Published: 20 October 2023
Last updated: 5 March 2024
Hundreds of people were filmed setting fire to a 16th century synagogue, during riots which spread through the Arab world, where Israel was blamed for the explosion at a Gaza hospital.
A historic but defunct synagogue in Tunisia was reduced to rubble on Tuesday amid mass rioting after an explosion in Gaza that Hamas blamed on Israel.
Hundreds of people were filmed setting fire to a synagogue in the central Tunisian city of Al Hammah in the hours after the explosion, at a Gaza City hospital where Hamas said many people died. Videos that circulated widely on social media showed people planting Palestinian flags and chipping away at the synagogue building’s stone walls, all without any police intervention.
Some users shared the video of the arson alongside a “#Palestine” hashtag. A video taken Wednesday shows heavy damage to the site, including to the fenced-off grave of a 16th-century rabbi that been a historic pilgrimage site for some Jews.
The incident, which has deprived Al Hammah of a key vestige of its Jewish past, comes amid attacks on other Jewish and Israeli sites around the world — including Germany, France, Portugal, China, and Australia — as Israel retaliates in the Gaza Strip following Hamas’ sweeping, deadly attack on Israel Oct. 7.
Protests against Israel ramped up Tuesday night after the hospital explosion, which US intelligence and Israeli military say they believe with near certainty was caused by an errant rocket fired by Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
Dozens of rioters targeted the Israeli embassy in Amman, Jordan. Riots also broke out in Palestinian areas of the West Bank, Hebrew media reported.
In Istanbul police prevented protesters from storming the Israeli consulate overnight and more than 60 people, most of them police officers, were injured after a group targeted the consulate building with stones, sticks and fireworks, the Istanbul Governor's Office said. Five demonstrators were detained after they climbed over police barricades.
