Morocco's Jewish Heritage, Akhbar, Al-Aan TV, 17 Jan 2021

Olivier Guitta

13 January 2021

Since the fourth Arab normalisation deal in just six months, the Morocco-Israel agreement inked a month ago is from far the most unsurprising and logical. In fact, Morocco has always stood out in the Muslim world in its relationship with both Israel and its ancient Jewish community. The Moroccan Jewish community was the largest in the Arab world; at one point of the twentieth century, Morocco’s Jewish community accounted for 10% of the total population of the kingdom.

Quite tellingly, the main government-linked daily in Morocco, Le Matin, still mentions every day the date in the Jewish Calendar. In fact, until today, Jews are the only non-Muslim minority recognised in Morocco and their heritage is now going to be studied in Moroccan schools. Let’s look at some of it.

Early Years

The Jews have lived in Morocco since the Antiquity, arriving around the 5th century B.C. They interacted with the Berbers (Amazigh) in a complex process of reciprocal influences made of berberization of some and Judaization of others. After a few centuries, the Jews feeling at home in the area called themselves “toshavim” (the dwellers) and built the flourishing town of Tamegroute making it the capital of a principality. A veritable city-state, it became the centre of a prosperous kingdom and established itself as a nerve centre on the roads of gold, salt and other goods. It had continued commercial relations to the shores of Niger to the south and to India to the east. The cohabitation between Jews and Berbers continued even after the arrival of Islam in the eight century and the process of Islamization that began in Morocco.

The Jews of Spain who were persecuted by the Visigoths were making permanent back-and-forth between the Iberian Peninsula and Morocco to take refuge there; subsequently, the conquest of Andalusia by the Muslims took place in 711 with the active help of the Jews of Spain so that they could benefit from their protection. Later, the forerunners of the Spanish golden age came, for the most part, from the Jewish cultural centre of Fez. This cultural and intellectual mix coupled with a freedom of worship ceased between 1140 and 1269, during the reign of the Almohad, before being restored by the Merinids.

The Spanish Jews who fled to Morocco from the 1391 pogroms were joined a century later, in 1492, by a larger wave of exiles, after the Spanish Inquisition left no choice for thousands of Jews to leave Spain behind rather than convert to Christianity. These fellow Jews, the “megorashim” (or expelled Jews) also called Sephardim, had been forbidden to take gold and silver or minted coins out of Spain. This Iberian presence in Morocco was further reinforced by the arrival of a third group of Spanish-speaking Jews fleeing the forced conversions imposed by Portugal in 1497.

Thus, Moroccan Judaism is the fusion between two Judaism: the "Toshavim," who are "natives" and are of Berber origin and the "Megorashim," who came from the Iberian Peninsula. The cohabitation was not the easiest and it took centuries for these two types of Judaism to blend into one.

Trade

A number of Moroccan Jews in the main ports and towns in the interior of the country played a major role in the commerce from the Middle Ages to modern times. A small elite of traders and craftsmen developed rapidly, especially in occupations forbidden to Muslims: banking, silversmithing, the trade in precious metals, the wine trading and the maritime trade. That division of labour of some sorts between Muslim and Jews contributed to a largely harmonious relationship.

In 1578, Jewish financiers and merchants supported the Sultan of Morocco in his fight against Portuguese claims to the domination of Morocco, contributing to the victory of Sultan Abdel Malik against King Sebastian I of Portugal in the battle of the three kings. The Jews celebrated the victory as a new Purim (the Jewish holiday commemorating the time when the Jewish people living in Persia were saved from extermination by the courage of a young Jewish woman called Esther).

In the 17th century, European Jewish families mainly from Livorno (Italy) and Holland settled in Morocco and acted as intermediaries between Englishmen (who occupied Tangier) and Moroccans. Jews supported Moulay Rachid, the first Alawite sultan in his seizure of power in 1667, as well as that of his brother and successor Moulay Ismail in 1672.

While the Jewish community of Agadir focused on the Saharan trade, a new town was going to be vital for both Morocco and its Jews. Indeed, Mogador (now called Essaouira) was founded in 1764 by Sultan Mohammed III whose vision was to develop a new city open to the ocean and able to trade with the world and Europe in particular. Therefore, in 1766, on the orders of the Sultan, the Secretary of the Court, Moroccan Jew Samuel Sumbal chose representatives of Morocco's ten most important Jewish families to direct the trade in the new city. The sultan gave by royal decree these Jewish merchants the title of "tujjar al Sultan” (the Sultan's merchants) and granted them special privileges: cash advances, better tax status, housing and warehouses in the Casbah.

From the founding of the city, an important class of great Jewish notables emerged in Mogador. Also, the town attracted other Jews from all over the kingdom and sometimes from Algeria, Spain, Italy or England (for instance the Sebag, Pinto or Corcos of Marrakech, the Aflalo and Pénia of Agadir, the Aboudarham, Hadida and Israel of Tetouan but also the Lara of Amsterdam or the Cohen-Solal and Boujenah, of Algeria and the Berber Jews such as the Melluls and the Levys). By 1785, there were more than 6,000 Jews living in Mogador, becoming the first town in Morocco populated by a majority of Jews. Mogador had become by then the main trading port of Morocco, where all consulates and traders operating with Europe would be concentrated. Under Mohammed III, Jews would become the trade correspondents of the Europeans in Morocco and so local Jews become consuls in Morocco for different European countries.

European and Muslims also built houses in Mogador, attracted by promises of tariff-easing. Wealthy Jewish families came to dominate trade while Jewish craftsmen worked and lived side by side with Muslims.

The "merchants of the sultan" experienced a new boom with the reign of Moulay Abderrahmane (1822 - 1859). This community, in addition to being a bridge between the interior of Morocco and Europe, developed great relations with England in particular.

Diplomacy/Politics

Moroccan Jews served as counsellors to the king, ministers, colonels, members of parliament, judges, and ambassadors.

Before his coronation in Meknes in 1672, Moulay Ismail was the right hand man to his brother, Sultan Moulay Rachid, in Fez. The Jews of the time were mostly merchants. Among them, Joseph Maimran to whom Moulay Ismail owes his accession to the Alawite throne. Maimran would be the first to inform Ismail, then governor, of his brother's death in Marrakech. He even lent him the money needed to get ahead of all the other contenders for the throne. He was appointed to the sultan's court and according to the Dutch consul in Salé, he enjoyed "a credit equal to that of the great Colbert in France.”

Even after his death years later, and in recognition, Moulay Ismail called his son, Abraham Maimran, to become the strongman of the sultan's court and his most respected foreign policy adviser, post previously created for his father. Confident of his strength and power, Moulay Ismail aspired to open his country, whose trade was then limited to Holland alone, more broadly to the whole of Europe. Distrustful of the slinging Muslim elites of Fez, he relied on his mercantile ambitions on the three great Jewish families: the Toledano, the Maimran and the Benattar.

In May 1688, the Moroccan Jew, Joseph Toledano, presented his credentials to the General States of the Netherlands as the official ambassador of the Cherifian Empire. He then became ambassador of the Alawite sultan Moulay Ismail in that country. Since then, several people from the same family have held special envoy positions by the court of the Sultan of the Cherifian Empire. History shows that during the first decades of Moulay Ismail's reign, Moroccan Jews stood out, holding positions as ministers, advisors to the sultan and emissaries. In 1717, Moulay Ismail dispatched another Toledano to Spain but to no avail. Indeed, the Alawite sultan will be shocked to discover that the Jewish ambassador and his suite were not allowed to disembark and do business in Spain…

Charged by the Alawite Sultan Moulay Ismail with several sensitive issues with the European powers, Moshe Ben Attar managed to win a treaty with Great Britain in 1721. But unlike the other ambassadors, Moshe will only leave Morocco to go to Ceuta and will never travel to London.

In 1757, Moulay Mohammed Ben Abdellah, later known as Mohammed III, ascended the throne to succeed his father. To implement the ambitions of the new Alawite sultan and his plans to transform the ports of the Cherifian empire into a platform for trade and exchange, it was necessary to find a powerful advisor capable of both talking to Moroccans and foreigners. He appointed as counsellor Samuel Sumbal, a Jew who had studied French in Marseille, and was the Nagid (the religious leader) of the Moroccan Jewish community. At the time, he was an interpreter and a connoisseur of international relations. He was fluent in Arabic, French and Spanish. First an advisor, Samuel Sumbal quickly became foreign minister of the Alawite sultan and his right hand man for trade and economy.

Samuel Sumbel negotiated treaties with Sweden and Denmark, including clauses relating to the payment of an annual tribute to the sultan in exchange for guaranteeing the safety of their ships in the areas of the Mediterranean and the Atlantic where Moroccan pirates crossed.

Despite his achievements or maybe because of them, in 1780, after thirty years of service, Sumbal found himself thrown into prison on a charge of sending remittances abroad. Later on, he managed to escape to Gibraltar, where he is said to have rendered important service during the great siege by organizing the supply of provisions from Mogador. His death not long after, in the autumn of 1782, was suspected to be due to poison, administered at the instigation of his ungrateful but clearly not oblivious former master.

Fast forward to today when this tradition of Moroccan Sultans and Kings having close Jewish advisors is still very much alive. Andre Azoulay has been special advisor to two Moroccan Kings since 1991, first to Hassan II then to his son Mohamed VI. Azoulay’s official title is economic adviser to King Mohammed VI but this obscures the real nature of his job, which is far more expansive. He’s a shadow foreign minister, the all-around “right hand of the king,” along with the person responsible for Jewish life and Jewish memory in his country. A native of Essaouira himself, Azoulay has been the driving force of establishing the city as a top cultural destination. He has contributed to founding numerous music festivals, which regularly includes Jewish and Israeli performers. For Azoulay, his work in the city has shown that Jews and Muslims have gotten along and can still get along.

Cuisine

The Jewish Moroccan cuisine is a fundamental element of Moroccan culinary heritage. Moroccan Jewish cuisine is considered one of the richest and most varied in the world. The coexistence of Berbers, Jews, Arab-Muslims from the East, Andalusians, Africans, on Moroccan soil has fostered exchanges on the culinary level, giving birth to a rich Moroccan cuisine, of which Moroccan Jewish cuisine is an integral part.

This culinary heritage has crossed every continent and continues to shine with its diversity, taste and finesse.

Jewish cuisine is mixed with Amazigh and Andalusian Moroccan cuisine. It is a mosaic of traditions and rites and has therefore been the result of a mixture of many cultures thanks to the movements and numerous encounters of different civilizations. Moroccan Jewish cuisine reflects this aspect of the cohabitation of religions and this homogeneity of lifestyles in a Morocco that has been a crossroads of cultures and civilizations for centuries.

Very attached to the requirements and customs of kosher cooking, the Jews have been able, since the Antiquity, to imagine preparations adapted to the climate and the availability of agricultural products from the regions where they settled.

Spicy and aromatic, Moroccan Jewish cuisine uses among other ingredients saffron, candied lemon, garlic, fresh coriander and amounts of cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and Jamaican pepper. One of the culinary traditional delights dish of Moroccan Jewish cuisine is "la Dafina". The word dafina is a Judeo-Arabic word and comes from the Arabic word ad-dafina meaning “covered”, “very hot”, “smothered”, in relation to the cooking mode. The dafina is generally composed of beef, beef or calf’s foot, small potatoes, chickpeas, eggs, rice and wheat. Since observant Jews are not allowed to cook on Shabbat, the dafina is therefore prepared during the day on Friday. After having cooked for a long time before the start of Shabbat (Friday before sunset), it is placed on a hot plate and it simmers for almost 15 hours, which gives it a very special taste. After cooking, the ingredients are caramelized.

Another iconic Moroccan Jewish dish is the pastilla or Bastilla (while the Sephardic Jews continued to pronounce the name with a P, Arabs replaced it with a B) that has become one of the national dishes of Morocco. Pastilla incorporates pigeon slices with eggs, almonds and spices. It originated with the Jews of Morocco expelled from Spain and is even referred as a "Sephardic pastel”. The pie was baked or, for those who do not have access to an oven, suitable to be fried in a large frying pan. Within the Moroccan Jewish community, Pastilla was a dish for special occasions, because how labour-intensive it is to make. Sephardic Jews cook pastillas in Morocco to celebrate some Jewish holidays or during weddings. And as with Sephardic Jews, the Bastilla has even become a dish in its own right in traditional Moroccan cuisine, making its way for instance into the marriages of Muslim Moroccans.

Music

The musical Jewish heritage in Morocco is also an important portion of what Jews brought when they settled in Morocco. Andalusian music is one of the oldest music genres of Moroccan music. Developed as a fusion of Hispanic-Arab musical styles around the 9th century, Andalusian started to spread to Morocco by the 10th century. With the rise of the Berber Almohad Caliphate in the 12th century, Andalusian music was suppressed, as the Almohads discouraged music, smashing instruments but the Jews resisted and preserved it.

The Sephardim left Spain for good in 1492 with no belongings and no money but took with them invisible assets: their Spanish language and culture. One important cultural tradition Sephardim Jews held very close to their hearts was music. So quickly, Moroccan Jews performed and developed the traditions of the Andalusian classical music and introduced it into their Liturgical music.

In Morocco, Jews were ardent maintainers of Andalusian music and the zealous guardians of its old traditions. Indeed, as in so many other areas of Andalusian culture and society, Jews have played an important role in the evolution and preservation of the musical heritage of al-Andalus throughout its history.

The Sephardim preserved also the ballad or romance, the most popular form of Spanish culture. Amazingly, they have continued to sing these narrative songs until recent times. With the dispersal of Morocco's Jewish communities, and the changed lifestyles of the Jews from Morocco, there remain but a few singers for whom the ballads are part of their living culture. This ballad repertoire has, however, proved to be of exceptional interest to Hispanists for its archaic nature and its fidelity to the ballads' earliest sources.

Not only many important Moroccan Andalusian musicians were Jews, but also Moroccan Jewish communities today in Israel preserve Andalusian melodies and even song texts in their religious music.

Jewish singers singing in Arabic such as legends Samy El Maghribi, Salim Hilali and Zohra Fassiya are still popular among their co-religionists but also very much so among Muslims. More Moroccan Muslims have discovered or re-discovered the music and songs of great Jewish artists of the country; for proof their big hits are more and more often covered by Muslim singers.

Personalities

As we have seen in this article, there has been notorious Jewish Moroccans that have left a mark in history in various fields. Today, the Jewish Moroccan diaspora has also some famous members, just to cite a few: comedian Gad Elmaleh, U.S. Hedge Fund Star Marc Lasry, technology and media mogul Patrick Drahi, Israeli Minister Amir Peretz and UNESCO Head Audrey Azoulay.

One of the most intriguing Moroccan Jews is David Levy Yulee (1810-1886) who is known in the United States as the first Jew to sit as a senator. He is the descendant of a renowned Moroccan Jewish family that was very respected in the community and served the royal court in the 18th century. Yulee's family fled to Morocco with many of the last Jewish families expelled by Spain following the fall of Granada in 1492. Within the Moroccan Jewish community, the Yulees climbed the ranks to finally serve the royal court as emissaries and traders sent to different countries.

David Levy Yulee's great-grandfather, Judah, was an influential international trader. Judah's grandfather, Rabbi Samuel Ha-Levy ibn Yulee, served as an advisor to Sultan Moulay Abdallah and political leader of the Moroccan Jewish community. Then David's grandfather was one active participant in the signing of the first international treaty jointly signed by the United States with a foreign country, Morocco, in 1786.

Conclusion

Even though a minority, the Jews have had a significant impact on Morocco’s history from the political, economic, financial social and cultural regards. Interestingly Morocco has also an importance place in Jewish history: indeed, the kingdom has produced over the centuries top rabbis, merchants, ambassadors, artisans, singers, cooks. 

Moroccan Jews have always had a special place in their hearts for their native homeland and despite some of the hardships still consider their fellow Moroccan Muslim as very special. The new Morocco-Israel deal has opened a Pandora’s box that is unveiling for many Muslim Moroccans that didn’t even know that there were Jews in Morocco for 2,500 years, the contributions that their fellow citizens brought.

Olivier Guitta is the Managing Director of GlobalStrat, a security and geopolitical risk consulting company for companies and governments. Olivier tweets @OlivierGuitta