Les Juifs du Maroc

WILL PARTICIPATE:

Joseph Chetrit professeur émérite à l'Université de Haïfa, spécialiste de la culture et de l'histoire des Juifs en Afrique du Nord.
Ruth Grosrichard agrégée d'arabe, professeure à Sciences-Po à Paris.
Kamal Hashkar réalisateur du film “Tinghir Jérusalem: les échos du Mellah”.

At least since the ninth century, the Jews formed in Morocco numerous prosperous communities active in the domestic trade as in the trans-Saharan and international trades, who were able to stay, thanks to the close and daily relationship with their Muslim, Arabic and Berber neighbours. Their contribution in the rabbinical and case law literature and in the Jewish poetic creation has continued since that time, in spite of periods of sometimes very strong persecutions, as under the dynasty of Almohades in the XII-XIII centuries. These communities were strengthened at the end of the fifteenth century by the arrival of thousands of Jews expelled from Spain and Portugal, of which the knowledge and the various know-how served Morocco in diplomacy, international trade, jewellery and other businesses. Until they left between 1947 and 1975, the Jews of Morocco were the most important Jewish population of the Arab-Muslim world. In 1956, they counted 275,000 persons. Today only 3000 Jews still live in Morocco, mainly in Casablanca.

In spite of their massive and often precipitated departure, the Jews of Morocco wanted to keep the links which attach them to the places of birth, to their acquaintance among Muslims and to their country of origin. They return every year by thousands to refresh memories, visit the graves of their ancestors and those of the numerous saints who are buried there, to walk in the country and to take care of their commemorative sites.

The debate which will follow the projection of the movie of Kamal Hashkar will try to solve the paradoxes of this absence and presence at the same time of the Jews of Morocco and to give elements of answer to the following questions:
1/What were the forms of cooperation between Jews and Muslims in Morocco?
2/For what reasons did the Jews leave massively Morocco?
3/How was felt at the time and how is felt today in Morocco the departure of the Jews? What welcome do they receive there, being nostalgic of the country?
4/What represents for the Jews of Morocco their attachment to their country of origin and what role does it play in their new identities outside Morocco?