4.10.2011. 8:56 |
Židovi u Libiji
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With brooms and rakes, Libyan ‘revolutionary Jew’ starts restoring Tripoli synagogue
TRIPOLI, Libya — David Gerbi is a 56-year-old psychoanalyst, but to Libyan rebels he was the “revolutionary Jew.” He returned to his homeland after 44 years in exile to help oust Moammar Gadhafi, and to take on what may be an even more challenging mission.
That job began Sunday, when he took a sledgehammer to a concrete wall. Behind it: the door to Tripoli’s crumbling main synagogue, unused since Gadhafi expelled Libya’s small Jewish community early in his decades-long rule.
nove vijesti :
Returning Libyan Jew says threatened over temple
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
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Click here to read the original article in Ynet
Ynet
By AFP
A Libyan Jew who returned from exile as Muammar Gaddafi’s regime fell said on Monday he is facing death threats over his attempts to restore Tripoli’s abandoned and crumbling main synagogue.
David Gerbi, a 56-year-old psychoanalyst who fled with his family to Italy at the age of 12, said he was facing discrimination and being ignored by Libya’s new authorities in his efforts to reopen the Dar Bishi synagogue and gain recognition for Jews who fled Libya during Gaddafi’s rule.
"This already happened 44 years ago and now it’s happening again," Gerbi, wearing a skullcap on his head and Star of David pendant, said.
"They think they can make threats, that they are going to kill me, but I’m not going to give up. Like they did not give up to Gaddafi, I’m not going to give up to them."
Gerbi said he was told on Monday when he showed up to work at the synagogue that he would have to leave for his own safety.
A man claiming to represent the authorities told him his efforts were provoking anger in the country and that death threats had been made.
"He said ’there are many coming now, they are coming with guns, if they come you will be killed’," Gerbi said, adding that he had been told that a major demonstration against his efforts was being organized in Tripoli for Friday.
The Jewish community in Libya dates back to the third century BC and at its peak numbered about 38,000 people, although it was always the smallest of the Jewish populations in North Africa.
Most of the Jewish population left in the 20 years following World War II, mainly to Israel, where an estimated 180,000 Libyan Jews now live.........
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