CONTRIBUTI / 18 / Angy Cohen and Rotem Leshem
Mois Benarroch is a Moroccan-Israeli poet who has been very influential on Mizrahi (Eastern/Oriental) poetry in Israel. This article analyzes The Immigrant’s Lament, Benarroch’s first book of poems in Hebrew. It was published in 1994, after years of not remembering his past in the Moroccan city of Tetouan, where the author grew up until the age of thirteen. His integration into Israeli society had required a transformation of himself and his memories that did not match those he needed to have to become a first-class Israeli. The Immigrant’s Lament is part of his process of recovering his memories alongside his political awareness. The book is a project of remembering and a liberation device, part of an awakening. The poet dares to call himself an immigrant and not only an oleh, “one who ascends”. In the very title of the book there is a redefinition of himself and his experience as a Moroccan Jew in Israel. It is also a challenge to the Zionist promise of ending exile. Benarroch laments the loss of the promise of redemption, the continuation of exile in the Land of Israel, the place of historical redemption for the Jewish people. This article explores the rebellion against oblivion and the search for recognition and legitimacy that accompanied the poet’s recovery of memory and, with it, a political conscience. We will analyze the interaction between identity processes and the politics of recognition.
