The Disputes regarding the Jewish Emigration from Morocco 1956–1961

Yigal Bin-Nun

Description

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 mat- ters of fundamental importance. Others were circumstantial, resulting form the specific time at which the Jews left, during the early 1960s. 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.

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• Publié par: yigalbinnun
• Publié le: 02 décembre 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 249
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 5 Mo

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Muslim-Bin-Nun Page 51 Monday, July 8, 2013 12:43 PM
The Disputes regarding the Jewish Emigration
from Morocco 1956–1961
YIGAL BIN-NUN
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
1behalf of the Mossad in Morocco. Liberal circles within the Moroccan lead-
ership rejected the idea of Jewish emigration, because, with the advent of
Moroccan independence, they wished to create the appearance of a pro-
gressive country in which all its citizens, regardless of religion, enjoyed
equal rights so that none would have any desire to leave. Liberals also op-
posed emigration because of the concern that if Jews left the country, the
2economy would suffer. Pan-Arabists in the conservative wing of the Istiqlal,
for their part, were unhappy that wealthy Jews from Morocco would emi-
grate to Israel, thus strengthening the Zionist forces there against Arab
nations.
The history of the Jewish community during the early years of Moroccan
independence is one of continuous worry regarding an unclear future and
the possibility of impending disaster. During that period, the Jewish com-
munity was forced to address several critical questions that would ultimate-
ly determine the future of Moroccan Jewry, as well as the future of individ-
ual 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 demo-
cratic progressive country or to escape from the country out of fear of pos-
sible disaster.
1 The Mossad had established a network in Morocco, which it called Misgeret (Frame-
work). The network dealt with the subject of Jewish self-defense and, later on, the
issue of illegal emigration.
2 The Istiqlal Party—the word means “independence”—was established after the publi-
cation of the proclamation of independence in Fès. Its 58 signatories made up a group
of young people who had already in 1934 formed a group called Action du Peuple,
which demanded reforms from the colonial administration. Allal Al Fassi and Ahmed
Balafrej headed the party.
51
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52 YIGAL BIN-NUN
The Moroccan monarchy also had to choose between continuing its con-
nection to France, the democratic West and its culture and language, or
aligning Morocco with the countries of the Middle East, which had pan-Ara-
bist policies and 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 deci-
sion 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 assimi-
lation, as was the case of the Jewish communities of Western Europe. The
first option was not very popular, because its potential backers simply pre-
ferred 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, subse-
quently, 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 that was midway
between a search for complete community autonomy and an attempt at cul-
tural 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 lead-
ers chose to preserve the clearly ethnic public institutions that went beyond
any religious function and were more connected to the social, educational,
and cultural spheres. These were the kind of that give a commu-
nity 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 loy-
alty to the Moroccan homeland, the country in which their fathers had lived
even before the advent of Islam, along with faithfulness to its language, soci-
ety, and royal house. 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 rela-
tions with the Jewish community in Morocco, and they determined the
basic guidelines of the Zionist understanding of the situation: first, anti-
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JEWISH EMIGRATION FROM MOROCCO 53
Semitism is timeless and universal; second, the ingathering of all Diaspora
Jewry in Israel must eventually be accomplished in order to defeat this eter-
nal anti-Semitism; and third, Israel must take the responsibility for having
the Jews brought to Israel preemptively in order to overcome the demo-
graphic fear stemming from the regional situation and to strengthen the
Jewish base within it. After the Holocaust in Europe, the Jews of North Afri-
ca and especially the community in Morocco became the most important
Jewish bloc in the world for American Jewry, which wished to mark the tra-
dition of maintaining Jewish existence in the face of the danger of assimila-
tion. 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 defense.
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 emigrated to the young state at an average rate of
3,000 Jews per month. During all the years in which the Jewish Agency’s
3Qadima 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 to
1967.
A census held in November of 1957 showed that the Moroccan Jewish
community as a whole numbered 164,216, which made up 1.8% of the gen-
eral population, and that seventy-five percent of it lived in twelve cities or
villages. The remaining Jews (a group that 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 cit-
ies, 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 Jew-
ish population. Only 10.6% of the community was elderly. The Jews lived
mainly 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 gen-
3 Qadima (1949–1956) was the Jewish Agency’s organization in Morocco. It was also the
name of the transit camp run by the Jewish Agency near Al Jadida, which housed Jews
emigrating to Israel.
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54 YIGAL BIN-NUN
eral 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%<