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their imperial intentions in Morocco. 4 Law and “justice” were particularly central to France’s
justification of its protectorate over Morocco: as one French journalist put it, “We know that
justice is our best argument concerning the Muslims that we administer. It is through this that
our regime differs from that of the Beys, Deys, Emirs, and Sultans…” 5 Many historians,
especially those focused on Jews, have adopted this rhetoric nearly without modification. In
their descriptions of the encounter between consular officials and the Moroccan state, these
scholars paint a portrait of the Makhzan as an anachronistic government stuck in a medieval
mindset. For them, foreigners (mostly Europeans and Americans) represent the ideals of justice,
religious tolerance, and emancipation, faced with the intransigence of Islamic rule. 6 In their
view, whatever improvements in the lives of Jews that came about in the years preceding the
French protectorate were mostly due to foreign intervention. This depiction of righteous
foreigners saving Jews from their Muslim rulers is an important expression of the neo-
lachrymose approach to the history of Jews in the Islamic world
4
On Western diplomats’ use of Jews to justify their intervention in Morocco, see especially Kenbib, Juifs et
musulmans, 4-6 and Chapter 3; idem, Les protégés, 225; idem, “Muslim-Jewish Relations,” 153, 159. For some
particularly colorful examples, see USNA, reg. 84, v. 001, McMath to Corcos, 12 June 1864; reg. 84, v. 47, Felix A.
Mathews to Lucius Fairchild, 11 April 1880.
5
Rober-Raynaud, “La justice indigène au Maroc,” 581. Rober-Raynaud founded the newspaper La Dépêche
Marocaine in 1905: see Isaac J. Assayag, Tanger, un siècle d’histoire ; origines, transformation, histoire du
boulevard Pasteur (Tanger: I. J. Assayag, 1981), 170.
6
See, e.g., Parsons, The Origins of the Morocco Question, 4-7; Ye‘or, The Dhimmi: Jews and Christians under
Islam, especially 78-86, 305-8; Littman, “Mission to Morocco”; Stillman, The Jews of Arab Lands in Modern Times,
6-8, 14-15; Tudor Parfitt, “Dhimma versus Protection in Nineteenth Century Morocco,” in Israel and Ishmael:
Studies in Muslim-Jewish Relations, ed. Tudor Parfitt (Richmond: Curzon Press, 2000), esp. 150; Laskier and
Bashan, “Morocco,” 482-3; Eliezer Bashan, “New Documents regarding Attacks upon Jewish Religious Observance
in Morocco during the Late Nineteenth Century,” in The Legacy of Islamic Antisemitism: From Sacred Texts to
Solemn History, ed. Andrew G. Bostom (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2008); Fenton and Littman, L’exil au
Maghreb; Gilbert, In Ishmael’s House, Chapter 8. When these scholars do introduce nuance into their accounts, it is
usually in the form of distinguishing among those consular officials who more consistently championed Jewish
causes and those who were deemed unfriendly to Jews and, perhaps, anti-Semitic; John Drummond Hay (British
ambassador from 1845-86) and Laurent-Charles Féraud (French ambassador from 1884-8) are both accused of
lacking commitment to helping Moroccan Jews. See, e.g., Laskier, The Alliance Israélite Universelle, 53; Fenton
and Littman, L’exil au Maghreb, 51, 468-77, 90-1, 502-3.
332