Seventeen Tunisian Jews have published a joint declaration denouncing Israeli Premier Menachem Begin “and his helpers heretics for having failed to respect the commandment: thou shalt not kill,” according to a report from Tunis by Le Monde.
The French daily also reported that another declaration, signed by 190 Tunisian personalities, condemned “all forms of racism” and rapped recent anti-Semitic incidents in the Tunisian towns of Zarzis and Ben Gardane. Homes and businesses of Jews in those cities were recently set afire and looted and several Jews were injured. The declaration by the 190 personalities was published in the Tunisian ruling party’s newspaper Al Aman.
Le Monde pointed out that with the two declarations, the Tunisian Jewish community now hopes that the current tensions will abate and that the situation will revert to the normal peaceful relations between the Jews and their neighbors.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
