In El Hamma, in southern Tunisia, the mausoleum of Youssef El-Maarabi, a 16th-century rabbi, usually sees only a few hundred faithful from the Jewish community parade each year, pilgrims from the rest of the country to pay homage to the wise man whose name it bears. On the night of October 17-18, a few hours after the announcement that the Al-Ahli hospital in Gaza had been bombed and while protests were taking place in many cities in Tunisia, hundreds of young people here stormed the synagogue and the sanctuary it houses to vandalize them and shout their support for Palestine, hoisting its flag on the roof in a sign of victory.
The building was set on fire, graffiti was left on the walls, which were severely damaged during the night. “They went there with a hammer, they burned the place, they smashed everything,” denounces Ariel, who prefers to use an assumed name for fear of reprisals. Apart from the annual pilgrimage during the Hanukkah festival in December, the mausoleum, more than 400 kilometers south of Tunis, remains little visited but the announcement of its desecration has sparked emotion within the Tunisian Jewish community and confirmed the fear that the historic support for the Palestinian cause which transcends the country regularly lapses into anti-Semitism.
As of Sunday, the authorities had still not reacted to the fire at the El Hamma mausoleum. On May 9, President Kaïs Saïed, after the terrorist attack against the Jewish pilgrimage of La Ghriba, which left five dead including two pilgrims, rushed to denounce international reactions attributing an anti-Semitic character to the attack then, he said, that “Palestinians are being killed every day and no one talks about it.”
In this context, the events of El Hamma revive painful memories within the local Jewish community and refer to the history of violence suffered as the situation in the Middle East evolved. “It feels like 1967 and it’s scary,” says Nino, originally from Djerba, also using an assumed name. On June 5, 1967, at the start of the Six-Day War, a demonstration in Tunis in front of the American cultural center turned into a riot. Stores run by Jews had been ransacked, the great synagogue of Tunis burned. Nino was not born but the trauma was passed down from generation to generation.
“How can you not be worried? »
“It’s always the same: Israel attacks Gaza and Jews around the world suffer the consequences,” he summarizes. Unfortunately in Tunisia, people do not differentiate between Israelis and Jews. » A confusion maintained by “an old tradition of anti-Judaism”, analyzes Sophie Bessis, Franco-Tunisian historian. “In education, in teaching, Jewish Tunisians do not exist. School textbooks make no mention of the millennia-old Jewish presence in this country. Children are not educated in the knowledge of the old Tunisian plurality, which does not only concern Jews,” she explains. In less than a century, the Jewish community in Tunisia has been drastically reduced, going from more than 100,000 members to around 1,500 today.
Those who resisted the urge to exodus to Europe, America and the calls for Aliyah, emigration to Israel favored by the Jewish state, plunged into a certain anxiety over the crises in the Middle East. “We keep a low profile, we don’t post anything on social networks, and if there is a demonstration, we avoid the streets,” explains Nino, who does not plan to leave at the moment but does not hide that the choice could be different for others.
“How can you not be worried? », asks Ariel, who sees a major role played by social networks in the spread of anti-Semitism. “People are openly anti-Semitic there without any shame,” he observes, mentioning the numerous comments welcoming the damage committed in El Hamma or calling for other similar acts to be committed. “Bravo”, “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth”, “The rest at [the synagogue of] La Ghriba”, they indicate as Le Monde was able to consult them. Jews are also regularly referred to their links, real or supposed, with Israel and called to take a position, relates Ariel. “It’s simple if you don’t give your official position, you keep silent, therefore you condone” he says, and concludes fatalistically: “Today, it is enough for a madman to post a message calling for an attack on a synagogue and you have some who answer the call. »