In 1940-1941, as part of the American journalist Varian Fry’s rescue of anti-Nazi European intellectuals, artist Marcel Duchamp fled to New York, with a brief stopover in Morocco. This visit is the focus of a new novel by Serge Bramly, a Frenchman of Tunisian Jewish origin. The title of “Orchidée fixe” cites a virtually untranslatable…
A Tunisian minister wished a Merry Christmas to the country’s tiny Jewish community. “I want to wish all the Jews of Tunisia a happy holiday tonight, it is a big holiday all over the world,” Houcine El Jaziri, Tunisia’s state secretary for immigration and Tunisians living abroad, said while participating in the talk show “Attasia”…
Tunisian police have arrested four people for allegedly plotting to kidnap local Jews for ransom, an official said on Thursday, stoking insecurity in the dwindling Jewish community after last year’s “Arab Spring” revolt led to a resurgence of Islamists. There are less than 2,000 Jews in Tunisia, mostly living in the town of Zarzis and…
Switzerland has blocked nearly one billion Swiss francs ($1.07 billion) in stolen assets linked to dictators in four countries at the centre of the Arab spring – Egypt, Libya, Syria and Tunisia – the Swiss foreign ministry said on Tuesday. Swiss authorities are cooperating with judicial authorities in Tunisia and Egypt to speed restoration of…
According to reports on Twitter and in Tunisian media, Muslim protestors have scaled barrier walls at the U.S. embassy in Tunis. The police and military response was quick, with men on horseback and armored vehicles arriving to disperse protesters — identified as hardline Islamists — who raised a black flag of the radical Salafi movement…
Video: Nate Lavey After years of decay and neglect, the Jewish cemetery in Tunis is overgrown, unkempt and could be declared ‘abandoned’ by the Tunisian government a status that could result in its redevelopment. The fate of the cemetery rests on a few caretakers like Joseph Krief, a native-born Tunisian Jew, who has tried for…
Video: Nate Lavey A year and a half after the ouster of Tunisian dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, the president of the Tunisian Jewish community is wistful for the one-party government that ruled the country for decades. “You cannot find a better government than what we had,” said Roger Bismuth, who has held the…
In this week’s podcast, host Josh Nathan-Kazis talks with Nate Lavey about his recent trip to Tunisia and the status of the country’s Jews. Then, Josh reports back on his recent trip to a cemetery convention where concerns ranged from how to handle trusts to missing bodies, voodoo and cow tongues. Finally, editor Jane Eisner…
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