The Chargé d'Affaires of the Moroccan Embassy in Damascus Speaks — In Defense of Princess Aisha

The chargé d'affaires of the Moroccan Embassy in Damascus speaks to the correspondent of 'The Woman's Voice'

The article that appeared in the last issue of 'The Woman's Voice' caused a great stir in Damascene circles, which roused the zeal of our correspondent in Syria, Miss Inayat Ramzi, to speak on this subject with the Honorable chargé d'affaires of the Moroccan Embassy, Mr. Abd al-Rahman al-Fassi. His Excellency was keen that his reply appear in The Woman's Voice magazine, in view of Princess Aisha's connection with this magazine's women readers throughout the whole Arab world, and in view of the respected standing enjoyed by the Lebanese Women's League, which publishes 'The Woman's Voice,' and the standing of its editorial board.

The conversation between Mr. al-Fassi and Miss Ramzi began in a corner of the halls of the Orient Club in Damascus, during the reception given by the Syrian Arab Women's Union on the eighth of last January, and she inquired of him as to the truth of what 'The Woman's Voice' had published concerning the patronage by Princess Aisha, leader of the women's movement in Morocco, of a Jewish vocational association there.

Miss Ramzi had, while Her Highness the Princess was attending the general congress of the Arab Women's Union in Damascus last summer, asked of Her Highness that she kindly, after her return to Morocco, found a branch of the Permanent Bureau of the 'Every Citizen a Sentinel' committees — this because of the deep impression she had observed in Her Highness's person of the savage consequences the Palestine catastrophe has created among our brethren, following Her Highness's visit to the front line and to the refugee camps.

Out of a desire to bring the truth to light, to clear Princess Aisha's name, and to repel the accusation from her, the Honorable chargé d'affaires kindly gave the following reply:

It matters to me to comment on the article carried in this magazine, although I know that our Arab brethren in Lebanon, where this magazine is published, and in Syria, know things as they truly are and have no need of any clarification or comment. But it is important that I draw attention to the fact that the Jewish community in the Arab Maghreb has, since the Islamic conquest of these lands, been distinguished by a special status: it has its own quarters, as it has its own judges from among the spiritual heads, who decide personal-status cases among themselves according to their teachings. It is this which, in the commentary on this subject, is called the original or particular Jewish culture — as a safeguard against a Jewish culture tinged with Zionist principles.

This Israelite community has likewise had, since ancient times, its own schools, which Muslim Moroccans do not attend, because they are reserved for the children of the Jews; and the programs of those schools do not go beyond the scope of the French baccalaureate curriculum, or vocational instruction, to which are added the teaching of the Jewish religious doctrines and the principles of their worship, along with certain subjects of financial and commercial instruction, such as bookkeeping and the like, since the majority of the Israelites in Morocco practice trade after leaving school. All these schools, and the community's own courts, fall under the supervision and care of the competent Moroccan ministries, headed by Arab Muslim ministers whose minds could never accept — nor would their national feelings or their history permit them — to shut their eyes to any Zionist movement or activity that might creep into such establishments.

I add to this that there are social establishments known as reform centers and juvenile reformatories, working under the supervision of the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Justice to reform and correct juvenile delinquents and to study their psychological conditions, whether these juveniles be Muslim Moroccan Arabs, or Jews, or of a European colony. The Jews have their own centers and reformatories among these reformatories spread through all parts of Morocco; and I do not mean that they are run, financed, or organized by a Jewish or Zionist organization — they are centers belonging to the two aforementioned ministries, but reserved for Jews, in the sense that their juveniles are placed in the reform centers reserved for them, in which neither Muslim Moroccans nor Europeans join them; and they are, first and last, under the ministry's supervision, and they carry out the programs of the Moroccan ministry. Someone may hear of a 'Jewish reform center' or a 'Jewish reformatory' and imagine it a purely Jewish organization outside the scope of Moroccan Arab Islamic control.

Say the like of the organizations of the young Jews of Morocco: they are purely athletic societies — scouting, or skiing, or the like — only, their members are Jews alone; and they operate according to the decisions of the Directorate of Youth and Sports in Morocco, which is attached to the Ministry of National Education.

It may be that some of these societies have a hidden, covert activity, as is the case with the emigration activity; for there is no way, nor would any Moroccan permit himself, to witness a Zionist movement and approve of it, let alone patronize it or supervise it. And this is not merely because of the tie of kinship that binds us to our Arab brethren in the East; it is what our feelings impose on us as Arab Muslims, before our duties impose it on us as Arab Muslims and as members of the Arab family.

And I recall that His Royal Highness Prince Moulay Hassan delivered a speech before an Israelite gathering in Morocco, at the beginning of the past year, and he did not omit to warn the Jewish youth against practicing any activity or making any Zionist gesture, for such a thing would make the Moroccan authority look upon the Jewish citizens in another light.

After this, I wish to draw attention to the fact that this article, which The Woman's Voice magazine took pains to translate and publish, contains erroneous information about the Princess's life, and I can offer it my own knowledge on the subject, seeing that I was tutor to the Crown Prince and knew at close hand the programs of his studies and of the studies of his sisters the Princesses. The school was attached to the palace, but it included a company of the people's children — among them the son of the minister and the son of the builder and the son of the schoolmaster, indeed among them the son of the humble post-office clerk — all of this among the marks of His Majesty's care that his children, sons and daughters, receive a popular upbringing. This school has a French program, which is the program of the French baccalaureate, and an Arabic program whose subjects are the equal of the French baccalaureate program; among the subjects of this Arabic program are Arab Islamic history, the history of Arabic letters, and the Islamic religion; and in the same institute there is a mosque for prayer. The teachers who undertook to instruct the Princess in religion and Arab history are well known and famous. And all of this was carried out under His Majesty's personal supervision.

For this reason, I believe that such an Arab upbringing contains every guarantee against whatever may be said in this vein.

As for what certain papers publish with the aim of tarnishing Her Highness's reputation, it was published deliberately and with premeditated purpose in foreign magazines, among them the French magazine al-Musawwar, and its intent is demolition and cheap political intrigue — a thing our sincere Arab brethren know, though they sometimes fail to take notice of it.

As for the emigration of the Jews of Morocco to Israel: before we won our independence, not long ago, we knew full well that the French administration used to encourage the emigration of the Moroccan Jews, and from time to time it would hunt up a company of unemployed Jews who imagined that if they came to Israel they would come to the longed-for paradise, the land where they would find work after unemployment and wealth after poverty. But after we achieved independence and took over the authority for security, and the reins of affairs came into our hands, we worked to prevent this emigration; and the newspapers in Morocco have published, on various occasions, some of the measures taken to this end by the Ministry of the Interior.

I recall that at the end of 1956 and the beginning of 1957 — I was at that time governor in the city of Settat — there came to the governorate a circular from the Ministry of the Interior ordering that no Israelite be permitted to travel outside Morocco unless it was proved and verified to the governorate that he had a commercial interest behind the journey, by documents of the commercial houses, and after he had given sufficient guarantees; and a reasonable period was to be fixed for him in which to conclude his business abroad.

And when I was in the city of Tangier, preparing to come to Syria, the governor told me that on that very day he had arrested a group of Jews who were attempting to flee by emigrating to Israel.

All of this is something that needs no reminder, for we have in our Arabism and our Islam that which makes us work to prevent emigration to Israel before any prompter need prompt us to it.