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When Moroccan Jews immigrated to Israel in the 1940s, they were promised a better life. Hundreds of them left the Kingdom to start a new life in the country. Declassified documents revealed that North African Jews once faced discrimination in Israel.
The Israeli authorities treated Jewish immigrants from North Africa and the Middle East differently during the establishment of the Hebrew state. “Housing projects for immigrants from the Middle East and North Africa were handed over to ‘white’ immigrants,” the documents reveal.
Discrimination against Mizhari and Sephardic Jews continued for years in the European-dominated nation. “This was notably salient in the case of African and Asian immigrants who were placed in transitional camps for up to a decade, while Europeans were often provided preferential housing in developed urban areas,” it reads “The Rise of the Party Israeli Black Panther “.
Mizrahi and Sephardic Jews were also absent from the political and decision-making scene, the highest levels of public service, and higher education.
Inspired by an African American training
But this situation, even though it lasted for decades, had to change. Inspired by the African American Black Panther Party (BPP), a Black Power political organization founded in California by college students Bobby Seale (president) and Huey P. Newton in October 1966, a social movement was born.
A group of Sephardic Jews of Moroccan descent founded the Israeli protest movement in 1971. The social movement built in the poorest neighborhoods of Jerusalem, “Musrara”, was intended to “confront the social exclusion of the promises of Israeli citizenship”, Alex Lubin wrote in “Black Panther Palestine”.
Called the Black Panther, or Israeli Black Panther, it was the only way that second-generation Jewish immigrants, primarily those from the Middle East and North Africa, worked for social justice.
“These individuals were predominantly young, Jewish men of Moroccan, Algerian or Iranian origin, among others,” wrote Black Past.
Sa’adia Marciano, born in Oujda, Morocco in 1950, and Charlie Biton, born in Casablanca, along with four other young Moroccan Jews living in the poor Moroccan Jewish section of Jerusalem, “began to meet to discuss the experiences of Jews. North African unemployment, police beatings, discrimination in housing and education, and exclusion from government political office and office.
“They used the recognized name of the Panthers to get the government to take this group seriously and to draw national attention to the fact that Israeli discrimination against them was similar to the experiences of African Americans,” recalled the same source.
Putting pressure on the Israeli government
The Black Panthers of Israel had precise tactics, including “higher subsidies for the slums, welfare payments and free education from age four through college.”
“The initial demonstrations focused on Jerusalem and then spread to Tel Aviv and Haifa. These demonstrations were sparsely populated with less support from the left-wing Matzpen party, ”Black Past reported.
In fact, the Israeli Black Panthers held their first demonstration on March 3, 1971 in Jerusalem. The move made headlines in Israel and became a top concern of government officials.
In April of the same year, Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meier agreed to meet with members of the movement, after its members went on a hunger strike at the Western Wall.
“As Meir knew that the Black Panthers of the United States repeatedly denounced the Israeli oppression of Palestinian Arabs, he feared that the IBPP would form an alliance with the Palestinians,” wrote Black Past.
To find a solution to his threats, he appointed a commission to study “Young People in Distress” and found $ 22.9 million to fund services for Mizrahi and Sephardic Jews. One of its biggest demonstrations was the “Night of the Panther” on May 18, 1971, which brought together 4,000 protesters.
Two years after its creation, the Black Panther movement became a political party. Casablanca-born Biton, its founder, was elected to Israel’s parliament in 1977, where he served until 1992. The party was dissolved in 1977 and his legacy gave a voice to the Jews of the Middle East and North Africa in Israel.
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