History of the Jews in Tunisia


The history of the Jews in Tunisia dates back nearly two thousand years to the Punic era. The Jewish community of Tunisia grew following successive waves of immigration and proselytism before its development was hampered by the imposition of anti-Jewish measures in the Byzantine Empire in late antiquity. After the Muslim conquest of Tunisia, Tunisian Jews experienced periods of relative freedom or cultural apogee which were followed by periods of more marked discrimination and persecution; under Muslim rule, Jews were granted legal status as dhimmi, which legally assured protections of life, property, and freedom of religion, but imposed an increased tax burden on them. The community developed its own dialect of Arabic, but the use of Judeo-Tunisian Arabic has declined due to the community's relocation from Tunisia. The arrival of Jews expelled from the Iberian Peninsula, often through Livorno, greatly influenced the community's composition, inter-group relations, and customs.
The economic, social and cultural position of the community was significantly compromised during the Second World War due to the occupation of the French protectorate of Tunisia by the Axis powers.
The Israeli Declaration of Independence in 1948 and the ensuing 1948 Arab–Israeli War provoked a widespread anti-Zionist backlash in the Arab world, to which was added nationalist agitation, the nationalization of enterprises, the Arabization of education and the Arabization of part of the administration. Prior to Tunisian independence in 1956, the Jewish population was estimated at 100,000 individuals. These Jews lived mainly in Tunis, with communities also present on the island of Djerba. Jews left Tunisia en masse in subsequent years due notably to the Bizerte crisis in 1961 and the Six-Day War in 1967. The population had declined to 1500 by 2017.
The Jewish diaspora of Tunisia is divided between Israel and France, where it has preserved its community identity through its traditions, mostly dependent on Sephardic law and customs, but retaining its own specific characteristics. Djerbian Judaism in particular is considered to be more faithful to tradition because it remained outside the sphere of influence of the modernist currents. The Tunisian Jews who have relocated to Israel have switched to using Hebrew as their home language. Tunisian Jews living in France typically use French as their first language, while the few still left in Tunisia tend to use either French or Judeo-Tunisian Arabic in their everyday lives.

Historiography

The history of the Jews of Tunisia was first studied by David Cazès in 1888 in his Essay on the History of the Israelites of Tunisia, André Chouraqui, and later by Haim Zeev Hirschberg, in the more general context of North African Judaism. The research on the subject was then enriched by Robert Attal and Yitzhak Avrahami. In addition, various institutions, including the Israel Folktale Archives in University of Haifa, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and the Ben Zvi Institute, have collected material evidence, traditions, and manuscripts as well as Judeo-Arabic books and newspapers. Paul Sebag is the first to provide in his 1991 book History of the Jews of Tunisia: from origins to our days a first development entirely devoted to the history of this community. In Tunisia, following the thesis of Abdelkrim Allagui, a group under the direction of Habib Kazdaghli and Abdelhamid Largueche brought the subject into the field of national academic research. Founded in Paris on June 3, 1997, the Society of Jewish History of Tunisia contributes to the research on the Jews of Tunisia and transmits their history through conferences, symposia and exhibitions.
According to Michel Abitbol, the study of Judaism in Tunisia has grown rapidly during the progressive dissolution of the Jewish community in the context of decolonization and the evolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict while Habib Kazdaghli believes that the departure of the Jewish community is the cause of the low number of studies which are relevant to the topic. Kazdaghli, however, points out that the publication of them has increased since the 1990s, due to their authors' attachment to this community, and the belief that the Jews originated in one or another community or the belief that they originated in multiple Tunisian communities. As for the fate of the Jewish community during the period of the German occupation of Tunisia, it remains relatively unknown, and during the Symposium on the Jewish Community of Tunisia which was held at Manouba University in February 1998, it was not mentioned. However, the work of memory of the community exists, with the testimonies of Robert Borgel and Paul Ghez, the novels The Statue of Salt by Albert Memmi and Villa Jasmin by Serge Moati, as well as the works of some historians.

Antiquity

Hypothetical origins

Presently, the earliest verifiable record of the presence in Jews in Tunisia is from the second century. However, there are other, mostly speculative, ideas about when Jews first arrived in the land which is presently known as Tunisia:
File:Date Palm Tree, Hammam Lif, Tunisia, 6th century AD, mosaic of stone, mortar - Brooklyn Museum - Brooklyn, NY - DSC08250.JPG|thumb|Date palm, Byzantine mosaic from the Roman synagogue of Naro in Hammam Lif, 6th century CE, Brooklyn Museum.
It is probable that these Israelites would have assimilated into the Punic population and offered sacrifices to its divinities, like Baal and Tanit. Thereafter, Jews from Alexandria or Cyrene could have settled in Carthage following the Hellenization of the eastern part of the Mediterranean Basin. The cultural context allowed them to practice Judaism more in keeping with ancestral traditions. Small Jewish communities existed in the later days of Punic domination over North Africa, without it being possible to say whether they developed or disappeared later.
Jews had, in any case, settled in the new Roman province of Africa, and enjoyed the favors of Julius Caesar. The latter, in recognition of the support of King Antipater in his struggle against Pompey, recognized Judaism and the status of religio licita, and, according to Josephus, granted the Jews a privileged status under the Roman Empire. These Jews were joined by Jewish pilgrims, expelled from Rome for proselytizing, 20 by a number of defeated in the First Jewish–Roman War, deported and resold as slaves in North Africa, and also by Jews fleeing the repression of revolts in Cyrenaica and Judea under the reigns of the emperors Domitian, Trajan, and Hadrian. According to Josephus, the Romans deported 30,000 Jews to Carthage from Judea after the First Jewish-Roman War. It is very likely that these Jews founded communities on the territory of present-day Tunisia.
A traditional account of the history of the descendants of the first Jewish settlers states that their ancestors settled in that part of North Africa long before the destruction of the First Temple in the 6th century BCE. After the fall of the Second Temple, many exiled Jews settled in Tunis and engaged in agriculture, cattle-raising, and trade. They were divided into clans which were governed by their respective heads, and they had to pay the Romans a capitation tax of 2 shekels. Under the dominion of the Romans and of the fairly tolerant Vandals, the Jews of Tunis increased and prospered to such a degree that early African church councils deemed it necessary to enact restrictive laws against them.
Al-Qayrawani wrote that at the time of the conquest of Hippo Zaritus by Hasan ibn al-Nu'man in 698, the governor of that district was a Jew. When Tunis came under the dominion of the Arabs, or of the Arabian caliphate of Baghdad, another influx of Arabic-speaking Jews from the Levant into Tunis took place.

Genetic studies of Jews in Tunisia

Numerous studies have been conducted on the genetics of Jews in general, on North African Jews in particular, and specifically on Jews of Tunisian origin.
They conclude that "the closest genetic neighbors to most Jewish groups were the Palestinians, Bedouins, and Druze in addition to the Southern Europeans". And that :
Furthermore, "The Tunisian Jews exhibited two apparent clusters—one with proximity to Libyan and Djerban Jews and the other proximal to the Moroccan and Algerian Jews."

Under Roman rule

The first documents attesting to the presence of Jews in Tunisia date from the second century. Tertullian describes Jewish communities alongside which Pagan Jews of Punic, Roman and Berber origin and, initially, Christians; The success of Jewish proselytism led the pagan authorities to take legal measures, while Tertullian wrote a pamphlet against Judaism at the same time. On the other hand, the Talmud mention the existence of several Carthaginian rabbis. In addition, Alfred Louis Delattre demonstrates towards the end of the nineteenth century that the Gammarth necropolis, made up of 200 rock chambers, each containing up to 17 complex tombs, contains Jewish symbols and funerary inscriptions in Hebrew, Latin and Greek.
File:Mosaïque d'Asterius de la synagogue d'Hammam Lif - Bardo National Museum 0101 03.jpg|thumb|"Sinagoga", Roman mosaic, Bardo Museum, Tunisia.
The Jewish community of Carthage was very pious, adhering strictly to traditions, eating kosher, and consuming matzah during Passover. They observed Yom Kippur, gathering outdoors to await the end of the fast. The community celebrated Shabbat with festive meals prepared on Friday evening, lighting a lamp, and holding public Torah readings at the synagogue. They also practiced frequent ritual ablutions. A distinctive feature of Jewish women in Carthage was covering their heads.
Tertullian further maintains that Jewish worship was protected by Roman law. While a tax served as a reminder of Roman authority in the region, he suggests that the community was granted a certain level of autonomy for daily affairs: alongside the archisynagogue, the spiritual leader, there was the Archon, a kind of council of elders. For reasons likely both political—Jews were Roman citizens—and proselytizing among local populations, Latin was the predominant language in inscriptions, while Hebrew appeared only in a few phrases, such as greetings.
"Judaism, in Carthage as elsewhere, exerted a great influence on local populations: crowds gathered for the Saturday sermon, and pagans and Christians sometimes observed the Shabbat and other festivals and conversions were widespread". Despite some controversies, rivalries, or mockery between Jews and Christians, it appears that Christians were accepted in the Jewish cemetery of Gammarth, a necropolis discovered in the late 19th century. The decoration of necropolises and magical tablets, which combine pagan abjurations with sacred Jewish formulas, illustrate the syncretism of the time. The success of Jewish proselytism thus prompted the pagan Roman authorities to take legal measures.
The ruins of an ancient synagogue dating back to the 3rd–5th century CE was discovered by the French captain Ernest De Prudhomme in his Hammam-Lif residence in 1883 called in Latin as and motifs common across Roman Africa, attests to the affluence of its Israelite members and the quality of their interactions with other populations. Another synagogue, dating to the 5th century, was discovered in Clipea. Other Jewish communities are attested by epigraphic or literary references to Utique, Chemtou, Hadrumète or Thusuros. As elsewhere in the Roman Empire, the Jews of Roman Africa were romanized after hundreds of years of subjection and would have adopted Latinized names, worn togas, and spoken Latin.
According to St. Augustine, only their morals, modeled by Jewish religious precepts, distinguished them from the rest of the population. Some devoted themselves to translation for Christian clients and to the study of the Law; many rabbis were originally from Carthage. Others worked in agriculture, livestock and trade.
Their situation was modified by the Edict of Milan, which legalized Christianity. Jews were gradually excluded from most public functions and proselytism was severely punished. The construction of new synagogues was prohibited towards the end of the fourth century, and by the fifth century even the upkeep of existing ones was subject by law to the approval of the imperial administration. Access to civil service positions was also restricted, and it was prohibited to disinherit Jewish children who converted to Christianity, circumcise them, or even own Christian slaves.
However, various councils held by the Church of Carthage, in advising Christians not to follow certain practices of their Jewish neighbors, serve as testimony as to their ongoing influence.