Tagged Casablanca

How the world’s longest-running Chabad house survives in Morocco

Photos of King Hassan II and Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson adorn the wall of the Chabad facility in Casablanca. (Ben Sales)
November 13, 2015 / Ben Sales, JTA

CASABLANCA, Morocco (JTA) — Raizel Raskin’s office feels like a cluttered museum of Moroccan Jewish heritage. A photo from an old Jewish summer camp lays on the table. Another, of a rabbi meeting Moroccan dignitaries, hangs on the wall. Outside the door is a bookshelf filled with Hasidic tracts… Read more »

In off year for Israel, Morocco is etrog hot spot this Sukkot

Merchants walk a dirt path between the coastal city of Agadir, Morocco, and the highland etrog groves in Assads, Sept. 8, 2015. (Ben Sales)
September 18, 2015 / Ben Sales, JTA

ASSADS, Morocco (JTA) — Why the Jews want etrogs, Mohammed Douch does not entirely understand. What he does know is that they are his main customers. Each August and September, Jewish merchants come from around the world to his remote grove in the highlands of Morocco — an hourlong hike through… Read more »

Personal connections enhance JFSA men’s mission to Morocco
November 15, 2012 / Sheila Wilensky, AJP Associate Editor
Tucsonan Alain Avigdor, right, visits with a Jewish woman at an assisted living facility in Casablanca, Morocco. (Larry Gellman)

“Casablanca” brings to mind an almost mythical film in an exotic locale, conjuring up images of Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman parting on a foggy airfield. But Casablanca is a real place where Jews have lived as far back as Roman times. Sixteen Tucsonans witnessed the vibrancy of Morocco’s… Read more »