Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Ex-Libyan Jew Cannot Restore Tripoli Synagogue; Threatened by Crowd to Stop Project or Be Killed

The New American website reports today (October 4, 2011) that a Libyan Jewish man -- who fled Libya with his parents decades ago -- returned to Tripoli to restore its main synagogue, but was forced to abandon the project due to armed men who threatened to kill him.

David Gerbi, 56, said he had obtained permission from members of the ruling National Transitional Council (NTC) to start fixing the Dar al-Bishi synagogue, which was shut down and sealed off under the Gadhafi regime following a wave of anti-Semitic persecution in the late 1960s.

Most of the other synagogues in Libya were destroyed or turned into mosques, as Jewish property was confiscated and Jews were expelled.

Gerbi said an angry crowd told him "that if I am not leaving now, they are going to come and they are going to kill me because they don't want Jews here."

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