The Lag Ba’Omer procession to the Ghriba Synagogue in Er-Riadh, Djerba, Tunisia.
The government of Tunisia decided for the first time to allow tourists from Israel to use their Israeli passports on an annual pilgrimage during the upcoming Lag Ba’Omer holy day to the Ghriba Synagogue on the island of Djerba. In the past, they required a special document issued by the Tunisian embassy.
Since Tunisia does not have diplomatic relations with Israel, the move has drawn opposition from lawmakers who see this as de facto recognition of the Jewish state.
Over a third of the Tunisian assembly signed a petition requiring Tourism Minister Amel Karboul to explain her actions.
Tunisia’s interim prime minister Mehdi Jomaa supported the new policy, recognizing that the restoration of the annual pilgrimage could revive the nation’s tourism industry. About 8,000 Jews visited Tunisia in 2000 when the pilgrimage was at its peak.
“We must dispense with these political arguments and focus on the essential,” said Jomaa. “All the previous governments authorized Jews from Israel to come to Tunisia for the annual pilgrimage; we just decided to do it with total transparence.” (Israel Hayom)
Those who oppose the move are careful to distinguish between Jews in general, who they say they don’t object to, and the government of Israel.
“Our problem is not with our Jewish brothers who come for the pilgrimage but with the Zionist entity that occupies Palestinian territories,” said the head of the center leftist Democratic Alliance Mohammed Hamdi. (Haaretz)
In recent years, violence and civil unrest linked to al-Qaida and the Tunisian revolution have kept Jewish tourists away, with only a few hundred coming in the past couple of years.
