"They never said goodbye!" Assam complained wistfully of his Jewish neighbours of many years as he hammered a leaded glass lantern together for us in Marrakesh's Place des Ferblantiers.

This square, packed with artisans, is the entrance to the city's old Jewish quarter, known as the Mellah. It is about to undergo a massive £13 million government refurbishment.

For centuries a prosperous neighbourhood containing many synagogues and a cemetery as well as Jewish-owned silver and spice shops, it has fallen into disrepair in the 40 years since the majority of Jewish inhabitants fled to Israel.

Assam recalled: "We got on so well, living all mixed up together - but then they disappeared to Israel overnight."

Some stayed, but the majority of Marrakesh's remaining Jews preferred to live in the "new town" built by the French, or the suburbs beyond, while the biggest community in a country whose Jewish population was once the largest in the Arab world, is hundreds of miles away in Casablanca.

Nevertheless, heritage sites like Mellah attract cultural tourists, so the City of Marrakesh has joined with Morocco's housing ministry to restore its own 16th-century Jewish quarter.

The planned work will include restoration of the tombstones and walls of the Jewish cemetery, the largest in Morocco with three layers of graves, and at least one synagogue, according to Hicham Hlimi, who said the refurbishment would only extend to the commercially exploitable part of the 40-acre site.

"It should definitely attract more Jewish tourists," added Mr Hlimi, who manages the Riad Suliman guesthouse in the Mellah.

He has seen more visitors flock to his native Fes since the magnificent 17th-century synagogue got a government facelift.

The Lazama shul marked out for refurbishment in Marrakesh was originally established in 1492 to accommodate the exodus following the Spanish Inquisition, but was rebuilt in the 19th century.

While the Mellah work is only part of a larger civic refurbishment, the city fathers are aware Marrakesh needs to show Jewish visitors the city is safe and welcoming after an incident four years ago in which JC travel writer Peter Moss was killed with 16 others when terrorists blew up a café in the main square.

And the stakes are higher now that tourists who love the exoticism of North Africa are potentially fleeing adjacent Tunisia in the wake of last month's atrocities, which left dozens dead.