Project on Middle East Democracy

Project on Middle East Democracy
The POMED Wire


Morocco: “Beacon” of Religious Tolerance, or Repressor?

June 30th, 2010 by Jennifer

Menachem Rosensaft, founder and Chairman of the International Network of Children of Jewish Holocaust Survivors, writes at the Huffington Post that recent reactions by some U.S. Congressmen to the deportation of American citizens from Morocco on charges of proselytizing, are overly harsh and not merited. Rosensaft says that Jews and Christians practice their faith openly in Morocco without persecution, calling the North African nation “a rare beacon of tolerance in an otherwise mostly religiously xenophobic Muslim world.” He notes that Morocco is only one of many nations in the Arab and Muslim worlds with laws against proselytism on the books, and argues that the foreign citizens were expelled for violating national laws, not for their personal religion.

Rosensaft’s commentary comes in light of a hearing on religious freedom in Morocco held by the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission of the U.S. House of Representatives in mid-June, in which several Congressmen leveled heavy criticism against the Moroccan government and called for repercussions. Rosensaft notes that Rep. Joe Pitts (R-PA) went so far as to equate Morocco’s actions to those of the Nazi regime in Germany, commenting, “these comparisons are over the top and betray either an ignorance or a disregard of history.”


Posted in Congress, Human Rights, Morocco |

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One Response to “Morocco: “Beacon” of Religious Tolerance, or Repressor?”

  1. Welcome | Project on Middle East Democracy Says:

    […] a new piece at Commentary, Jennifer Rubin praises Menachem Rosensaft’s op-ed on recent controversy in Congress over the expulsion of foreign and American citizens from Morocco […]

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