Posted on 06/23/2017 4:50:05 AM PDT by SJackson
I had to pinch myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. There I was, an Orthodox Israeli Jew, at a 500-year-old synagogue in Marrakesh, distributing food parcels to Muslims for Ramadan, representing the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (The Fellowship) on behalf of millions of Christians in the U.S. and worldwide.
It just didn’t make sense. It seemed too good to be true. But as I quickly learned, it was just another day in mystical Morocco, a country that defies norms, defines tolerance and is home to a dwindling population of 2,500 Jews.
Though Morocco is a Muslim country, the bellboy at my hotel told me with a loving smile, Jews were actually in Morocco 600 years before Muslims—when they were sent out of Jerusalem following the destruction of the First Temple.
“This is your home,” the bellboy said, while pointing to a picture on the wall of the Atlas Mountains. “Your people were here before mine.”
This respectful attitude was the prevailing sentiment in my communications with every Muslim I met during my stay. Moroccans are genuine in their respect for the Jewish people, love for Moroccan Jews, and awe for the holy rabbis who walked their streets and are buried in the Jewish cemetery. I nearly cried when I saw how well the locals preserve the Jewish cemetery.
“Why do you treat the Jews so well?” I asked a Muslim teenager who works for an organization called Mimouna, whose members are Muslim youths passionate about spreading Jewish history. Mimouna made history by starting a Jewish studies program at a Moroccan Arab university, along with the Arab world’s only Holocaust education program.
“Why wouldn’t we treat them well?” he responded.
Indeed, it is illogical for local Muslims to suddenly turn on native Jews who have lived in their country for thousands of years. But we live in an illogical world. Morocco is one of the few places where Christians, Muslims and Jews coexist in peace and mutual respect. Why?
One night I attended a Ramadan fast-breaking event—organized by the inspiring local Chabad rabbi at an Orthodox synagogue. Dozens of Jews and Muslims gathered to celebrate. King Mohammed VI’s representative for the entire Marrakesh region also attended. He sent blessings from the king to the Jewish community and closed his eyes with intent—and answered “amen”—when the Chabad rabbi said the traditional Jewish prayer for kings.
Why are Jews in Morocco treated so well? Simply put, it’s because of the king. During World War II, when the Nazis asked the king of Morocco to put together a list of Jews in his country, he boldly answered, “We don’t have Jews, we have Moroccans,” and refused to comply.
Today’s king, Mohammed VI, is the grandson of King Mohammed V, who protected his country’s 265,000 Jews. Like his grandfather, Mohammed VI believes Jews are just as Moroccan—and just as important—as Muslims, Christians and everyone else. If anyone in Morocco messes with Jews, they are messing with the king.
Many project that in a decade, there won’t be any Jews left in Morocco. Most of the Moroccan grandmothers who read Psalms all day have moved to Israel. Moroccan Jewish youths have largely moved abroad. The remaining Jews are the gems of ancient times.
What legacy do Jews want to leave in Morocco? What pillars do Jews want to set up in Morocco that will carry on long after there are no Jews left?
After my four-day journey representing Christian and Jewish supporters of The Fellowship, I deeply understand why it’s so important that our organization partnered with Chabad and Mimouna to distribute thousands of food parcels from the country’s ancient synagogues to local Muslims for Ramadan. It is clear to me why we must set up a Jewish information center in central Marrakesh and make sure the Jewish cemetery will keep being preserved by local Muslims.
I realize how critical it is that we also continue to distribute food parcels to poor Jews on a monthly basis, so they aren’t neglected or looked at as beggars, but rather serve as a shining example of the fact that all Jews, Christians and Muslims are responsible to look out for one another.
In a country that lives on ancient spiritual stories of holy men and women who once walked its streets, this is our final opportunity to leave an eternal legacy on behalf of the millions of Moroccan Jews who came before us.
What legacy should we leave? That the Jewish people came in peace, left in peace and were only known for peace. This is what it means to live in the vision of God.
"Jew eat yet ?"
"No, Jew ?"
What brought you to Morocco?
My health...I came for the waters.
But Morocco is a desert.
I was misinformed...
Thank you for an excellent article.
If you'd like to be on or off, please FR mail me.
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Morocco, a country that defies norms, defines tolerance and is home to a dwindling population of 2,500 Jews.Today’s king, Mohammed VI, is the grandson of King Mohammed V, who protected his country’s 265,000 Jews. Like his grandfather, Mohammed VI believes Jews are just as Moroccan—and just as important—as Muslims, Christians and everyone else. If anyone in Morocco messes with Jews, they are messing with the king.
Yes, during the Nazi occupation the king's grandfather refused to enforce Vichy/Nazi antisemitic directives. For which he deserves a great deal of credit. The post war Jewish population, 250,000 to 350,000. Particularly post 67, it was a less than pleasant place. Though perhaps the best of the Arab nations.
“But we live in an illogical world. Morocco is one of the few places where Christians, Muslims and Jews coexist in peace and mutual respect.”
Just don’t leave Islam and BECOME a Christian in Morocco. You’re family might kill you.
I’ve wanted to visit Morocco...especially Marrakech...since reading Michener’s book “The Drifters” decades ago.
Maybe there’s still a chance.
Morocco is the first country to recognize the U.S.
On December 20, 1777, the Kingdom of Morocco became the first country in the world to recognize United States independence, only a year and a half after the U.S. Declaration of Independence was issued. The War of Independence was still in progress, and the result was still far from certain.
In the 1780s, after independence had been secured, Moroccan pirates threatened American shipping in the Mediterranean. Thomas Barclay, the American consul in France, arrived in Morocco in 1786. There he negotiated the Moroccan-American Treaty of Friendship, which was signed later that year in Europe by John Adams and Thomas Jefferson.Under Sultan Mohammed III, Morocco became at once the first Arab state, the first African state, and the first Muslim state to sign a treaty with the United States. Congress ratified the Treaty of Peace and Friendship between the two nations in 1787. Renegotiated in 1836, the treaty is still in force, constituting the longest unbroken treaty relationship in U.S. history.
What a weird story. The Jews in Morocco decline 99% since WW II and the author considers this a success story of tolerance. I wonder what his definition of “pogrom” is?
A little odd. Much was voluntary emigration to Israel. Which at one time was banned. Tensions greater post 67. Still, far better than the rest of the Arab world. And King Mohamed V’s resistance to Vichy on the Jewish issue should be remembered. Many Moroccan Jews emigrated to France and Europe. Rather than forcasting the end, perhaps they could be encouraged to return. Probably safer than France.
There was Moroccan in the 60s than at other times in modern music history.
>What a weird story. The Jews in Morocco decline 99% since WW II and the author considers this a success story of tolerance. I wonder what his definition of “pogrom” is?
It’s only bad when whites do it.
"Yes, It Is All About Islam-Ibn Warraq takes on the apologists' lies."
Oh, the duality of it all..!!
Probably the Jewish history in Morocco will be erased by a fundamentalist takeover. Jews in Morocco, as in other Muslim lands, saw their fortunes rise when ‘moderate’ Muslims came to power, and then fall when an inevitable Muslim revival movement brought fundamentalists to power.
The Jews are Morocco are mostly French-speaking, reflecting the moderating influence of western Civilization on Muslim countries. Western Civilization and its humane effects are dying rapidly.
I actually had to read that with my lips moving, but very good!
I’ve been told that 1/2 of the remaining Jews in Turkey are planning to leave. The number to leave is about 6,500. They see what is ahead for them in Turkey.
Turkey has practiced cultural genocide on a number of groups, including Jews.
Turkey is a hostile environment to Jews, Christians, Kurds, Yazidi’s and many “non-approved” Muslim sects.
I once spent an afternoon talking with a (Muslim) man who had been a fighter pilot in the Royal Moroccan Air Force who told me the same thing.
Wiki: Barbary corsairs and crews from the North African Ottoman provinces of Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli, and the independent Sultanate of Morocco under the Alaouite dynasty (the Barbary Coast) were the scourge of the Mediterranean. ...between 1 and 1.25 million Europeans were captured by Barbary pirates and sold as slaves between the 16th and 19th centuries.
On 11 October 1784, Moroccan pirates seized the brigantine Betsey. The Spanish government negotiated the freedom of the captured ship and crew; however, Spain offered advice to the United States on how to deal with the Barbary States. The advice was to offer tribute to prevent further attacks against merchant ships. The U.S. Minister to France, Thomas Jefferson, decided to send envoys to Morocco and Algeria to try to purchase treaties and the freedom of the captured sailors held by Algeria. Morocco was the first Barbary Coast State to sign a treaty with the U.S., on 23 June 1786. This treaty formally ended all Moroccan piracy against American shipping interests. Specifically, article six of the treaty states that if any Americans captured by Moroccans or other Barbary Coast States docked at a Moroccan city, they would be set free and come under the protection of the Moroccan State.
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