1960 earthquake killed 1,500 Jews in Agadir

Exactly 49 years ago this week an earthquake in southwest Morocco nearly destroyed the city of Agadir, killing some 15,000 of its residents, including 1,500 of the city's 2,300 Jews. Now a survivor, Dr Orna Baziz, has reconstructed a picture of the community as it was, Ynet News reports:

"The story of Agadir's lost Jewish community has not been told until now. For the past six years Dr. Orna Baziz, a survivor of the terrible quake and a senior literature lecturer at David Yellin College of Education, has conducted an extensive research of the community's history.

"Her book, "Hagadat Agadir" (Yad Ben Zvi Publishing) which includes an account of the city's history, testimonies from survivors and a partial list of the victims, will be officially released next month.

Agadir, summer 2008. Almost no traces of the terrible disaster remain (Photo: Orna Baziz)

"Baziz, who lost her father and sister in the quake, made aliyah to Israel with her mother and sisters in 1962. For over 40 years, she said, none of her family members ever mentioned the disaster. "Mom never spoke of Agadir or mentioned what has happened, and we completely suppressed it as well," she recounted.

"But it turns out that it wasn't only us who didn't talk about it. Apparently none of the survivors wanted to open this wound."

"But in 2001, something was opened. On the week of her father's annual memorial day she visited her sister's house, and the latter suddenly started bringing up memories from Agadir. That night Baziz dreamt that she was visiting her father's grave in Morocco.

"In a spontaneous decision Baziz flew to Morocco several days later and – for the first time in 40 years – visited her father's burial place.

The Ribo family before the earthquake. The little girl on the right is Orna Baziz

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