Vanishing Tribe

The scene inside Beth El synagogue is resplendent with Jewish tradition. Fathers and sons wearing yarmulkes are singing from prayer books. In a Shabbat, or Sabbath, ritual familiar to Jews everywhere, Rabbi Israel Hazout leads the congregation through a Hebrew reading of the Torah-Judaic teachings inscribed on a ceremonial scroll. "We lead a normal Jewish life," he says after the three-hour service. "People practice their religion how they like."

Unexpected words, perhaps, from a Jewish citizen in a Muslim country. But Morocco has long promoted tolerance, encouraging Jews to practice their customs alongside the Muslim majority. Yet despite the country's relative harmony, 2,000 years of Moroccan Jewry is now being threatened with extinction.

Moroccan Jews, who arrived after the destruction of the Jewish Temples (587 B.C. and A.D. 70) and following the Spanish Inquisition in the late 15th century, are quick to say they have suffered no persecution in modern times. In a Muslim society, they have become business tycoons, M.P.s, cabinet ministers and royal advisers. They recall how King Mohammed VI's grandfather refused to deport Jews during World War II. But since 1948, for complex political, social, economic and religious reasons, Moroccan Jews have been leaving for Israel, as well as for France and North America. The community fell from 300,000 to as few as 4,000, with the numbers poised to dwindle further. Continuing the trend, nearly all Jewish high school graduates are heading for study abroad and planning to remain there because of better job opportunities. "In another 15 years, everybody who stayed here will be dead," says Moshe Halioua, 50, whose family is one of a handful still living in the mellah, or Jewish quarter, of Marrakesh. Another factor: the smaller the community becomes, the edgier its members get over periodic political rumblings, when some Muslims accuse them of siding with Israel against the Palestinians.

The decline of the community can be viewed nearly everywhere. Casablanca's Jewish home for the aged is down from 130 residents to 72 in the last 10 years. At the Ecole Normale Hébraïque, director Amram Levy expects that 99% of the school's 147 students will leave Morocco after their studies. Carlynn Bitton, 18, who plans to study medicine in Paris, says she feels alienated from young Muslims and laughs when asked about local distractions for Jewish teenagers. "There's a certain beach club one day, a certain cinema the next, and then a certain night club," she explains. "Then we do them all over again."

Casablanca is still home to some 2,000 Jews. But fewer than 600 remain in Marrakesh, Meknes and Fez altogether. "I cry every time somebody leaves," says retired teacher David Dayan, 73, as he points out abandoned synagogues, Hebrew schools and kosher butcheries in Marrakesh. At a home for the aged that doubles as a slaughterhouse, Rabbi Chalom Gabbay, 63, is slicing the neck of a chicken. "The last wedding here was 10 years ago," he says, noting that his own six children have moved away.

Many hoped that the 1993 Oslo Peace Accords would call a halt to the exodus. Moroccan Jews could live in truer harmony with their Muslim neighbors and visit their families in Israel with a direct air service. Also, an expected influx of Israeli tourists would rejuvenate local Jewish cultural life. "People were talking about a new Andalusia," says Rabat businessman David Toledano, referring to the flourishing Jewish culture of Muslim Spain.

Such dreams are fading, after the renewed Israeli-Palestinian fighting. Still, many Moroccans insist on preserving their country's legacy of religious tolerance. The government-supported Fondation du Patrimoine Culturel Judéo-Marocain is opening Morocco's first Jewish museum, restoring synagogues, identifying thousands of additional preservation sites and training Muslim guides in Jewish history. The idea is to lift community spirit, draw Moroccan Jewish emigrants back to their roots and educate Muslims about Moroccan Jews. "There is a danger," says director Simon Levy, "that 2,000 years of our history could be lost without a trace." A research team at the University Mohammed V, Rabat, is pressing ahead with a history of Moroccan Jews from a Muslim perspective. "If the Jewish community disappears," says coordinator Jamaa Baida, "it will impoverish Morocco's cultural diversity."

The question is whether all this will help revive a dying community or create monuments to a receding past. Take Abraham Sabbagh, 57, the only rabbi in Fez. The city's 60 synagogues have dwindled to three; the Jewish population, once 28,000, is down to 200. "The candle is going out," he says, touring a Jewish cemetery. "It causes us a lot of anguish." Stepping around the tomb of a 17th century notable, Sabbagh reveals how he, too, feels the pressure to leave, since his wife, children and siblings have all gone to Israel or France. "I want to keep the flame alive here," he says. "But if my children ask me, I'll probably join them." When that happens, the city that served as the home of the great Jewish thinker Maimonides 900 years ago may well be saying good-bye to the last of its distinguished line of rabbis.