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Israel is declassifying Jewish Agency archives that trace racist absorption of Jewish immigrants coming from Morocco, Haaretz reported on Wednesday. These documents show how the Jewish entity discriminated against jews when leaving the North African Kingdom for the newly established state in the 1950s.
The decision, announced by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked, was first tackled through a documentary directed by David Deri and entitled «The Ancestral Sin». The movie contains testimoniales and previously sealed transcripts that reveal a method, an ideology and a cruel practice of law enforcement and decision makers behind the «population» dispersal policies in the first two decades of Israel's creation. Its airing has raised questions regarding the documents that give details on such practices.
According to the Israeli online newspaper, the documentary has pushed Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked to announce, earlier this month, her intention of making these archive files public.
Documents revealing discrimination
Indeed, Shaked’s intention is to see light soon as Netanyahu insisted that «documents kept in the Zionist Archives from that period will be digitized and posted online». On top of that, a cabinet resolution will be submitted to allocate funding for this operation. The Israeli Prime Minister acknowledged that the material shown in the documentary isn’t classified but hasn’t been scanned which made it inaccessible to most people.
«That’s why I made a decision; they will be accessible to any person in Israel, to any person in the world. Totally accessible,» he added.
Meanwhile, Shaked pointed out that other documents related to the subject are classified. Referring to police archives, she stated : «I will suggest to the cabinet that the documents be reviewed and approved for perusal under the auspices of the State Archives».
Indeed, Jewish immigrants from North Africa and the Middle East were treated differently by the Israeli authorities during the establishment of the Hebrew state. In a tweet by the Israeli State Archives, a document from a February 1957 cabinet meeting in which Labor Minister Mordechai Namir discusses the need to move immigrants from Arab countries out of transit camps cited a «problem». It indicated that «the housing projects meant for immigrants from the Middle East and North Africa were given to ‘white’ immigrants.»
Similar pieces of information were revealed by David Deri’s documentary. According to Haaretz, «the new immigrants suffered from systematic neglect and had to contend with difficult living conditions in the undeveloped towns that suffered from lack of infrastructures».
