30 October 2018

Looking for a church but
finding two synagogues
in the streets of Tangier

A sign points to two surviving synagogues on Rue Synagogue in the heart of the old city in Tangier (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2018)

Patrick Comerford

During my visit to Tangier last week, I tried to find my way into the Spanish mission church in the Soukh, but instead ended up finding two of the hidden synagogues in this Moroccan coastal city and learning about the story of the Jews of Tangier.

Earlier in the day, some former Jewish homes were pointed out as we strolled through the narrow streets Kasbah, but I had noticed no synagogues or churches, and attracted unwelcome responses at the few mosques I tried to visit.

After lunch in the Mamounia Palace, I went strolling through the old Medina and the Rue Es-Siaghinie, lined with cafés and bazaars, jewellers’ shops and an arts centre with displays depicting Tangier’s social history.

A view of Rue Es-Siaghinie towards the port of Tangier from the balcony of the Mamounia Palace … the Rue Synagogue and the Spanish Mission Church are to the right (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2018)

The Spanish Mission Church, with its domes and large windows, is a Franciscan mission church dating from the 1870s. The doors were closed, and at first I thought directions at a side door were sending me on a wild goose chase. But as I turned the corner I found I was on ‘Rue Sinaguogue’ and with sign pointing to two synagogues on this colourful back street.

Unlike Morocco’s other imperial cities in the past, Tangier did not have a walled Jewish Mellah or ghetto. Instead, Tangier had an unprotected Jewish quarter.

Tangier was first inhabited by the Phoenicians and then by the Carthaginians. Archaeologists have found ceramic objects marked with menorahs that date the Jewish presence in Tangier, then called Tingis, to the period immediately after the destruction of the First Temple.

Jewish refugees from Spain fleeing the Visigoth persecutions arrived in Tangier in the fifth and sixth centuries AD, bringing with them their culture, industry and commerce. Several Berber tribes converted to Judaism and Jews lived in peace in Tangier for the next several centuries.

Abraham Ibn Daud and Joseph Ha-Kohen record how the Jewish community in Tangier was destroyed by the Almohades in the year 1148.

A Star of David above the door of an old Jewish house in the heart of the old city in Tangier (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2018)

Jewish refugees expelled from Spain in 1391 brought new life to the community, and the Jewish population of Tangier grew again with the arrival of refugees expelled from Seville, Cadiz and other parts of Spain by the Inquisition in 1492. These new immigrants brought with them their Andalusian Sephardic liturgy, creating a Moroccan Jewish culture with a distinctive Sephardic identity.

Small numbers from the Jewish communities of Azemmour and Safi settled in Tangier in 1541 when it was ruled by the Portuguese. However, the community eventually came to the attention of the Portuguese Inquisition, which tried to outlaw Jews living in the city.

When the Portuguese ceded Tangier to England in 1661, another wave of Jews and Muslims arrived in the city, particularly from the neighbouring towns of Larache and Ksar El-Kabir, along with a small number of Jews from the Netherlands.

In 1675, tensions boiled up between the Moroccan-born Jews and those from abroad who had arrived in Tangier, and the rabbis of Tetuan issued an excommunication or cherem against the new arrivals. The Jews were expelled from Tangier in 1677 and did not return until 1680.

Although the Jewish community of Tangier was generally poor, a number of notable figures lived in the city, including Solomon Pariente, an adviser and interpreter to four successive governors; Samuel de Paz, a British diplomat; and Jacob Falcon, who played an important role in building relationships between the English and the Muslims.

However, the English withdrawal in 1684 ushered in a new phase of economic decline, and most Jews left the town. By 1725, only one Jewish merchant, Abraham Benamor from Meknes, remained in the city. With the support of Moses Maman, the sultan’s treasurer, he began to organise a new community as Maman encouraged Jewish merchants from Tetuan and Rabat to move to Tangier with the promise of some tax exemptions.

A sign at the entrance to Rue Synagogue (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2018)

The new community soon numbered about 150 people, and Rabbi Judah Hadida, the first dayan or rabbinical court judge of Tangier, became its leader in 1744.

When Christians were excluded from Tetuan in 1772, many European consulates moved to Tangier and the consuls were followed by their Jewish interpreters. However, the majority of the Jewish community in tangier continued to live in poverty.

Unlike Jewish communities in Europe, the Jews of Morocco suffered little or no government-sponsored violence. But all this changed under Sultan Mulay Yazid. In a brief reign of terror, many prominent court Jews were executed, including Jacob Attal who was executed in Tangier in 1783. Jewish houses were pillaged, people were killed, and women were raped.

The Jewish community of Tangier recovered in the early 19th century. There were fewer than 800 Jews living in Tangier in 1808, but by 1835 they had grown in numbers to 2,000. The community, however, was still poor, despite the presence of the Nahon family, who were successful wax traders, Joseph Chriqui of Mogador, and the Abensur, Sicsu, Anzancot, and Benchimol families.

Life was difficult for the Jewish community in Tangier during the Franco-Moroccan War of 1844. But the community escaped the French bombardment and celebrated a special Purim known as Purim de las Bombas (‘Purim of the Bombs’).

Wandering through the streets of the former Jewish quarter of Tangiers (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2018)

By 1856, Tangier was the largest port in Morocco. Life improved with the arrival of a new group of Jews from Tetuan, and numbers rose to 2,600. By 1867, there was a community of 3,500 people, and the French school, Alliance Israelite Universelle, opened in 1869.

Many Jews were involved in a new Moroccan press based in Tangier, founding and editing news newspapers, published in English, Spanish, French and Arabic, and calling for the Europeanisation of Morocco.

Jewish authors and poets, many writing in Spanish, also flourished in Tangier. The Jewish middle class founded hospitals and numerous welfare institutions in Tangier. The Jewish intelligentsia, including the historian Jose Benoliel, the kabbalist Sanuel Toldedano, and Abraham Laredo, were involved in reviving Jewish culture.

When the French Protectorate was established in 1912, Jews were given equality and religious autonomy. By the time Tangier became an international zone in 1923 administered by France, Spain and Britain, over 10,000 Jews were living in the city. But many more emigrated to South America or settled in Casablanca.

With the outbreak of World War II and the beginning of the Holocaust, many Jews fleeing Eastern Europe sought refuge in Tangier from 1939 on. By the 1940s, there were 22,000 Jews in Tangier and Morocco’s Jewish population reached its peak at 250,000 in 1948. About 12,000 Jews were living in the international zone that year, and by 1950 they were joined by 2,000 Spanish Moroccan Jews, so that the community in Tangier numbered about 15,000 people in 1951.

The Synagogue Rebbi Akiva on Rue Synagogue was originally built in the mid-19th century (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2018)

After Moroccan independence in 1956 and the annexation of Tangier, several Jews, including Solomon M Pinto, tried to preserve the community of 17,000. But emigration had begun; Jews from Tangier helped to build a new Jewish community in Madrid, others settled in Geneva, Canada or the US, and a few hundred emigrated to Israel. By 1968, the number of Jews in Tangier had fallen to about 4,000. By 1970, only about 250 Jews were left in Tangier.

Today, the synagogues, cemeteries, monuments and communal institutions of Tangier show how important Jewish life has been in the city over the centuries.

At one time Tangier had over 20 synagogues. On Rue des Synagogues, many of the synagogues are now closed, but I found signs pointing to two of them.

The Synagogue Rebbi Akiva on Rue Synagogue was originally built in the mid-19th century. It was restored by Rabbi Moshe Laredo in1902, and was rebuilt in 1912. More recently it has been converted into a museum of Tangier’s Jewish community, but it was closed when I visited on Thursday afternoon.

At the very end of this twisting and turning street, behind a nondescript door, I found myself outside the Moshe Nahon Synagogue, the last surviving functioning synagogue in the old city. From the street, appearances are deceptive, but inside this is a monumental and lavish building, and one of the most beautiful synagogues in Morocco.

This synagogue was built in 1878 and was a working synagogue until it fell into despair in the late 20th century. But it was renovated in 1994, revealing intricately covered carvings that are illuminated by hanging lamps and many Jewish artefacts.

The Moshe Nahon Synagogue, the last surviving functioning synagogue in the old city, was built in 1878 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2018)

Chaar Rafael on 27 Boulevard Pasteur is another surviving synagogue in Tangier. This Jewish-owned villa was built in 1919, and was converted into a synagogue in 1954, when the owner Raphaël Bendriahm died.

The Jewish Cemetery in Tangier, known as the ‘old cemetery,’ has more than 1,000 graves, some dating back to the 16th century, with tombstones in Hebrew, Portuguese and French.

Today, there is a vibrant Jewish community in Morocco numbering about 2,000 to 2,500 people. Moroccan Jews make up the second largest community in Israel, and Moroccan Jews and their descendants can be found in France, Canada, Spain, the US and Venezuela.

I never found my way into the Spanish Mission Church, nor did I find Saint Andrew’s Anglican Church before I left Tangier on Thursday evening and returned to Seville. But I found evidence of an openness and tolerance that many people do not expect in islamic-majority and Arab-speaking countries in North Africa and the Middle East.



Two sculptures in Seville
recall human rights: 2,
‘Bartolomé de las Casas’
by Emilio García Ortiz

The monument to ‘Fray Bartolomé de las Casas’ by Emilio García Ortiz on the banks of the River Guadalquivir in Seville (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2018)

Patrick Comerfor

As I walked along the banks of the River Guadalquivir in Seville early on Friday afternoon, taking time to watch the rowers on the river between the Torre del Oro at the Puerta de Jerez and the Puente de Isabel II, I took time to admire two sculptures close to the Triana Bridge that are moving reminders of tolerance and intolerance in Seville.

The ‘Monument to Tolerance’ by Eduardo Chillida, accompanied by a poetic text by Elie Wiesel, recalls the mutual tolerance that was often found in Seville until the ‘Catholic Monarchs,’ Ferdinand and Isabel, and the Spanish Inquisition expelled all Jews from Spain in 1492.

On the other side of the pedestrian steps up to the bridge, a sculpture by Emilio García Ortiz in 1984 commemorates Fray Bartolomé de las Casas (1484-1566), a Dominican friar and missionary bishop from Seville who is revered as a ‘Universal son of Seville’ and a father-figure in the development of international human rights.

The sculpture stands on the bank of the Guadalquivir River, across from Triana, where Fray Bartolomé de las Casas was born, to mark the fifth centenary of his birth, and shows Fray Bartolomé as Bishop of Chiapas with some Indians and some Spanish soldiers.

The sculptor Emilio García Ortiz (1929-2013) was also born in Triana, and for many years he was Professor of Sculpture and Ceramics at the Faculty of Fine Arts in the University of Seville.

Bartolomé de las Casas was an historian and social reformer before becoming a Dominican friar. He was the first resident Bishop of Chiapas and the first official Protector of the Indians.

Bartolomé de las Casas was born in Seville on 11 November 1484. His father, Pedro de las Casas, a merchant, was descended from a family that had migrated from France to Seville. One biographer says, his family were of converso heritage, descended from Jews who had been forced to convert to Christianity to escape the Inquisition.

Las Casas and his father migrated in 1502 with the expedition of Nicolás de Ovando to the island of Hispaniola – divided today between the Dominican Republic and Haiti. There, Las Casas became a hacendado and slave owner, taking part in slave raids and military expeditions against the Taíno people of Hispaniola. When he was ordained a priest 1510, he was first priest ordained in the Americas.

A group of Dominican friars led by Pedro de Córdoba arrived in Santo Domingo in September 1510. Appalled by the injustices they saw, they decided to deny slave owners the right to confession.

Fray Antonio de Montesinos, a Dominican friar, preached a sermon in December 1511, implicating the colonists in the genocide of native people. The colonists, led by Diego Columbus, sent a complaint against the Dominicans to the King of Spain, and the Dominicans were recalled from Hispaniola.

Las Casa was a chaplain during the Spanish conquest of Cuba in 1513, when he took part in the massacre of Hatuey. He witnessed many atrocities and later wrote: ‘I saw here cruelty on a scale no living being has ever seen or expects to see.’

But while Las Casas was studying a passage in Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) 34: 18-22 as he prepared a Pentecost sermon in 1514, he became convinced that Spanish activities in the New World were illegal and a great injustice. He gave up his slaves and began preaching that other colonists should do the same. He soon realised he would have to take his campaign to Spain and arrived back in Seville in November 1515.

By the banks of the River Guadalquivir in Seville, close to the monument to Bartolomé de las Casas (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2018)

While King Ferdinand lay ill in Plasencia, Las Casas was provided with an introduction to the king by Diego de Deza, Archbishop of Seville, and they met on Christmas Eve 1515. However, King Ferdinand died on 25 January 1516.

At first, Las Casas argued that Black slaves should be brought from Africa to relieve the suffering Indians. But he later rejected this idea too, and also became an advocate for Africans in the colonies. He also proposed fortifying the northern coast of Venezuela, establishing ten royal forts to protect the Indians and starting up a system of trade in gold and pearls.

When he arrived in Puerto Rico in January 1521, he heard the Spaniards of the islands had launched a raid into the very heart of the territory that he wanted to colonise peacefully.

He entered the Dominican monastery of Santa Cruz in Santo Domingo as a novice in 1522 and took vows as a Dominican friar in 1523. He worked throughout Hispaniola, Peru, Panama, Nicaragua, Guatemala and Mexico, and came into conflict with the Franciscan orders and their approaches to the mass conversion of the Indians.

As a direct result of the debates between the Dominicans and Franciscans and spurred on by Las Casas’s treatise, Pope Paul III promulgated the Bull Sublimis Deus, which stated the Indians were rational beings who should be brought peacefully to the faith.

Las Casas returned to Guatemala in 1537 with two mission principles: to preach the Gospel to all and treat them as equals, and conversion must be voluntary and based on knowledge and understanding of the Faith.

Las Casas then spent a year in Mexico, before returning to Spain in 1540, where he secured official support for his Guatemalan mission and continued his struggle against the colonists’ mistreatment of the Indians. He presented a narrative of atrocities against the natives of the Indies and argued for new laws and legal protections.

Before Las Casas returned to Spain, he was also appointed as Bishop of Chiapas. He was consecrated in the Dominican Church of San Pablo on 30 March 1544, and took possession of his new diocese when he returned in 1545.

As a bishop, Las Casas was embroiled in frequent conflicts and in a pastoral letter on 20 March 1545, he Casas refused absolution to slave owners, even on their death bed, unless all their slaves had been set free and their property returned to them. He also threatened to excommunicate anyone who mistreated Indians within his diocese.

He became so unpopular among the Spanish colonists that he had to leave his diocese, never to return. He left for Europe in December 1546, arriving in Lisbon in April 1547 and in Spain in November 1547.

In 1548, the Crown decreed that all copies of his Confesionario be burnt. But he publicly defended his views on slavery, mission, war and the rights of Indians in a formal, public debate in Valladolid in 1550-1551. Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda argued that the Indians were less than human and required Spanish masters in order to become civilized. But Las Casas maintained that they were fully human and that forcefully subjugating them was unjustifiable.

Las Casas spent the rest of his life working closely with the imperial court in matters relating to the Indies, working on behalf of the natives of the Indies, with many of them asking him to speak directly to the Emperor on their behalf.

He had to defend himself repeatedly against accusations of treason, and was denounced to the Spanish Inquisition. His extensive writings, including A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies and Historia de Las Indias, chronicle the first decades of the colonisation of the West Indies and describe the atrocities committed by the colonisers against the indigenous peoples.

He died in Madrid on 18 July 1566.

Although he failed to save the indigenous peoples of the Western Indies, his efforts improved the legal status of the natives, and increased focus on the ethics of colonialism. Las Casas is often considered to be one of the first advocates of the universal human rights.

Sadly, the monument is fenced off to deter repeated graffiti and attacks by vandals who do not value the monumental and cultural legacy of Seville.

The monument by Emilio García Ortiz on the banks of the River Guadalquivir in Seville hails ‘Fray Bartolomé de las Casas’ as a founding figure in the concept of Universal Human Rights (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2018)

This morning:Monument to Tolerance’ by Eduardo Chillida