‘Tunisian Jews are Tunisian’: How the Gaza-Israel fighting made its mark in a part of north Africa

With a long-established Jewish community, will tensions in Tunisia be exacerbated by events in Gaza? Simon Speakman Cordall reports

Tunisians wave Palestinian flags and chant anti-Israel slogans during a demonstration in solidarity with Palestine (EPA)

The tentative sense of relief that appears to be finding ground in the skies over Gaza and Jerusalem has found echoes among the communities of both sides of the conflict around the world. During the 11 days of fighting, protests roiled cities across Europe and much of the world.

In Paris, as in Baghdad, demonstrators took to the street to voice their solidarity with the citizens of one of the most contested territories in the world.

In Tunis, with its health service already teetering on the brink from the pandemic’s onslaught, protesters took to the streets in their hundreds, urged on by civil society and political groups, to give voice to their solidarity with Palestine and their denunciation of the “Zionist entity”.