The Times of Israel quoted Alma Rachel Heckman, the Neufeld-Levin Chair of Holocaust Studies and assistant professor of history and Jewish studies, in an article about a new book that explores the story of the many Jewish refugees in the Vichy Moroccan port of Casablanca fleeing the Holocaust. Heckman states that what might have befallen Casablanca’s Jews had Vichy rule continued “is speculation, and really impossible to say.” Though she asserts “it’s becoming clearer and clearer that Vichy authorities were working with Nazi authorities. There were plots to exploit Africa’s natural resources, including “a plan for a trans-Saharan railroad, Algeria on through French West Africa, to transport natural resources to Mediterranean seaports, enrich France, and in turn enrich Germany.”
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