From sultan-protector to king-diplomat

In the 17th century, the sharifian Kingdom of Morocco emerges from its Saadian crisis weakened and disunited. The death of Ahmed al-Mansur (1603) causes the disintegration of the kingdom until the final collapse of the dynasty in 1659. The sharifian Kingdom is immersed in serious succession wars. Divided between rivals in Marrakesh and Fez, undermined by civil wars and the weakening of central power.

The Alaouite dynasty, founded by Moulay Rashid (1666), is part of a context of recomposition of power in Morocco after the Saadian decline and a period of political anarchy. It aims at the reunification and consolidation of power relations. The Jewish communities, rooted in the Moroccan space and strengthened by the arrival of Sephardim expelled from Spain, also seek a new framework of stability.

It is in this context of anarchy that Moulay Rashid imposes himself. Coming from a sharifian lineage, he seizes Fez and proclaims himself sultan, thus becoming the first Alaouite sultan. The favorable welcome given to Moulay Rashid by the Jews of Fez, mentioned by several historians, signals less an ideological adherence than a pragmatic choice. Moulay Rashid was indeed well received by the Jews of Fez during his conquest of power, which contributed to improving their situation. Subsequently, under his brother and successor Moulay Ismail, many Jews occupied high-ranking positions.

No State antisemitic doctrine existed under the Alaouites.
The condition of the Jews is often played out at the border between central authority and local powers. The exactions and massacres that punctuate the history of Moroccan Jews under the Alaouites stem more from periods of dynastic instability, popular revolts or tribal rivalries than from a programmed will.

In principle, all subjects are placed under the protection of the sovereign. The Jews of the kingdom were considered dhimmis – protected subjects subject to a distinct status – which did not prevent the rise in influence of some, notably in trade, diplomacy and other vital or popular sectors. This configuration paradoxically reinforces the value of the Alaouite throne, perceived as the ultimate recourse in the face of the excesses of peripheral power. The most notable case of rupture was the reign of Moulay Yazid (1790–1792), an exception that marked memories by its brutality. Historians describe him as a “particularly tyrannical sultan.”
Historiography insists on the fact that Moulay Yazid constitutes an exception in a long series of sultans whose policy towards the Jews oscillates between paternalistic protection and integration of Jews (merchants, diplomatic intermediaries, close advisers to the sovereign). This ambivalence is at the heart of the Judeo-Alaouite relationship: the Jews are at once dhimmi subjects placed under the responsibility of the Commander of the Faithful, and political and economic partners sometimes privileged of the throne.
This has historically offered the Jews a predictable framework: by pledging allegiance to the sovereign, they inscribe their loyalty in a religious legitimation, without for all that renouncing their Jewish identity.

In the contemporary context, marked by the recomposition of relations between Morocco, Israel and the Jewish diasporas, the Alaouite throne becomes a diplomatic symbol. It is mobilized as guarantor of an Islam of tolerance and as a shared reference which allows Jews of Moroccan origin to reconcile attachment to the kingdom and integration into other societies.
The memory of protections granted, of court Jews and of the relative absence of a State antisemitic doctrine nourishes a narrative in which the throne appears as historical mediator between Moroccan Judaism, Muslim power and international openness. In the diaspora as well, this attachment is found.

The throne has contributed to forging a singular Judeo-Moroccan identity, in which loyalty to the throne remains a strong marker, even at the heart of diasporas, bringing together Muslims and Jews around the common project of developing Moroccan singularity. Mohammed V and Mohammed VI both play a central role in the construction of a Judeo-Moroccan narrative in which the Alaouite throne appears as a universal example. Studies on the monarchy underline that Mohammed V, as Amir al-Mouminine, mobilized his value as Commander of the Faithful to embody a national-inclusive Islam, protective of the communities “of the Book,” and refused a racial instrumentalization of the Jews by the Vichy regime, whenever his powers allowed it.

Mohammed VI, who ascended the throne in 1999, inscribes his legitimacy in the continuity of his grandfather, notably by maintaining a bond of love with the Judeo-Moroccan diasporas. His reign is marked by a recurrent discourse on the Islam of the just middle and the recognition of the Jewish component (Constitution of 2011) through concrete gestures towards the Jewish communities, whether by the restoration of synagogues and cemeteries or by support for memorial initiatives.

Mohammed VI reactivates the narrative of protection inaugurated by Mohammed V and puts it at the service of an international image of Morocco as a space of coexistence.The first laid the founding gestures of protection and independence, the second modernizes this tradition by inscribing it in the registers of diplomacy and citizenship rights.