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Moroccan Police Refuse to Rescind Order Expelling Rabbi

March 23, 1961
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A series of representations to Moroccan police officials to rescind an expulsion order against Rabbi Mordechai Belinov brought no results, it was reported here today from Casablanca.

Soon after Rabbi Belinov’s expulsion order was issued last week, an attorney met with Col. A. Oufkir, director of Moroccan national security, to discuss the order. Col. Oufkir said that no action would be taken against foreign Jews already in Morocco but that no more would be admitted into Morocco for any special missions.

Rabbi Belinov had been in Morocco four months, taking over direction of the Lubavitcher Yeshiva at Marrakesh, which has 150 pupils. Authorities, however, refused to issue him a work permit. The Lubavitcher schools provide schooling for nearly 2,000 Jewish pupils in Morocco.

A report from Morocco received here today said that a ten-month-old Jewish boy, Makhlouf Wazana, was kidnaped by Moslems in the Jewish quarter of Casablanca. The infant was being looked after by his eight-year-old sister, whose attention was distracted by the kidnapers who then spirited off the infant. The abduction is one of the many which have taken place recently in the Jewish quarters of Moroccan cities.

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