The Encaoua who chose the Maghreb settled mainly in Tlemcen and Fès, joining Jewish communities already established there.
The Toshavim (long-established residents) welcomed the Megorashim (the expelled) with a mixture of generosity and tension. In Tlemcen, the Encaoua quickly established themselves as one of the leading rabbinic families, benefiting from the prestige acquired a century earlier by the Rab Éphraïm Al-Naqua. The legal regime of the Jewish communities in the Maghreb — the Takkanot — was often the scene of rivalries between the new Castilian arrivals and the indigenous families of local rite.
The exiles of 1492 took several routes toward the Maghreb. Some passed through Portugal (before the Portuguese expulsion of 1496–1497), others through the Balearic Islands or directly by sea toward Oran, Fès and Tlemcen. The family memory of the Encaoua preserves the recollection of this journey through liturgical piyutim and allusions in the responsa. The Rab Éphraïm had, moreover, obtained from the sultan of Tlemcen, a century earlier, permission for Jewish families from Spain to come and settle in the city — in a sense prophesying the exodus to come.
During the 16th century, the Jewish communities of the Maghreb organized themselves into distinct communities — the Castilians (megorashim) and the natives (toshavim) — before gradually merging. In Tlemcen, as in Fès, the Encaoua dayanim played a decisive role in this unification, bringing the Castilian legal tradition enriched by centuries of practice in Spain. This fusion gave rise to an original Maghrebi Judaism, neither purely Sephardic nor purely indigenous, but a creative synthesis of the two traditions.
The settlement of the Iberian exiles unfolds across six major centers documented by MMJMM: Tlemcen, Oran, Fès, Tétouan, Salé, and the Italian refuge of Livorno. Each has its own liturgy, its dayanim and its manuscripts.