Improvement and clarification of the legal position of the Jews of Morocco was urged here today by two representatives of the American Jewish Committee upon their return from a visit to Morocco where they made a study of Jewish rights.
The two representatives, Zachariah Shuster and Max Isenbergh, emphasized that the Moroccan Jews are now subject to three extremely different and often conflicting juridical systems. This, they said, affects their position adversely. They stressed the necessity for putting Moroccan commercial, civil and penal laws on a secular basis.
For the most part, they pointed out, Jews must come before the courts of Moslem pashas or their delegates. Since these courts hand down decisions without reference to a fixed code of law or precedent, and since most of the customary procedural protections used in Western courts are lacking, their decisions tend to be arbitrary by Western standards. “It is impossible for a Jew to be a judge in this Moroccan court system, or to occupy any post of importace, and discrimination against Jews is rampant,” they reported.
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