the two of them to wait until Golan recovered, at which time he would re­ceive them. Easterman and Jabès were forced to return from Morocco as they had arrived without having met the Prince. They were angry that the ambassador had not ap­proved Golan’s departure, and as a result they refused to report to him regarding their visit in Morocco.

Thus, in the fall of 1960 there were a variety of groups who were running back and forth between the palace and the opposition in order to obtain advantages and improvements for the Jews of Morocco and approval of their departure from the country. At the same time, efforts were being made by the Israelis to distance the young country from the Pan-arabist bloc. Several brokers took part in these contacts, including André Chouraqui, Sam Benazeraf, Isaac Cohen-Olivar, Marcel Franco and David Amar. In August of 1961, these people succeeded in realizing their goal in two areas: The Jews were allowed to leave on a collective basis and the State of Israel retained a channel of direct communication for cooperation with the head of the Moroccan government in the areas of security and intelligence which continued to develop with time until they were formally recognized in the 1970’s.

Why the Jews left Morocco ?

There are many answers to the critical question as to why the Jews of Morocco left. Some of the reasons were substantive and were based on matters of fundamental importance, and some were circumstantial – resulting form the specific time at which the Jews left during the early 1960’s. The Jewish community, the international Jewish organizations and the State of Israel were all concerned because, despite all the calming declarations put out by the Moroccan authorities, it was impossible to deny the basic fact that the independent Moroccan state was defined by its constitution as an Islamic state. But the problem was not connected to legal definitions alone. Post-colonial Moroccan society was characterized by a lifestyle in which religion played an important role, and all of its cul­ture was based on the Muslim experience. This socio-cul­tural situation did not leave any room for those who were not Muslims, or for those who were secular in the style of many West European societies since the French Revolu­tion.

With this as a starting point, any attempt to overcome the problem of the existence of a Jewish community within a Muslim society was doomed. It is true that some of the Jewish intelligentsia tried to ignore the problem for a time while the initial excitement generated by independence continued, but they were forced to face reality only soon enough. It was true that the leadership of the independent state had for some time been torn between its wish to adopt the progressive principles of the democratic West on the one hand, and on the other - its sense of kinship with the flag-bearers of the pan-arabist ideology then sweeping the area and Morocco as well. Despite the leadership’s early wavering, it became obvious that the pan-arabists had won the day shortly after independence was achieved.

Morocco joined the Arab League, cut off its postal ties with Israel, and began a process of moroccanization and arabization of the government administration, all of which, together, tipped the scales for the Jews, and eliminated the possibility that the status of the country’s Jews would be similar to that of the Jews in the secular democratic coun­tries of Western Europe.

The Arab-Israeli conflict only aggravated a problem that would have existed anyway. The fear of a loss of the advantages given them by their education as a result of the Arabization process put the Jews into a state of chronic discomfort and uncertainty, which only increased with time. Since Morocco could not offer any guarantee that the future would be better for its Jewish citizens in an Arab-Muslim state, the Jews had no choice but to leave.

It is true that the Middle East conflict – which was one of the reasons for the urge to emigrate – was an important element in the deterioration of relations between Jews and Muslims. The conflict raised concerns on both an emo­tional and a religious level. But sooner or later the con­flicts between the Jewish and Muslim communities within Morocco would have become much more critical and the Jews’ status within society would have been seriously weakened. The experience of Jews in other Arab countries did not encourage the development of good neighbourly relations between Jews and Muslims in Morocco.

Along with the intrusion of the Middle Eastern conflict into the Jewish-Muslim relationship in Morocco, another concern arose regarding the loss of the advantages, which the Jews had enjoyed in the past, relative to the Muslim public. The ending of these advantages was due to the country’s adoption of the arabization process which was to cause the Jews’ to lose the preferences they had previously enjoyed in terms of obtaining management positions, pref­erences which came from their having benefited from French education. Financial shocks, which flowed from the departure of the French, also impacted on the Jewish merchants and artisans. A fear grew among the Jewish bourgeoisie and among the free professionals that they would indeed have to choose between French language and culture, to which they had been so open in the past, and the process of expected arabization, which would bring along with it Muslim cultural baggage in which the Jews would be at a disadvantage. Many of Morocco’s Jews understood that it would not be possible to hold onto France and the artificial imposition of its culture in the post-colonial independent state. The formal Jewish leader­ship remained relatively weak because of its dual loyalty to both France and Morocco. David Amar, for example, was forced to say one thing and then the opposite so as to avoid conflict with the authorities while still following his true wishes as a Jewish leader. The Hebrew-Israeli option was not ideal from this perspective, but it was still better than a Jewish future in an Arab-Muslim state, which was attempting to determine its future character.

It is important to note that the Jews’ departure from Morocco was also part of a social process that had begun long before Moroccan independence. This historical trend toward migration was an integral part of a natural demo­graphic process that had been going on for a long time within the Moroccan population in general and even more within the country’s Jewish community. The strength of this movement among the Jews was due to the socio-eco­nomic status, which they enjoyed. The process existed in the 18^th and 19^th centuries and was accelerated even more during the period of French control. This demographic change was basically a trend, which began with the aban­donment of villages in the direction of a nearby town, and then progressed to the move from towns to the medium-sized cities and the largest cities. With the transformation of Casablanca in a most important economic center, vil­lagers began to migrate directly from their distant and remote homes to this new center. It should be recalled that the villagers numbered more than 30,000 people out of a total population of 250,000 Jews. Along with the exodus from the villages and the small cities to Casablanca, there was also a movement of Jews out of Morocco, even before the establishment of the State of Israel. The Jews of Mo­rocco moved not only to France and Spain but also to Brazil and to Venezuela, British Gibraltar, Great Britain, United States and Canada.

The departure from Morocco to more attractive locations that promised, in the long run, an improved quality of life was thus a part of an eternal demographic process that grew in strength with the pas­sage of time. The migration to Israel, France, Canada and South America should thus be seen in this historical demographic perspective which itself took place as part of the process of educational and cultural development which France had brought to the Jews of Morocco. Within a relatively short time, the Jewish community had so ab­sorbed the advantages of French civilization that a large gap between them and their Arab-Muslim geo-social envi­ronment was created, a fact that motivated them to con­tinue the migration process in the direction of new hori­zons. The relative backwardness of Moroccan society would sooner or later have pushed the Jews out of inde­pendent Morocco. It was an inevitable process for the country’s Jews, who sought to improve their social status and to be concerned about their children’s cultural future.

The assistance offered by the emissaries of the Mossad to the Jewish community should not be discounted either. This led to a sense of obligation, which the emissaries succeeded in creating among part of the community’s leadership. An entire generation of young Jews which experienced the DEJJ (Département Éducatif de la Jeun­esse Juive of Charles Netter Association), youth move­ment, the Jewish scouts, the Alliance schools and the Israeli youth movements absorbed a great affection for the young State of Israel. The young Jewish state enlivened their imagination through its victories, its scientific achievements and the almost magical sense with which terms like qibbuts, moshav, TSAHAL, halutsim (pioneers), "Jerusalem" and others lit up their imaginations. On this foundation, a few sentences from the Jewish prayers and from Scripture were mixed up with abstract mystical longing for the Holy Land. Thus, fertile ground was laid for a departure to a foreign land, even if the push for such a departure was somewhat mixed with longing for a homeland in which generations of ancestors had been buried.

Regarding the circumstances of the departure which took place in the period between November 1961 (in the wake of the "Compromise Agreement" which was reached with the Moroccan authorities in august 1961) and the Six-Day War, it should be noted that the conditions of the departure themselves created a strong sense of having been aban­doned – a sensation which was felt by many Jews. Since during this period those who left did so in an atmosphere of secrecy, no one person in the community knew the ac­tual size of the migration. For obvious reasons, no one was interested in publicizing the statistics regarding the num­bers of those leaving, so that the "Jew-on-the-street" knew only what he saw with his own eyes and what he felt as fear in his own heart. In the minds of the individual Jews, the pace of the migration reached proportions that were so high they caused each person to believe that all his rela­tives and acquaintances had left, and that he was the only one who had stayed behind. Those who had not yet left sensed that, sooner or later, they would also be going.

Moreover, and paradoxically, the very same Moroccan authorities that had sought to prevent it created the depar­ture psychosis. The more they made the Jews’ emigration difficult and tried to seduce them into staying, the greater was the Jews’ desire to leave before it became impossible to go. Since independence, the Jews were concerned by the question of whether Morocco could, in the long run, be tolerant of their presence. Even though there was no actual injury was done to them, the doubt regarding the future was sufficient to ignite the push to depart. The doubt, the fear and the panic transformed faithful citizens into emi­grants, primarily as a result of the obstacles the govern­ment had placed in the way of their departure.

Since the Jews of Morocco were not able to receive French citizenship as the Algerian Jews did, Israel was one of the significant destinations to which Jews turned. The heroic image of the Israeli sabra society that had devel­oped in the Jewish state, its victories over the Arab armies, worked a charm on the Jews of Morocco and was a major attraction for the younger generation. Israel thus provided an available and appealing alternative to other possible destinations, despite the economic difficulties that those who arrived there could expect. The thought of a new life and a source of hope in Israel became the antithesis of a fear of an uncertain future in Morocco.

As to the cardinal question of why the Jews left Morocco, there is a short answer: a psychosis of aban­donment had been created. Since, during this period, emi­gration took place in an atmosphere of secrecy, no one in the community knew what the levels of emigration ac­tually were. As a matter of course, no one was interested in publicizing statistics regarding this subject, so that eve­ryone was informed only by what he saw and what he feared in his heart. In the minds of the Jews, the rate of emigration had reached proportions that caused everyone to feel that all of his relatives and acquaintances had left and only he had remained behind. Even those who had not left knew that sooner or later, he would leave. Thus, para­doxically, the psychosis of departure was created not only by Israel’s agents who wished to instigate it but also by the Moroccan government, which wished to stop it.

The more they made it difficult for Jews to leave and tried to persuade them to stay, the desire on the part of the Jews to leave as soon as possible before it became impossible to do so only grew. From the time that independence was achieved, the Jews were bothered by the question of whether Morocco could be tolerant of their existence in the long run. Although there was never an actual attack on the Jews, this doubt was sufficient to incite the desire to leave. Doubt, fear and panic turned loyal citizens into a source of emigration, due to the obstacles with which their departure was blocked.

Were it not for the emigration psychosis, the Jews could have taken full advantage their preferred status and used it for economic and social purposes. This process would no doubt have weakened when educated Muslims completed their studies and began to seek positions in the country’s administration, commerce and economy. Friction might have developed between the long-time Jewish bureaucrats and Muslims who wished to take for themselves various public positions. But this would have happened gradually, and only after a period in which the Jews would have been able to exploit the advantages of their rela­tively high level of education. Had it not been for the overly rapid acceleration of emigration, it could be that the Jews of Morocco would have reached to Israel with their economic-educational status much improved.

At the same time, the state of Israel would have been better prepared to absorb them. The departure from Morocco could have been spread over a longer period of time. Had that hap­pened, it might have been possible to avoid the social cri­ses that developed in Israel, and which were expressed in the riots in Wadi Salib and in those led by the "Israeli Black Panthers" among whom there were so many Moroccan immigrants.

 

 

Commentaires sur The Establishment of Rights for Jews in Morocco (1956-1961)

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