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Former School of the Alliance Israélite Universelle (AIU), Essaouira, Morocco

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More information regarding Essaouira specifically located after the AIU History.

Alliance Israélite Universelle (AIU) History: The Alliance Israélite Universelle (AIU) was a Jewish philanthropic organization founded in 1860 by six Jewish intellectuals in Paris, including Adolphe Crémieux, a French Jewish statesman. The Alliance established a network of schools throughout the Middle East, North Africa, Asia Minor, and the Balkans, with the goal to protect and improve the lives of Jews around the world. The organization promotes the values of Jewish self-defense and self-sufficiency through education and professional development. AIU’s mission was constructed upon two pillars — “the Jewish tradition and the values ​​of the French school”¹ — which informed their aim of aiding Jewish emancipation, enfranchisement, protection of rights, and modernization, in order to facilitate their integration into their home countries.² However, it was at times the case that, instead of being integrated, they became detached, with some Alliance students feeling disconnected from their non-Alliance Jewish and Muslim communities, as well as the French and European world. The Alliance established schools for both boys and girls, with the first school being constructed in 1862 in Tetouan, Morocco. By 1895, there were seventy schools with 17,000 students enrolled.³ Aside from the primary school system, the Alliance also established vocational schools, agricultural schools, apprenticeship programs, rabbinical seminaries, and teaching schools where they would train the next generation of Alliance teachers and directors. At AIU’s peak in 1913, there were 183 active schools with 43,700 students.⁴ The Alliance created an entire generation of educated Jews who were able to enter the workforce and experience upward social mobility, many of whom had previously not received a formal education, especially girls and young women. In the middle of the 20th century, with the mass exodus of Jews from their home countries in the Middle East and North Africa, Alliance schools began to close their doors. The organization, however, is still active. Known as “Alliance - Kol Israel Haverim” in Israel, it “works towards two main goals: 1) Advance educational excellence for all children regardless of socio-economic status or geographic location that in turn will lead to increased social mobility. 2) Offer a Jewish education that emphasizes social responsibility and involvement, while cultivating Jewish leadership committed to social activists."⁵

Essaouira History: Founded in 1764 on the southwestern Atlantic coast, Essaouira is one of the most important ports in Moroccan history. During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, it housed the largest Jewish population; some Jews had already lived in the region, while other Jews moved to the port once it was established, and even more migrated over once the port began to flourish. There were around twenty to thirty royal merchants in Essaouira, with the majority of them being Jews, each protected and utilized as intermediaries by the Moroccan Sultan. These Jewish merchants aided in trade, establishing networks outside of Morocco, bringing in luxury goods, and creating partnerships with the Muslim community. Out of the entire population of Essaouira, Jews made up around thirty to fifty percent. The majority of the Jewish community migrated out of Morocco in the 1960s, and now there are only a handful of Jews left in Essaouira.⁶

AIU in Essaouira: The Alliance Israélite Universelle (AIU) established a school in Essaouira in 1866, with the help of the efforts of the French Consul in Essaouira, August Beaumier. Due to the cholera outbreak in 1868, many students stopped attending the AIU, causing the AIU to close its doors in 1869. The school was then reopened in 1875, but with the competition that came from the English schools and traditional religious education, as well as famine and other epidemics that devastated the country from 1878-1879, the AIU once again shut down. The third attempt to reopen in 1888 was successful, with French influence permeating through the country.⁷

The building of the former School of the Alliance Israélite Universelle (AIU), a French-Jewish organization, can be found in another direction, leaving the Medina through Bab Marrakech or Bab Sbaa, it is located on a street parallel to the beach promenade. Today, the building is used by a middle school and an association providing education and professional training for those who left school early.

Said, the owner of Café l’Horloge, used to go to this school: “When I was young I studied at the old Israelite school. Long ago; now it’s closed partially and half is used as a middle school."

Essaouira, Morocco

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