Politics divide, culture unites. No better example than the love affair that has gone on for centuries between Jews and Muslims in the town of Essaouira in my home country of Morocco. For the past few years, the town has hosted a musical festival to celebrate that unity, as reported here in Ynet, thanks in large part to the efforts of a Jew named Andre Azoulay, counsellor to the king and aspiring Mideast peacemaker. This year, the festival featured a legendary chazzan, Rabbi Chaim Louk, who was in Los Angeles for most of the 1990s, and who is recognized in the Sephardic world as the master of the ancient melodies.
Until politicians learn to play music of a different kind, we'll have to be thankful for real musicians who bring real peace.
A music festival bringing Jews and Muslims together in the Moroccan windy, walled fishing port of Essaouira, along a crossroads of civilization, is a step in breaking down political divides, says festival founder Andre Azoulay. Azoulay, a high-profile businessman and advisor to Morocco's King Mohammed VI, who is a player in the Middle East peace process, is the driving force behind the Andalousies Atlantiques festival of Judeo-Arab music, whose sixth edition ended this weekend.
"Essaouira throughout its entire history and its entire way of living was a synthesis between Muslims and Jews," Azoulay told AFP. "It was not something artificially constructed, it was natural."
"And this festival is a reconstruction of that reality as it was historically. It is not cosmetic, it is real."
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