Aviad Moreno<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Abstract
This study is based on the analysis of some rare audio recordings from the first orga
nized group tour of olim (Jewish immigrants in Israel) from northern Morocco, to their
former hometowns in Morocco. The tour was organized in 1987 by MABAT, the principal
\u00e9migr\u00e9 association of northern Moroccans in Israel during the 1980s. I compare this
\u2018free-style\u2019-oral audio source with related printed-edited narratives, written by MABAT
before and after the tour, showing an evolving tension between two forms of narration:
the expected ethnic-oriented narration among individuals travelling together as MABAT
members; and other \u2018extra-ethnic\u2019 narratives, encompassing contrasting spontaneous
recollections from their childhood in Morocco. The conclusions reveal the often orga
nized nature of vocally expressed ethnic voices; and the dynamic social environments
that such voices represent, both before and after aliyah (immigration). The study offers
a methodological and theoretical contribution to scholarship on ethnicity formation
in Israel.
Keywords
olim\/Jews of northern Morocco \u2013 MABAT (Mifgash Bnei Tangir) \u2013 collective narratives \u2013
audio recordings \u2013 \u2018voices from the past\u2019 \u2013 Haketia<\/p>\n\n\n\n
society.3 Beginning in the 1980s, a critical approach began to challenge this Aviad Moreno AbstractThis study is based on the analysis of some rare audio recordings from the first organized group tour of olim (Jewish immigrants in Israel) from northern Morocco, to theirformer hometowns in Morocco. The tour was organized in 1987 by MABAT, the principal\u00e9migr\u00e9 association of northern Moroccans in Israel during the 1980s. I compare… <\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1752,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","_themeisle_gutenberg_block_has_review":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[68],"class_list":["post-2134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-english","tag-avuad-moreno"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogia.com.ar\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogia.com.ar\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogia.com.ar\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogia.com.ar\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogia.com.ar\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2134"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/genealogia.com.ar\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2134\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2135,"href":"https:\/\/genealogia.com.ar\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2134\/revisions\/2135"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogia.com.ar\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogia.com.ar\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogia.com.ar\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogia.com.ar\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
view by highlighting \u2018innate\u2019 inequalities between hegemonic Ashkenazim4
and marginalized Mizrahim,5 supposedly structured in the Eurocentric Zionist
venture. According to this view, it was the inequality that led the Mizrahim to
1\u2002 Abraham Benabu, \u201cNotas de Viaje,\u201d MABAT Revista 1 (1989\u20131990): 97.
2\u2002 See below.
3\u2002 See Yaron Tsur, \u201cThe Israeli Historiography and the Ethnic Problem,\u201d in: Making Israel, ed.
Benny Morris (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2007), 234\u2013235; Mikha\u00ebl Elbaz, \u201c\u2009\u2018Exile
from Within\u2019: Moroccan Jews and the Reinvention of Tradition in Israel,\u201d in: Herm\u00e9neutique
Et Bricolage; Territoires Et Fronti\u00e8res de la Tradition Dans Le Juda\u00efsme. Actes du Colloque de
Bucarest, 27\u201328 Octobre 2006, ed. M\u0103d\u0103lina V\u00e2rtejanu-Joubert (Bern: Peter Lang, 2008), 209.
4\u2002 Ashkenazi: a widespread term used to denote Jews of European origin.
5\u2002 Mizrahi: \u2018Oriental\u2019 in Hebrew, commonly used by many scholars and in local Israeli parlance
for describing the non-Ashkenazi social components: mostly Jews of Middle Eastern, North
African and Central Asian origin. The term is confusing, and oversimplifies cultural and his
torical variations within the entire population. Throughout this study, I employ the term
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
54
Moreno
actively silence their unique cultural voice; and thus, re-voicing it in Israel was
seen as the correction of an historic injustice.6
Seen from the perspective of an erupting ethnic tension, ethnic voices from
the past became mostly an embodiment of stable but silenced identities that
one had to struggle in order to re-voice. In this connection, many studies on
ethnicity formation in Israel focused mainly on the reasons for the voicing
and silencing of Mizrahi voices. In so doing, they left only marginal space for
exploring the dynamic nature of these voices: the historical pre-immigration
societies that such voices represented, and\/or the dynamic post-immigration
environments and circumstances in which they came to be re-voiced. This
short article is part of my ongoing broader exploration of the evolution of eth
nic identities among Jews from Arab and Muslim countries, and seeks to point
up their dynamic nature.7
This study is based on nine hours of audio recordings from the first orga
nized visit of MABAT\u2019s members back home in Morocco in the summer of
1987.8 I compare this unedited source material with various edited, published
sources, including the MABAT Revista, a 108-page review that summarized
the association\u2019s activities over the past decade on the occasion of its tenth
anniversary (1989\u20131990), and several earlier brochures and letters containing
personal memoirs, articles, and announcements and summaries of MABAT\u2019s
Mizrahim as a discourse category only in order to accurately position my argument within
the context of the broader discussion.
6\u2002 See Shlomo Deshen and Moshe Shokeid, The Predicament of Homecoming: Cultural and
Social Life of North African Immigrants in Israel (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1974);
Shlomo Deshen and Moshe Shokeid, The Generation of Transition; Continuity and Change
among North Africa Immigrants in Israel (Jerusalem: Ben-Zvi Institute, 1999) [Hebrew]. Both
pointed out the clash of Moroccan traditions with Zionist modernity. Others adopted a post
colonial stance. See, for example, Yehouda Shenhav, The Arab Jews: A Postcolonial Reading of
Nationalism, Religion, and Ethnicity (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006); Sami Shalom
Chetrit, The Mizrahi Struggle in Israel: Between Oppression and Liberation, Identification and
Alternative, 1948\u20132003 (Tel-Aviv: Am-Oved, 2004) [Hebrew]. For further discussions see, i.e.,
Yaron Tsur, \u201cCarnival Fears: Moroccan Immigrants and the Ethnic Problem in the Young State
of Israel,\u201d Journal of Israeli History 18 (1997): 93\u2013103.
7\u2002 See Aviad Moreno, \u201cDe-Westernizing Morocco: Pre-Migration Colonial History and the
Ethnic-Oriented Self Representation of Tangier\u2019s Natives in Israel,\u201d Quest. Issues in Contem
porary Jewish History 4 (2012): 67\u201385; Aviad Moreno, Ethnicity in Motion: Social Networks in
the Emigration of Jews from Northern Morocco to Venezuela and Israel, 1860\u20132010 (Beersheba:
Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 2014).
8\u2002 The audio recordings are preserved in the Sound Archives of the National Library of Israel
in Jerusalem (hereafter SA-JUNL). Songs in Judeo-Spanish (Tangier, 1987), SA-JUNL, Call No.
Y-05697-a to Y-05697-f.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
\u2018Inappropriate\u2019 Voices from the Past
55
activities, distributed among its members during the 1980s. This combination
of sources allows me to contextualize the narratives and understand their
dynamic nature.
I start by exploring the character of MABAT and its activities, being the
main social framework within which Jewish natives of northern Morocco
came to narrate recollections from their past in Morocco in adherence to a
unified, ethnic-oriented narrative in Israel of the 1980s and early 1990s.9 I then
examine how individuals who traveled to their former hometowns as MABAT
members witnessed the welling up of other pre-immigration voices, reflecting
forgotten \u2018extra-ethnic\u2019 experiences that did not match the expected form of
ethnic narration within MABAT. The conclusions reveal the dynamic nature
of ethnic-oriented narration and contextualize it vis-\u00e0-vis \u2018extra-ethnic\u2019 voices,
encompassing any voice that went beyond the typical discourse within the
ethnic narrative\u2019s borders.
2
MABAT and Its Reconstructed Ethnic Narrative
The late 1970s and early 1980s in Israel saw the emergence of a form of Mizrahi
\u2018revival,\u2019 which comprised several customs and rituals, including for example
the Mimouna (a North African Jewish feast marking the end of Passover), which
was celebrated publicly by the large Jewish-Moroccan minority in Israel. A new,
vocal ethnic discourse appropriated by poets, musicians and authors accen
tuated the uniqueness of the Mizrahi minorities. This revival represented a
counter-acculturation taking shape vis-\u00e0-vis the hegemonic Ashkenazi,
European-oriented habitus in Israel during the nation\u2019s formative years.10
Against the backdrop of this dramatic transition, a process of ethnic revival
took place among Jews of northern Moroccan origin in Israel. In October 1979,
a group of pro-active olim from northern Morocco founded MABAT. Their main
goal was to differentiate in cultural terms the group of northern Moroccans
9\u2002
10\u2002
On the role of oral narratives and proverbs throughout the formation of ethnic identities
in Israel, see Tamar Alexander-Frizer, \u201cFolk Literature as an Expression of Ethnic Identity,\u201d
in: The Heart is a Mirror, The Sephardic Folktale, ed. Tamar Alexander-Frizer (Detroit:
Wayne State University Press, 2007), 3\u201323; on Haketic proverbs as an expression of iden
tity of the group, see Tamar Alexander-Frizer and Yaakov Bentolila, La palabra en su hora
es oro. El refr\u00e1n judeoespa\u00f1ol en el Norte de Marruecos (Jerusalem: Ben Zvi Institute, 2008),
142\u2013172 [Hebrew], 31\u2013<\/em>44 [Espa\u00f1ol].
Elbaz, \u201c\u2009\u2018Exile from Within,\u2019\u2009\u201d 213\u2013215; Tsur, \u201cThe Israeli Historiography,\u201d 246; As\u2019ad Ghanem,
Ethnic Politics in Israel: The Margins and the Ashkenazi Centre (London: Routledge, 2010),
63\u201376.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
56
Moreno
from the larger Moroccan population in Israel; or, as reflected in the words of
MABAT main founder, Dr. Amada Nahon Avital: \u201cWe certainly have the obliga
tion to increase awareness among the Israeli public of the fact that not all Jews
of Moroccan origin are of a \u2018Magrebi\u2019 [North African] culture\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009\u201d11
MABAT\u2019s activities were a historical episode that spanned roughly a decade
and a half, between 1979 and the early 1990s. MABAT\u2019s Spanish name, Asociaci\u00f3n
de Oriundos de T\u00e1nger, Tetu\u00e1n y dem\u00e1s ciudades de la ex-Zona Espa\u00f1ola de
Marruecos, Ceuta, Melilla y Gibraltar, demonstrated its aspirations to form
an inclusive group of Spanish-speaking Moroccans. This Moroccan collective
was based on their shared Hispanic origins, even if it meant that participants
would come from political entities that extended beyond the historical bor
ders of Morocco (Ceuta, Melilla and Gibraltar were not part of the Spanish
protectorate in Morocco; neither of the independent Moroccan state founded
in 1956).
The declared purposes of MABAT were fourfold: a) to maintain contact
between the natives of the \u201cformer Spanish zone;\u201d b) to preserve, \u201cbefore it
is too late,\u201d their unique cultural, religious and folkloric patrimony; c) to col
lect cultural material; and d) to preserve the dialect of Haketia, a local Judeo
Spanish dialect, spoken daily by the majority of Jews in northern Morocco
until the mid-nineteenth century.12 Through its publications, the association
presented itself as the main framework within which a northern Moroccan
native living in Israel could relate to his or her past. For instance, some of
MABAT\u2019s slogans included: \u201cDo not let yesterday expire; it is our foundation
today,\u201d or \u201cWithout a past, one cannot formulate a present. Come closer to your
community! MABAT!\u201d13
Reading MABAT\u2019s written sources, one cannot overlook the association\u2019s
clear and comprehensive tendency to closely associate the group\u2019s collec
tive past with an idealized image of a flourishing, pious Judeo-Spanish com
munity. Historically, during the mid-1900s, most Jews in northern Morocco\u2019s
central cities, Tangier and T\u00e9touan, had spent most of their pre-migration
day-to-day routine among Europeans as well as Muslims. Many attended non
Jewish European schools, shared working and dwelling milieus with non-Jews,
became friends with them, and adopted some of their customs, occasionally
11\u2002
12\u2002
13\u2002
A letter circulated among MABAT members, 1988, 5. A private collection maintained by
Sidney Pimienta and Gladys Pimienta, two siblings, Tangier natives, currently living in
Bat-Yam, Israel (I refer to this collection hereafter as PPC).
Mitchell M. Serels, A History of the Jews of Tangier in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries
(New-York: Sepher-Hermon Press, 1991), 177.
An announcement, MABAT Revista 1 (1989\u20131990): 108.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
\u2018Inappropriate\u2019 Voices from the Past
57
some that were considered immoral within ethnic Jewish circles, such as vio
lating the kosher dietary laws or attending Christian feasts.14
Nonetheless, the MABAT Revista encompassed narratives dealing in the
main with generous Jewish philanthropists, respected communal leaders,
flourishing Jewish educational institutions, the need for a strong Zionist affin
ity, and Sephardic folklore and musical traditions, and the like. In one case,
Amram Luke, an active member of MABAT, narrated a story designed to glorify
the religious scholars and great rabbis of Tangier, thereby instilling in the read
ers a sense of Jewish pious community that resonated from their past into the
present.15
Consequently, MABAT\u2019s narrative was \u2018Judaizing\u2019 and \u2018Sephardicizing\u2019 the
image of northern Morocco: it tended to mask elements from historical and
day-to-day contacts with non-Jews, local Muslims and European Christians
alike. The MABAT Revista stated, for instance, that Jews had been natural inhab
itants of Morocco in a time much earlier than the arrival of the Arabs.16 More
importantly, in Israel of the 1980s, MABAT was the main body that triggered
the revival of the ancient local Judeo-Spanish dialect of Haketia. Historically,
during the 1900s, this local ethnic dialect was rapidly vanishing among many
Jews as their daily language underwent a process of \u2018re-Hispanicization\u2019\u2014that
is an adjustment of Semitic components in Haketia to modern Spanish pho
netics, grammar and the general way of pronunciation. Within this context
of transformation, the generation that would comprise MABAT members had
encountered Haketia mostly among their parents and within the deep ethnic
communal spheres.17
MABAT\u2019s concentration on the revival of Haketia perhaps represented most
clearly the evolving gap between the broader pre-migration history and its
post-migration ethnic-oriented representation. MABAT encouraged olim from
northern Morocco to recall and document memories regarding the dialect and
submit them to be published. For example, while encouraging individuals to
send in traditional recipes for a contest it organized, MABAT specifically asked
the participants to recall anecdotes about the dish using Haketic terminology
rather than simply \u201cmodernized\u201d [sic] Spanish variants, as they would most
naturally do otherwise.18
14\u2002
15\u2002
16\u2002
17\u2002
18\u2002
Moreno, \u201cEthnicity in Motion,\u201d 65; see below several reflections in interviews.
\u201cHilula,\u201d MABAT Revista 1 (1989\u20131990): 55.
Amada Aviatal, MABAT Revista 1 (1989\u20131990): 8.
Yaakov Bentolila, \u201cThe Study of Moroccan Judeo-Spanish (Hakitia),\u201d El Presente: Studies in
Sephardic Culture 1 (2007): 160.
A letter entitled Gran Concurso MABAT, circulated among MABAT members, 1988, PPC.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
58
Moreno
Concomitantly, any \u2018extra-ethnic\u2019 narratives that did not match this image,
such as stories about immoral religious behavior among Jews, or their disen
gagement from communal activities, would be removed from MABAT\u2019s collec
tive narrative. As I have shown elsewhere, one of the reasons for reconstructing
such an ethnic-oriented narrative reflected MABAT\u2019s aspiration to express an
ethnic voice that would contrast the Mizrahi ethnic revival in Israel with a
sense of their own ethnic heritage.19 The ethnic narrative allowed MABAT to
represent themselves, vis-\u00e0-vis the general Moroccan image in Israel, as dif
ferent Moroccans who could \u201ccontribute to the Israeli culture\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u201d with their
traditions, as expressed in the MABAT Revista.20
Furthermore, MABAT\u2019s narrative comprising an idealized Judeo-Spanish
ethnic past could in practical terms imbue its own activities with a sense of
continuous communal life in Israel. For instance, the question \u201cWhat was our
community like?\u201d which appeared in the MABAT Revista was followed by an
additional question: \u201cWhat were its concerns, and what have we been able
to reproduce, here, today?\u201d21 The next thirty-seven pages provided the antici
pated \u2018answers\u2019 to these questions regarding the connection between ethnic
past and ethnic present. For instance, MABAT published its plans to resume the
\u2018tradition\u2019 back in Morocco of donating to the Jewish National Fund, by plant
ing a forest, named after MABAT, in Israel in 1989.22
In order to receive funds and also to imbue its activities with an image of
scientific support, MABAT collaborated with academic institutions and with
scholars dedicated to exploring aspects of the ethnic past. For instance, MABAT
collaborated with Dr. Shoshana Weich-Shahak, a scholar who since 1973 has
been recording and studying the Sephardic musical traditions at the Jewish
Music Research Centre of the Hebrew University. Dr. Weich-Shahak used
the MABAT Revista to call upon MABAT members to collaborate with her in
research on northern Moroccan Jewish ethnic melodies.23
19\u2002
20\u2002
21\u2002
22\u2002
23\u2002
Moreno, \u201cDe-westernizing Morocco,\u201d 67\u201385.
Salomon Benhayon, \u201cSaludos del Presidente de MABAT,\u201d MABAT Revista 1 (1989\u20131990): 3.
A.S. \u201c\u00bfC\u00f3mo era nuestra comunidad?\u2014\u00bfCu\u00e1les eran sus preocupaciones? Y nosotros hoy,
aqu\u00ed, \u00bfqu\u00e9 hemos podido reactualizar?,\u201d MABAT Revista 1 (1989\u20131990): 13.
\u201cEl Keren Kayemet Le-Israel,\u201d MABAT Revista 1 (1989\u20131990): 18; \u201cEl Bosque de MABAT,\u201d
MABAT Revista 1 (1989\u20131990): 19.
Shoshana Weich, \u201cInvestigaci\u00f3n de la Tradici\u00f3n Musical Sefarad\u00ed de Marruecos,\u201d MABAT
Revista 1 (1989\u20131990): 61\u201362.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
\u2018Inappropriate\u2019 Voices from the Past
59
3
The Borders of MABAT\u2019s Narrative: The Biographical Perspective
Unlike the clearer concentrations of Moroccans in development towns across
Israel\u2019s geographic periphery, the relatively small group of self-defined north
ern Moroccans lacked clear concentrations that would have enabled them to
maintain ethnic distinctiveness.24 However, by 1985, at least 769 members who
lived in 70 cities and towns in Israel had joined MABAT.25 They paid member
ship dues of 5,000 Israel (old) shekels and traveled from time to time within
Israel to participate in MABAT\u2019s organized events and activities. Some pro
active members helped reconstruct and disseminate the collective ethnic nar
rative fostered by the association.26
This collaboration, which helped to forge MABAT\u2019s network, should not be
taken for granted: MABAT members often would have to travel some distance
in order to take part in communal activities. Moreover, they had to shift from
their day-to-day routine into an ethnic state of mind, masking aspects of their
extra-ethnic past and present along the way.
In order to understand this transition, we need to look at some extra-
ethnic narratives outside MABAT\u2019s representative but restrictive framework of
narration.
Some sources reveal behaviors that would expose the gap between MABAT\u2019s
reconstructed ethnic image of the past and the way many individuals remem
bered their life routine in Morocco separately, outside MABAT\u2019s ad-hoc net
work. For instance, in an interview conducted in Israel in 2010 with Simi, a
24\u2002
25\u2002
26\u2002
Eliezer Ben-Rafael and Stephen Sharot, Ethnicity, Religion and Class in Israeli Society
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 65, 71; Seymour Spilerman and Jack Habib,
\u201cDevelopment Towns in Israel: The Role of Community in Creating Ethnic Disparities in
Labor Force Characteristics,\u201d American Journal of Sociology 81 (1976): 789.
According to a list of telephone numbers of MABAT members in Israel, 1985, the five
cities with the largest populations of MABAT members were: Jerusalem (72 members),
Netanya (49), Bat-Yam (42), Petah-Tikva (38), and Ashdod (35). However, the 769 regis
tered members lived in 70 Israeli towns, villages, kibbutzim and cities, not to mention
different neighborhoods within each area, even within the five large cities mentioned.
Some towns, including Azur, Or-Yehuda, Kfar-Shmaryahu, Atlit, Netivot, Mizpe-Ramon,
and Sderot, had only one MABAT member each (see a list of telephone numbers of MABAT
members in Israel, 1985, PPC).
Several circulars indicated that MABAT\u2019s organizational activities were conducted in sev
eral cities across Israel, including Jerusalem, Kiryat Gat, Tel-Aviv, Beersheba etc.; see a
circular sent to MABAT members, September 19, 1985, PPC, 3; a circular sent to MABAT
members summarizing the organization\u2019s activity from its founding in November 1979 to
April 1988, December 13, 1988, PPC, 2.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
60
Moreno
former MABAT member, who grew up in T\u00e9touan, she mentioned a dispute she
had with her father over her intention to watch a street parade on New Year\u2019s
Eve in her hometown. She showed me a picture of her young uncle attending
such a party, stating: \u201cHe was not like my father\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009my father did not even allow
me to eat a grape [referring to the Spanish custom of eating twelve grapes at
midnight on New Year\u2019s Eve].\u201d27
Alegr\u00eda Bendelac, who lived in the U.S., mentioned in her 1987 memoir that
despite her father\u2019s objection, her mother used to buy her a small present at
Christmas time. Her mother handed it to her at a special type of ceremony,
since she did not want her daughters to feel deprived in front of their non
Jewish classmates.
In the 1940s and 1950s in northern Morocco, many individuals oscillated
in their life routine between ethnic-communal (Judeo-Spanish) spheres of
identification, and extra-ethnic (colonial and Moroccan) spheres, represent
ing their other local identities. The same was true in Israel, where one would
\u2018became ethnic\u2019 only on certain occasions. However, in Israel of the 1980s,
unlike Morocco of the 1940s and 1950s, under circumstances of dispersion,
most gathering opportunities as a self-defined ethnic collective were organized
by MABAT. They thereby were subjected to MABAT\u2019s ethnic-oriented activities,
discourses and narratives. Thus, while gathering as a community, many Jewish
natives of northern Morocco referred to their past in clear ethnic terms that
masked much of their pre-immigration life experience.
Consequently, some MABAT members occasionally struggled to recall eth
nic voices. The musicologist Dr. Weich-Shahak stated that she had to work
hard in order to retrieve Haketic utterances, melodies and lyrics from her
informants, since, with the passage of time, these voices had become vague
memories, even in Morocco.28 Moreover, at times MABAT\u2019s ethnic orientation
exposed some of its members, even the most active ones, to unfamiliar voices
from \u2018their own\u2019 past.
For instance, the MABAT Revista published an article concerning a \u2018tradi
tional\u2019 custom among the Jews of T\u00e9touan to place a \u2018matesha,\u2019 a swing, in
their patios after Passover. According to the article, the custom had a social
function, enabling young, unmarried girls to meet potential husbands. The
article was accompanied by the publication of a sporadic romance, known as
\u201cThe Matesha Songs,\u201d which, according to the author, was commonly sung in
the northern Moroccan city of T\u00e9touan.29 In an interview held several decades
27\u2002
28\u2002
29\u2002
An interview with Simi (pseudonym), Israel, 2009, interviewer: Aviad Moreno.
A conversation with Dr. Weich-Shahak, Israel, 2009, Aviad Moreno.
Gladys Pimienta, \u201cLos Cantes de Matesha (Resumen),\u201d MABAT Revista 1 (1989\u20131990):
65\u201366.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
\u2018Inappropriate\u2019 Voices from the Past
61
later with the author Gladys Pimienta, who was an active MABAT member and
had spent most of her teenage years in northern Morocco, she remarked with
great honesty: \u201cMany of the songs I have collected here [namely, in Israel],30
including this one, I had never heard of in Morocco, nor did my mother, I think
[smiling].\u201d31
Likewise, Prof. Ya\u2019acov Bentolila, a T\u00e9touan native who became the leading
scholar in research on Haketia, asserted that most Haketic verbs and words
came to his attention only in the 1980s, when he started conducting his research
into the dialect.32 According to him, the stimulus for his academic interest in
Haketia was one of MABAT\u2019s gatherings in 1983, to which he had been invited to
lecture on the dialect as a philologist who was also a T\u00e9touan native.33 Earlier,
he dedicated his academic career to research on Hebrew linguistics, but since
then much of his scholarship had focused on Haketia in addition.34 Ya\u2019acov\u2019s
and Gladys\u2019 honest statements were part of their own personal narratives
regarding their past. In retrospect, these statements reflect the boundaries of
MABAT\u2019s ethnic narrative in the 1980s.
4
Re-encountering Morocco as MABAT Members
In July 1986, King Hassan II opened the borders of Morocco to visits of Israeli
citizens. The initiative led to organized tour groups which were characterized
by clusters of close friends and\/or small familial groups who visited typical
tourist sites, in addition to family graves and saint tombs and other Jewish
30\u2002
31\u2002
32\u2002
33\u2002
34\u2002
While conducting a project of preservation, mostly at the Ma\u2019ale Adumim Institute for the
Documentation of Judeo-Spanish Language and its Culture, affiliated within the Sefarad
Society.
An interview with Gladys Pimienta, Israel, 2010, interviewer: Aviad Moreno.
Reuven Shabat, \u201cLearning is Never Boring,\u201d Etrog\u2014Education Journal (2008) [Hebrew],
http:\/\/www.itu.org.il\/?CategoryID=1461&ArticleID=12590 (last accessed January 8, 2011).
An interview with Yaakov Bentolila, Israel, 2010, interviewer: Aviad Moreno.
See Yaakov Bentolila, The Sociophonology of Hebrew as Spoken in a Rural Settlement of
Moroccan Jews in the Negev (Jerusalem: The Hebrew University, 1983) [Hebrew]; Yaakov
Bentolila, \u201cLe composant h\u00e9bra\u00efque dans le jud\u00e9o-espagnol marocain,\u201d in: Judeo-Romance
Languages, eds. Isaac Benabu and Joseph Sermoneta (Jerusalem: Misgav Yerushalayim;
Hebrew University, 1985), 27\u201340. For more on similar professional-biographical trans
formations in related fields see Tamar Alexander-Frizer, The Heart is a Mirror: The
Sephardic Folktale (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2007), 569\u2013576. I thank Prof.
Tamar Alexander-Frizer for kindly enlightening me with her comments regarding this
phenomenon.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
62
Moreno
sites.35 A year later, in July 1987, MABAT took the initiative of organizing a simi
lar tour for its members.
According to MABAT\u2019s plans, as reflected in the handouts given to the par
ticipants, the tour was obviously designed to create an ethnic-oriented expe
rience for the participants. The program included meetings with community
leaders, prayers, a visit to local cemeteries, and tours to the former typical
\u2018Jewish areas\u2019 of Tangier and T\u00e9touan. By chance or not, the visit to Tangier,
the largest northern Moroccan city from which most MABAT members came,
was scheduled over a weekend, between Wednesday evening and Saturday
night. In such a way the activities could stimulate voices of recollection from
ethnic events on the Sabbath. On Friday night, a festive arvit (evening prayer)
at the local synagogue and a traditional Sabbath eve dinner were scheduled.
On Saturday morning, the organizers planned an adafina and horrisa meal
(two traditional longer-cooked stews, customarily eaten on the Shabbat) at the
hotel, and a meeting with community leaders. Sunday was dedicated to the
\u201cvisiting of ancient places and, of course, to the tradition of zorear [visit of
graves] of our beloved ones.\u201d On Monday, the group visited the famous Rabbi\u2019s
tomb in Ouazzane, on the outskirts of T\u00e9touan and Tangier.36
Dr. Weich-Shahak, who joined the excursion as an academic escort, encour
aged the participants to recall ethnic anecdotes, such as romances and stories
in Haketia, as well as other ethnic customs. Such ethnic anecdotes indeed arose,
as people stimulated and facilitated each other\u2019s recollections. Seemingly, this
form of collective recollection usually took place within segregated communal
buildings or within the private bus that had been hired for them. For instance,
during the trip to the Jewish cemetery in Ouazzane, Dr. Weich-Shahak managed
to encourage the travelers to join in the singing of several religious melodies,
mainly with the assistance of a rabbi who had joined the group.37 On the bus,
two siblings narrated aloud a story about their grandmother who, according to
their account, was a famous midwife in the service of Tangier\u2019s community.38
Another participant, stimulated by a conversation with Dr. Weich-Shahak,
35\u2002
36\u2002
37\u2002
38\u2002
Andr\u00e9 Levy, \u201cHomecoming to the Diaspora: Nation and State in Visits of Israelis to
Morocco,\u201d in: Homecomings: Unsettling Paths of Return, eds. Anders H. Stefansson and
Fran Markowitz (Lexington: Lexington Books, 2004), 98.
A program of MABAT organized tour to northern Morocco that was circulated among its
members, April 30, 1987, PPC.
Songs in Judeo-Spanish (Tangier, 1987), SA-JUNL, Call No. Y-05697-c.
Songs in Judeo-Spanish, Y-05696-f, Y-05697-a.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
\u2018Inappropriate\u2019 Voices from the Past
63
attempted to link his family\u2019s origins to the Spanish city of Albacete in medi
eval Spain.39
However, the re-encounter of MABAT members with their forgotten child
hood\u2019s landscapes during the trip obviously provided endless opportunities for
the emergence of voices that would potentially go beyond the MABAT ethnic
oriented collective narrative. Thus, while the main idea behind Dr. Weich
Shahak\u2019s initiative to record parts of the trip was to collect ethnic-oriented
material, the vast body of recordings also enabled a sufficient glimpse into
\u2018contrasting\u2019 voices. In this connection, the recordings also allow a glimpse into
the individuals\u2019 transformation back into an ethnic state of mind once a \u2018cross
ing\u2019 of the narrative\u2019s boundary was identified.
First of all, the recordings illustrate the predictable: that re-encountering
forgotten sights caused great excitement among natives of northern Morocco,
who spontaneously began to speak about their childhood experiences, memo
ries that were not central to MABAT\u2019s planned narrative. For example, after a
long ride on the bus, upon entering Tangier, the audio recording corroborated
that enthusiastic remarks were uttered each time a long-forgotten site was spot
ted: \u201cHere is the park where we used to sit\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009oh, God;\u201d \u201cThere\u2019s the Cine Goya
[movie theatre] where we used to go!;\u201d \u201cThere\u2019s the Emsalleh [then a Muslim
neighborhood]!;\u201d \u201cWasn\u2019t the Galerie Lafayette [department store] here?\u201d These
comments represented just a few among many other such remarks that would
be seen as \u2018less significant\u2019 memories and experiences from the perspective of
MABAT\u2019s ethnic narrative.
More interestingly, the recording illustrated a form of \u2018inappropriate\u2019 voices
that not only did not match MABAT\u2019s form of narration but even contrasted
with it. For instance, a few songs recollected from childhood were bawdy,
childishly mentioning sexual relations and sex organs. Sounds of giggling in
the background reveal that this sort of narration, in front of Dr. Weich-Shahak,
cause some participants to feel embarrassed. The extra-ethnic songs evoked
some intimate conversations about life routines in northern Morocco\u2019s colo
nial cities. Among the stories, a woman started narrating about her participa
tion in New Year\u2019s celebrations. She mentioned that she had \u201ca good-looking
Christian friend.\u201d At this point, the recording suddenly stops for some unknown
reason. The recording resumed a moment later, capturing an unfolding narra
tive about common local childhood games.
Later on, a man from the group came to narrate recollections of Jewish
celebrations, including the bar mitzvah ceremony. Then, he was diverted by
a remark by his (female) compatriot who asked about \u201cwhat happened in the
39\u2002
Ibid.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
64
Moreno
night before.\u201d The narrator then revealed the existence of a common \u2018tradi
tion\u2019 among adolescents to gather together in order to play cards, smoke, and
then use the services of a street prostitute in the city on the eve before the
religious ceremony of bar mitzvah took place at the synagogue.40 There are
no written documents regarding this adolescent custom; yet it was one \u2018un
narrated\u2019 story within MABAT\u2019s social frame, that exposed narratives from the
pre-immigration past, narrated in first-person plural, like many of MABAT\u2019s
ethnic narratives.
In another incident, unfolding in the midst of a discussion concerning
nicknames, which took place at a caf\u00e9 in the center of Tangier, a few partici
pants associatively recalled a song sung on Christmas eve, entitled \u201cLa Noche
Buena.\u201d Other participants joined in singing along another Spanish Christmas
song, \u201cTodos le llevan al Ni\u00f1o.\u201d Surprised by these incidents, Dr. Weich-Shahak,
wondered who used to sing these songs and whether it was a marginal phe
nomenon. Several recorded members of MABAT replied immediately and
unanimously that it had been a common custom among \u201call Jews.\u201d One par
ticipant felt the need to explain to Dr. Weich-Shahak that the songs used to be
part of their childhood leisure culture in northern Morocco, when they used to
participate in a street festival called \u2018comparsa\u2019 during the Christmas season.41
Even more instructive was the trigger that eventually stopped the cheerful
singing and abruptly halted the collective narratives about this shared non
Jewish, extra-ethnic tradition among northern Moroccan natives. It was a
remark in a low voice noting that the rabbi was present. The singer then imme
diately apologized, using the Hebrew expression: \u201csliha, sliha!\u200a\u201d [\u2018Sorry, sorry!\u2019].
Analyzing the subtext of this occurrence may reveal how such songs were
seen as inappropriate within certain contexts. These behaviors were in fact
\u2018inappropriate,\u2019 because within the given social context, MABAT\u2019s members
were expected to express a completely different voice from their past as an
ethnic group. Spontaneous, extra-ethnic recollections shared by many were a
prime example of an erupting broader hybrid collective narrative, cut short by
its existence within the ethnic framework within which the trip was organized.
Thus, the extra-ethnic story stimulated a re-entry into the ethnic state of mind:
one woman told a story about the generosity of Tangier\u2019s Jewish community,
which hosted Jewish European refugees during the Second World War.
Seemingly, for many participants the ethnic-oriented form of narration
constituted something that indeed represented their collective past, albeit one
that also embodied an irony within the context of the trip. The irony was that
40\u2002
41\u2002
Ibid., Y-05698-b.
Ibid., Y-05696-f.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
\u2018Inappropriate\u2019 Voices from the Past
65
these stories, regardless of their centrality to MABAT\u2019s organized tour, some
times reflected only a minor fraction of their recollections, and therefore were
marginal to their collective experience upon re-encountering forgotten land
scapes. Therefore, the situation evoked humorous gestures that attempted to
reduce the resulting tension between the two forms of collective narration.
For instance, the recordings reflected a repetitive tendency to accentu
ate Haketia\u2019s typical pronunciation, or Haketic phrases, with jocularity. Some
people imitated with amusement the guttural phonetics of the ancient idiom,
which sounded rather peculiar to a modern ear used to Castilian Spanish, as
they themselves were.42 In one incident, a woman from T\u00e9touan mentioned
that in her family, there were five girls. Another member interrupted her words,
jocularly shouting: \u201cNever say five, say \u2018your hand.\u2019\u2009\u201d The latter was a phrase
reflecting the traditional superstition to avoid using the word \u2018five\u2019 directly, as
it might cause bad luck. The comment invoked collective laughter due to the
appearance of this ethnic memory that was probably viewed as odd in retro
spect. At that moment, the woman, who had been speaking modern Spanish,
noticeably altered her intonation, replying in Haketic style: \u201cYes, to flee from
the evil eye\u201d (\u201cS\u00ed, para escapar del \u2018ayin ha-ra\u2019\u2009\u201d). While uttering the sentence,
she accentuated the guttural phonetics in a typical Haketic way, causing laugh
ter among others.
Subsequently, during the ride to the saintly rabbi\u2019s tomb in Ouazzane, one
of the participants spontaneously made a traditional ululation kind of high
pitched howl. In response, another participant was recorded commenting jok
ingly about this spontaneous gesture: \u201c[It\u2019s] like the black people of Africa\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u201d43
In another incident, one participant interrupted an attempt to tell Dr. Weich
Shahak how Tangier had deteriorated because the Jews had left by loudly sing
ing a modern Spanish (non-Jewish) song called \u201cDesde que t\u00fa te fuiste\u201d (\u2018Since
You Left\u2019). Several people joined in the singing, interrupting the woman\u2019s
ethnic narrative. Such interruptions constituted per se a form of collective
narration. It highlighted the clear gaps between the ethnic narrative and the
extra-ethnic experiences and their forms of narration, and thus the dynamic
nature of expressed ethnic identities.
As it would appear, during the trip, extra-ethnic memories contrasted with
the image of Morocco reconstructed among the group within the ethnic con
text, but were much more emotional, probably because they had been slowly
erased from the collective memory during the years in Israel. Now for the first
42\u2002
43\u2002
Ibid.
Ibid., Y-05697-c.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
66
Moreno
time, sometimes after decades away from Morocco, some olim could experi
ence them together, as a group, within their new communal framework.
5
Back to Israel
A comparison of narratives, and other expressed voices overheard on the
audio recordings with the impressions that MABAT chose to share from the
trip through its subsequent publication make the gap between the ethnic and
extra-ethnic narratives highly apparent. Abraham Benabu, the treasurer of
MABAT, who had participated in the trip (an enthusiastic private discussion
he held with his friends about their childhood was captured on tape), in fact
wrote about his emotional experience in Tangier, in adherence to the ethnic
narrative.
From the beginning of his essay, Abraham sought to reduce the experi
ence of the trip to the level of a collective ethnic memory. In fact, his first
\u201cmemories,\u201d in his own words, from the trip undermined the significance of
re-encountering Morocco itself. He wrote:
The first encounter with our memories had already occurred in Madrid,
where the members of the [local Jewish] community smothered us
with attention, including the Israeli ambassador, his Excellency Sir
S. Ben-Ami\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.44
Subsequently, Abraham mentioned an encounter with the Jewish community
in Gibraltar, where the group stopped in order to participate in a festive dinner,
which included the singing of piyyutim (piyyut, a religious, liturgical poem)
and Sephardic romances. In this context, the current landscape of northern
Morocco was depicted through his words with contempt, wrapped in sorrow
for the loss of Jewish life:
Then we got off [the bus] for half an hour at the Plaza Espa\u00f1a (I do not
remember the new name [sic!])\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009No, it is no longer the same clear and
pure pearl of the Spanish Zone that we used to know before. Today, there
are no more than two Jewish families living there.45
44\u2002
45\u2002
Abraham Benabu, \u201cNotas de Viaje,\u201d MABAT Revista 1 (1989\u20131990): 96.
Ibid.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
\u2018Inappropriate\u2019 Voices from the Past
67
Within this context, Abraham asserted that the participants, who came from
T\u00e9touan, had only one wish upon their arrival in the city: to go to the Jewish
cemetery, in order to visit the graves of their relatives and ancestors, masking,
and reducing in importance, much of the personal and collective experiences
captured on tape.46 Obviously, few of his written narratives embodied the
most significant personal experiences for Abraham, in comparison with his
overall experience while re-encountering his childhood city (as clearly heard
throughout the recording).
Another visitor\u2019s impression by Salomon Benhayon expressed the same
notion even more strongly. Many of his comments concerned the aspirations
of the visitors to find their relatives\u2019 and ancestors\u2019 graves, as if the graves were
the only living evidence of their lives in the city. Small wonder then that the
adjacent photograph showed a woman mourning at the Jewish cemetery in
T\u00e9touan in the early twentieth century.47
MABAT was the principal \u00e9migr\u00e9 association of northern Moroccans in Israel
who wished to reconnect with their pre-immigration ethnic origins. Its narra
tive thus became the main \u2018display window\u2019 for the group\u2019s self- representation
within the context of ethnicity formation in Israel in the 1980s and early
1990s. However, MABAT members were in fact willing to mask \u2018inappropriate\u2019
voices and memories welling up from their past to achieve the social goal of
self-definition vis-\u00e0-vis other ethnicities. In so doing, they accentuated ethnic
moments and places from Morocco, in order to reconstruct ethnic moments
and places in Israel. Small wonder than that during the group tour, the col
lective re-encounter with their home towns resulted in narration-based ten
sions: the re-encounter triggered challenging, \u2018inappropriate\u2019 voices from the
past that generated an alternative collective narrative. The proceeding efforts
by MABAT to silence such extra-ethnic narratives within its own post-tour nar
rative served as further indication of the gap between history and its dynamic
form of representation after migration through memory.
This study should thus further challenge the general scholarly and popular
notion that \u2018voices form the past\u2019 among Jews from Arab and Muslim coun
tries in Israel represent continuing and absolute ethnic voices that persons
would struggle to express or silence within the context of Israeli ethnic ten
sion. As seen at least in the case of northern Moroccans in Israel, the ethnic
voice evolved throughout the process of giving it voice. Moreover, through
out the process, the voiced appeared to be multifaceted, highly dynamic and
46\u2002
47\u2002
Ibid., 97.
Salomon Benhayon, \u201cViaje MABAT,\u201d MABAT Revista 1 (1989\u20131990): 98\u201399.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52\u201368
68
Moreno
contextual; and most interestingly, strongly depended on social networks that
would energize it.
Consequently, it is hoped this study provides a methodological contribu
tion to historians\u2019 efforts to reconstruct voices from the past. Despite the criti
cal contributions of edited narratives, they raise methodological obstacles and
lacunae: they restrict our ability to trace the shifting mindsets of narrators
within dynamic social environments throughout the process of narration. We
may begin to overcome this lacuna by means of cross-referencing sources that
enable access to more \u2018free-style\u2019 forms of narration: wide-ranging materials
including audio recordings and interviews that can provide richer information
about the narrators and the context of narration.
Aviad Moreno is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Jewish History
at Tel-Aviv University. He also teaches in the Department of Middle Eastern
Studies at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. His academic interests encom
pass aspects of migration and modernization in North Africa over the past
two centuries, with particular attention to the Jewish populations in north
ern Morocco. Selected publications: Europe from Morocco: the Minutes of the
Leadership of Tangier\u2019s Jewish Community (the Junta), 1860\u20131864, Pe\u2019amim
Supplement 1 (Jerusalem: Ben Zvi Institute, 2015) [Hebrew]; Ethnicity in Motion:
Social Networks in the Emigration of Jews from Northern Morocco to Venezuela
and Israel, 1860\u20132010 (Beersheba: Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, 2014);
\u201cDe-Westernizing Morocco: Pre-Migration Colonial History and the Ethnic
Oriented Self Representation of Tangier\u2019s Natives in Israel,\u201d Quest. Issues in
Contemporary Jewish History 4 (2012): 67\u201385.
European Journal of Jewish Studies 9 (2015) 52<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"