2023-05-10 05:51:41
Two worshipers who were taking part in a Jewish pilgrimage to the Ghriba synagogue, on the island of Djerba in Tunisia, were killed on Tuesday evening in an attack carried out by a gendarme who also killed two colleagues before being shot, announced the Ministry of the Interior.
This synagogue, the oldest in Africa, had already been targeted in 2002 by a suicide truck bomb attack that killed 21 people.
The attack took place in two stages, the ministry said in a statement. The gendarme who fired the shots first shot and killed one of his colleagues and seized his ammunition. Then he went to the outskirts of the synagogue where he opened fire on the security forces ensuring the security of the place before being shot.
Two “visitors” to the synagogue were killed by gunfire from the assailant before he was shot, and four others were injured and evacuated to a hospital, the ministry added. The Tunisian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement that the two dead were “a 30-year-old Tunisian and a 42-year-old Frenchman”, without providing their identities. Another gendarme was also killed, and five others injured by the assailant’s shots, according to the Interior Ministry.
Crisis Unit at the French Embassy in Tunis
Following the attack, the French Embassy in Tunis announced that it had opened “a crisis cell” and set up an emergency number.
“The United States deplores the attack in Tunisia, which coincides with the annual Jewish pilgrimage that draws worshipers from around the world to the Ghriba Synagogue. We express our condolences to the Tunisian people and salute the swift action of the Tunisian security forces,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller tweeted.
The attack came as hundreds of worshipers took part in the annual Jewish Ghriba pilgrimage which was coming to an end Tuesday night at the synagogue.
Security forces “surrounded the synagogue and secured everyone inside and around it,” according to the Interior Ministry. “Investigations are continuing to elucidate the motives for this cowardly attack,” added the ministry, refraining at this stage from mentioning a terrorist attack.
5,000 Jewish pilgrims this year
Tunisian media initially reported shooting near the Ghriba synagogue after a police officer was killed in unclear circumstances. The shots were heard from the synagogue, causing panic among the hundreds of worshipers taking part in the annual Jewish pilgrimage, according to media reports.
According to organizers, more than 5,000 Jewish pilgrims, mostly from abroad, took part in the Ghriba pilgrimage this year, which resumed last year after a two-year hiatus due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Organized on the 33rd day of Passover, the Ghriba pilgrimage is at the heart of the traditions of Tunisians of the Jewish faith, who are only 1,500, mostly settled in Djerba, against 100,000 before independence in 1956.
Pilgrims also traditionally come from European countries, the United States or even Israel, but their number decreased considerably after the 2002 attack.
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