Rabbi Baruch Abuhatzeira, an influential leader of Israel’s huge North African community, has called for direct negotiations with the Palestine Liberation Organization.
He urged the step while leading a pilgrimage to his grandfather’s grave in Egypt on Tuesday, and reiterated his views in an interview with Israel Radio on Thursday.
He also criticized Israeli leaders for making a demon of PLO chief Yasir Arafat.
Such remarks are heresy to large numbers of Israelis and were promptly denounced in some religious quarters.
Abuhatzeira, known as Baba Baruch, and the majority of his constituents are of Moroccan origin. He lives in Netivot, a development town in the Negev.
His spiritual leadership is largely the heritage of his father, the late Rabbi Shalom Abuhatzeira, who was known as Baba Sali and widely credited with mystical powers.
Baba Baruch made his controversial statements to a delegation of 5,000 Jews, many of them Israelis, who were gathered at the graveside of his grandfather, Rabbi Ya’acov Abuhatzeira of Morocco.
INITIATIVE UNDER WAY IN MOROCCO
Apparently impressed by the peaceful relations between Egypt and Israel, Baba Baruch said, “The leaders of Israel frighten the people against meetings with the PLO, depicting Arafat as a Satan. We must engage in negotiations with them, such negotiations which would lead to peace.”
He made essentially the same comments in the radio interview, adding that the PLO must renounce terrorism and recognize the existence of the State of Israel.
But his views were promptly condemned by the ultra-Orthodox Agudat Yisrael party, which Abuhatzeira supported in the last elections.
Rabbi Menahem Porush, the Agudat Yisrael leader in the Knesset, said his party is opposed in principle to any negotiations with the PLO. The only negotiations they support are with local Palestinians, he said.
Nevertheless, Baba Baruch’s position is expected to have a strong impact in the North African community. He is the first of their leaders to speak out unequivocally in favor of talks with the PLO.
Meanwhile, the ultra-Orthodox weekly Yom Hashishi reported that a wealthy leader of the Jewish community in Morocco recently met with PLO leaders, including Arafat, to try to organize talks between Israelis and Palestinians.
According to the paper, the unidentified Jewish leader was informed by Arafat that half of a $40 billion fund was earmarked by King Hassan of Morocco for the peace process, provided that Israel enter direct negotiations with the PLO.
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