Tunisian Jews Struggle to Preserve Ancient Island Community<\/p>\n
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The remaining Jewish families feel duty-bound to stay on Djerba even though they can envisage no future there for their children<\/p>\n
Anticipating the sun\u2019s rapid ascent in the African skies, six barefoot men align themselves early in the morning in a drafty corridor of the still-cool interior of Africa\u2019s oldest synagogue.<\/p>\n
Casually humming a biblical hymn in Hebrew, they and an Israeli journalist hold off on holiday prayers in the hope of performing them in a minyan \u2014 the quorum of 10 Jewish men that Orthodox Judaism mandates for certain prayers, and a threshold requirement for any viable community.<\/p>\n
Members of a dwindling Jewish minority on this Tunisian island, they wait for hours under the ornate arches of the centuries-old El Ghriba Synagogue in Riadh, a town where thousands of Jews once lived but now has only a handful of Jewish families. It will take a while for reinforcements to arrive: three more Jews from Hara Kebira, the last remaining Jewish town in Djerba, located four miles north of the synagogue.<\/p>\n
Belonging to one of the Arab world\u2019s few active Jewish congregations, their patience reflects a determination to preserve their ancient tradition in a tight-knit community of 1,000. Many members feel duty-bound to remain on the island even though they can envisage no future here for their children.<\/p>\n
\u201cEverybody\u2019s thought about leaving, myself included,\u201d says Ben Zion Dee\u2019ie, a 30-year-old yeshiva teacher who walked four miles to the El Ghriba Synagogue from his parents\u2019 home in Hara Kebira, where nearly all Djerba Jews live. \u201cThe economy\u2019s bad, the currency\u2019s plummeting, tourism\u2019s suffering because of terrorism and jobs are scarce and not well paying. It\u2019s not perfect.\u201d<\/p>\n
But leaving \u201cwould be very difficult,\u201d adds Dee\u2019ie, who comes each year with other congregants to make sure El Ghriba has a minyan. \u201cIt feels wrong to leave where my ancestors lived for so many years.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nonetheless, various factors, including state-tolerated violence against Jews following Israel\u2019s victory over its neighbors in the 1967 Six-Day War, have gradually almost emptied Tunisia of the 110,000 Jews who lived here before 1970. A few dozen families left following the 2011 revolution that briefly installed an Islamist and anti-Israel party in power.<\/p>\n
That bout of instability was the latest chapter in the story that led to the near-total disappearance of centuries-long Jewish life from the Arab world amid hostility and poverty.<\/p>\n
Jews on Djerba have also experienced these problems, not least in the explosion that al-Qaida terrorists set off outside the El Ghriba Synagogue in 2002 in which 20 people died, including 14 German tourists.<\/p>\n
The explosion occurred three weeks before the Jewish holiday of Lag b\u2019Omer, when hundreds of tourists, including from Israel, gather at the El Ghriba for a pilgrimage that is particularly popular among Jews of Tunisian descent.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s the only time of the year that we can count on having a minyan,\u201d Dee\u2019ie said at the synagogue, where the sounds of the shofar on Rosh Hashanah blended with the Muslim call to prayer and the chiming of church bells.<\/p>\n
After prayers at the synagogue \u2014 a normally quiet place where the only sounds are the wind\u2019s rustling of the wicker mats on the floor and the crackling of the glass oil lamps hanging over the windows \u2014 the 10 men walk to a deep well nearby to perform tashlich, a ritual of atonement requiring a large body of water.<\/p>\n
Running for 200 feet beneath the sun-baked desert soil, the well used to service a complex of communal buildings and orchards belonging to the thousands of Jews who once lived here. But now it stands at the edge of a barren and open field.<\/p>\n
Then the men head to the home of Joseph Azria, 42, and his ailing parents \u2014 three of the few Jews still living in Riadh \u2014 to blow the shofar for Azria\u2019s father, who is too old and weak to walk to synagogue. The old man smiles as his only son still living in Tunisia speaks about his hope for finding a Jewish bride in Morocco and possibly moving with her to Israel.<\/p>\n
The synagogue now is surrounded by anti-tank obstacles and permanently guarded by a platoon of soldiers toting machine guns. They forbid visitors from taking pictures and turn them away altogether whenever members of the Jewish community are in the building.<\/p>\n
Photography is also forbidden inside Hara Kebira, which has permanently manned checkpoints at its two entrances. Police officers in civilians clothes patrol the town, quickly intercepting and questioning anyone who seems out of place. Inside Hara Kebira, which has a chief rabbi, four synagogues and three Jewish schools, Jews walk around wearing kippahs, greeting passers-by with \u201cshalom\u201d and wishing one another \u201cShanah tovah\u201d \u2013 Hebrew for Happy New Year.<\/p>\n
Sukkot, huts with palm-tree canopies, are erected in every yard on the Jewish holiday and the whole neighborhood falls silent on Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement. Still, Hara Kebira residents do not advertise their Jewish identity outside their town: The men don hats over their kippahs upon leaving the enclave.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a very good thing the police are here, they protect us, just like they protect you in Israel,\u201d Dee\u2019ie, who studied at a religious seminary in Israel in 2007. He returned to Hara Kebira but moved away last year to Zarzis, where his wife was born and he teaches a classroom of 15 children from that city\u2019s Jewish community of 130 members.<\/p>\n
Dee\u2019ie\u2019s father, the community\u2019s most experienced mohel and schochet \u2013 respectively the person who performs circumcision and the ritual slaughter of animals \u2013 still lives in Hara Kebira with his wife and Dee\u2019ie\u2019s nine siblings. They meet on holidays for elaborate meals rich with alcohol, including a kosher wine that the Dee\u2019ies produce themselves because importing it is too expensive and complicated in Tunisia, a Muslim country where many oppose the sale of any alcohol.<\/p>\n
Despite the challenges of living here, Djerba is one of the few spots in the region where a sizable Jewish community persists, thanks to what locals \u2014 Jews and non-Jews alike \u2013 say is a special set of circumstances: the local population\u2019s relative immunity to waves of xenophobia and political agitation seen on the mainland.<\/p>\n
Pretty much all aspects of life in Djerba bear the effect of centuries of interaction among Muslims, Christians and Jews, who have lived here since Roman times.<\/p>\n
Whereas elsewhere in Tunisia the traditional bean stew known as tfina pkaila is considered a typically Jewish dish, here in Djerba everyone eats and makes it. The island\u2019s best makers of blousas \u2014 a traditional Djerban woolen robe that Muslims wear on religious holidays \u2014 are all Jewish. (One Jewish tailor, Makhiks Sabbag, and his son Amos are widely considered the very best.)<\/p>\n
The symbol of the menorah, the Jewish traditional oil lamp, is a local icon adopted by the general population featured in decorations of government buildings such as clinics and schools. And non-Jewish locals are surprisingly familiar with the Jewish calendar and customs.<\/p>\n
Muslim customs clearly have also rubbed off on Jews here: They take off their shoes before entering their synagogues the way Muslims do before entering a mosque.<\/p>\n
This familiarity breeds intimacy and mutual assistance, according to Ridha Arfaoui, a non-Jewish resident of Riadh who owns a small restaurant near the El Ghriba Synagogue.<\/p>\n
\u201cI grew up with the Jews, we had a Jewish neighbor on all sides of our house and on Yom Kippur we would not turn on the radio out of respect,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
But in Tunisia, expressions of anti-Semitism, often featuring anti-Israel vitriol, continue to occur, reminding the country\u2019s remaining 1,700 Jews \u201cthat the Arab, he is very easy to incite,\u201d Dee\u2019ie said.<\/p>\n
A recent example came when Tunisia joined several other countries in banning the film \u201cWonder Woman,\u201d apparently because its lead character is portrayed by the Israeli film star Gal Gadot. The Jewish-French philosopher Bernard-Henri Levy, who is not Israeli, was greeted during a 2014 visit to Tunisia by dozens of Islamists carrying signs calling on \u201cLevy the Zionist\u201d to leave.<\/p>\n
The invitation to a Tunisian festival in July of the Jewish comedian Michel Boujenah provoked protests in Tunisia that local anti-racism activists said were anti-Semitic. Tunisia has several pending bills, introduced by Islamist and secular nationalists, proposing a blanket boycott on Israel and a ban on any Israelis from entering the country.<\/p>\n
Notwithstanding, Tunisia\u2019s government is showcasing its Jewish heritage sites, including Djerba, whose ancient synagogue is on Tunis\u2019 list this year for locales put forth for recognition as world heritage sites by the United Nations. The government has made several statements about the positive role of its Jewish citizens, invested considerable resources in renovating sites of worship and is considering allocating two seats in parliament for representatives of the Jewish community.<\/p>\n
But in parallel, authorities in Tunisia are \u201cquietly confiscating\u201d Jewish antiques, including a 15th-century Torah scroll whose whereabouts the government is refusing to disclose, according to an expose published last month by the French news site Dreuz.<\/p>\n
The effects of anti-Semitism in Tunisia may be \u201cunpleasant at times, but they are not a threat to the survival of this community,\u201d said Dee\u2019ie, who was ready to immigrate to Israel last year with his wife because they could not find an affordable apartment to their liking in Zarzis.<\/p>\n
\u201cPractical things matter: Whether Jews can find a Jewish partner, make a living and live a comfortable life,\u201d he added. \u201cI grew up here, but I don\u2019t know if this is the place where my children will grow up.\u201d<\/p>\n