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AIU Narcisse Leven School at Casablanca, Morocco

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More information regarding Casablanca 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”² — which informed their aim of aiding Jewish emancipation, enfranchisement, protection of rights, and modernization, in order to facilitate their integration into their home countries.³ 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.⁴ 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.⁵ 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."⁶

Casablanca History: During the early twentieth century, Casablanca became Morocco’s primary seaport. This caused Casablanca to grow and flourish, bringing many new inhabitants to the city, with many of them being Jews; Casablanca’s Jewish community was the largest out of the Maghreb during the twentieth century. While a Jewish community can be traced back to as early as the fifteenth century, it was not until the nineteenth and twentieth centuries when an organized community was developed. Based on census figures, 20,000 Jews resided in Casablanca in 1926, 40,000 in 1936, and 74,000 in 1952. Before the protectorate period, Jews lived in the mellah (an established Jewish quarter, named after the salt marsh area in Fez where the first mellah was created⁷), but after the protectorate they were no longer required to live within the mellah. In 1949, Casablanca became the headquarters of Cadima, the 'aliya organization in Morocco designed to organize emigration to Israel. Between 1949 and 1956, when Cadima ended, Moroccan Jews passed through Casablanca on their paths to Israel. The number of Jews living in Casablanca declined through the 1960s and 70s, yet the community grew in importance on a national scale; it still remained the Jewish center of Morocco and largest Jewish population in the Arab world. In 2010, Casablanca's Jewish population numbered around fewer than 3,000 inhabitants.⁸

AIU in Casablanca: The AIU’s Moroccan headquarters were located in Casablanca. Many schools were established all throughout Casablanca, with the first one being created in 1897 by Moise Nahon.⁹ This came to be after French vice-consul, M. Craveri, appealed to the AIU Central Committee, explaining that Casablanca would eventually become an important port, and that France should be the ones to bring over modern education to the Casablancan population.¹⁰ Over time, many of the children obtained an AIU education. In 1901, there were 295 boys and 161 girls enrolled in the AIU.¹¹ By 1912 there were a total of 557 pupils, 331 boys and 198 girls.¹² Director Nahon realized in 1906 that only thirty-four of the children enrolled at the AIU had Casablancan parents, the other pupils were migrants from other Moroccan cities, with seventy-five coming from the north, twenty-six from Marrakesh, forty-four from the interior, twenty-three from the Atlas, and eighteen from unspecified locations.¹³ Casablanca was also a location for the training of AIU teachers, it was called École Normale Hebraique (ENH) and it was created in 1946. In 1951, there were 7,683 students, boys and girls, of the AIU. The École Narcisse Leven school still operates as an elementary school for children in Casablanca.¹⁴

Casablanca, Morocco

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