USPOT hebrew singing
On the Tunisian island of Djerba, a synagogue has stood on this spot for over two and a half thousand years |
Inside Djerba synagogue Jews praying
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0.17” Around 1,500 Jews live in the country, most on this island. | Wide shot of synagogue |
Here, Jews mix with muslims, arabs with berbers in relative harmony
0.26” But despite reassurances from the new Islamist-led government, since the revolution, stories of younger Jews doing what others have done throughout the 20th century - leaving the country - are on the up
USPOT Jewish music from festival |
Elderly Jewish lady.
Younger Jewish kids playing, blowing bubbles. Young girls smiling. |
0.42” At a festival being held at the synagogue, I speak to Mehdi, as we’ll call him, who tells me of the concerns the community has.
His identity has been concealed | Woman lighting candles, cuts to ‘Mehdi’ outside. |
0.53” ‘MEHDI’ (English requiring subtitles)
‘Before the revolution, Tunisian people lived in peace; Jewish Christian, Muslim and atheist. But after the revolution we can say the mind was different...we have Salafists, Jihadists, all of them. |
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1.19” UPSOT -Music soundtrack
Most Jews left the capital Tunis years ago...all that remain to use the stunning art deco synagogue are a handful | Inside Tunis’s synagoguge |
1.31” And since the revolution, a number of demonstrations have targeted and threatened them. UPSOT roar of protest | YouTube footage of riots during the revolution. |
‘YOUTUBE’ STRAP
1.40” These were the scenes outside the synagogue at the time of the uprising - anti Jewish chants which have been replicated in public on more than one occasion.
UPSOT chanting at demo |
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UPSOT call to prayer
01.54” Mehdi’s story is far from the norm - and he’s taking a risk speaking to me. Like the vast majority of Tunisians, he was born a Sunni Muslim. But he’s now committing the sin of apostasy, and converting to Judaism after making jewish friends, and becoming fascinated with the tradition. |
Mosque overlooking Jewish area.
Jewish girls, Muslim woman.
Candelabra on door.
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2.13” Amid the festival’s heavy security, he shares his hopes
| Outside the synagogue, police presence. Cut to Mehdi. |
‘MEHDI’ (English requiring subtitles)
2.19” I didn’t feel it: I stayed in Islam without believing in it. You have every to believe in the religion that you think is the best for you. If they don’t accept my new religion, I will look for a new home in another city. | Cut aways of Mehdi’s head, hands...smoking.
Shots of Tunis synagogue from outside. |
2.46” USPOT roar of crowd ‘allahu akhbar’
‘YOUTUBE’ STRAP
He has reason to be concerned. This show of strength was filmed at one of Islam’s holiest sites this past Spring, Tunisia’s great mosque of Kairoun. It would have been unimaginable before the revolution |
Kairoun mosque during Salafist rally (April). Martial/art sword fight experts duelling.
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03.04” USPOT Salafist chanting
But now, amid a post-revolution debate on what it means to be a Tunisian - ultraconservative muslims - many operating as part of the broad Salafist movement, which advocates a puritanical approach to Sunni Islam- have become increasingly vocal after years of oppression.
| Shots of impromptu Salafist rally in centre of Tunis. |
03.31” Demonstrations have often turned violent, and critics say the government is being far too soft. | Bird’s eye shot from tall building of rally on the Avenue below. |
03.41” Like many NGOs, the Association for the Support of minorities would not have been permitted before the revolution - but it’s now attracting interest from the media, and some politicians in its calls for a clampdown on what it says the source of the problem is.
UPSOT Yamina Thabet speaking in French. | Meeting of the Association. |
04.00” YAMINA THABET
‘They’ve taken control of 400 mosques and now they are teaching the new generation the way they think - i’m talking about Salafists - and it’s a really bad thing especially for a country that is trying to learn democracy’ |
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04.18” While the number of mosques may be up for dispute, the concern about the rise of ultraconservative groups is widespread.
| Shots Kram Mosque - known for Salafist preaching. |
04.28” UPSOT Russian church singing
Inside this church in central Tunis, a small Russian Orthodox community, has worshipped for decades
Several times a week, they gather in song. | Wide shots of church.
Inside church as women worship, candle’s lit. |
04.46” But after the revolution, the community was shocked by the desecration of its gravestones.
04.54” And soon after that, a man visited the church and began smashing its crosses - before others made personal threats | Religious paraphernalia inside church.
Shots of damaged crucifixes. |
05.05” FATHER NTSVETAEVA RUSSIAN ORTHODOX PRIEST (Russian)
In four more days there came a man who brought a letter saying that we have to remove all the Christian symbols, which disturb the righteous Muslims in Tunis. And if we didn’t do it, they’d resort to force. Also it said we had to convert to Islam. When I asked “what if we don’t do it?”, he said they’d have to use force & we’d have to pay a special tax to the ‘Party of God’. | Priest inside church.
Cutaways - Christ on the cross. |
05.49” He says his family, which lives on site, saw men circling the building at night, before they found faeces smeared on the walls. One man was sentenced to jail, security was provided and the secular president in the government coalition, even visited the church. | Shots of worshippers inside the church, religious iconography. |
06.11” But his family was shaken. |
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06.14” FATHER NTSVETAEVA RUSSIAN ORTHODOX PRIEST (Russian)
We don’t know how many members the Party of Allah has, what are their intentions and what’s the probability of them coming the very next day and killing us all. | Grab of Priest. |
06.28” UPSOT Music soundtrack
Other Christian groups I spoke to refused to be filmed. Arab Christians told me off camera that in the new Tunisia, there may be repercussions if their faces appeared on television. |
Shots of the Tunis Catholic cathedral. |
06.44” And tucked away in the Medina, I met another minority facing new challenges | Inside the courtyard of the stambali shrine. |
06.52” UPSOT stambali singing
Stambali is a Tunisian take on a spiritual, musical tradition unique to North Africa, stemming from the beliefs of Sub-Saharan slaves. |
Riadh and assistant sitting and singing in Stambali room. |
07.05” Followers communicate with the spirits of deceased black African holy men - via a chosen caretaker, in this instance, Riadh.
07.14” But now, radical Islamists are scaring his flock from visiting the resident saint’s tomb - Riadh says fewer people are visiting, out of fear |
Performing religious ceremony - smoking material and children’s dolls.
Riadh attending the saint’s tomb and performing ritual. |
07.25” RIADH ZAOUCH SIDI ALI LASMAR SHRINE (ARABIC)
‘With the problems that came after the revolution, such as Salafism, the religious people who says this is allowed and this is not, and that this (the stambali) is a new concept in Islam...All these things help me to say that before the revolution the situation was better.’ | Riadh grab. |
07.38” Those who practice Stambali are Muslims who often visit mosque as well - but now unwelcome visitors are telling him what to do in the name of Islam. Riadh doesn’t want the new identity debate, to sideline groups like his. | Riadh shows me Islamic display..photos of Mecca etc, then Tunisian flag. |
07.55” RIADH ZAOUCH SIDI ALI LASMAR SHRINE (ARABIC)
Yes many (Salafists) came, but everything they say goes in one ear and comes out of the other; their sayings are not as sacred as the Koran. When they came, we talked to them to avoid problems and even violence. We just said ‘If these things are a novelty in Islam, it is me doing it. If it’s forbidden, it’s me breaking the rule - you stay with your halal. We should remember here, that this is national heritage!’. | Grab.
Cutaways - smoking ceremony |
08.35” UPSOT MUSIC score
But as Mehdi’s keen to point out - the groups seeking a caliphate with Islamic law - have a different idea of nationhood to people like Riadh. | Cutaways of Mehdi smoking, outside synagogue |
08.46” ‘MEHDI’
The Salafists want all the territory of Tunisia to become an Islamic country, an islamic state. They usually forget we have Jews and Christians and Atheists.
| Shots of wide desert areas.
Zooms in on shot of delapidated stone church on rocky outcrop. |
09.10” USPOT MUSIC score continues.
Yet politically inclined conservative muslims still feel demonised after years of secular dictatorship. |
Exquisite mosque in central Tunis. |
09.21” Many preachers refuse to speak on camera - attempts to set up and film at mosques preaching a more puritanical message are rendered near impossible by their teenage followers.
09.33” USPOT being questioned in Arabic | Trying to film at Fatah mosque - young men in traditional Islamic dress prevent me from filming. |
Fear of journalists, foreign or Tunisian, runs deep.... | Youth trains his camera phone on me. |
09.4o” Banned in several Arab countries, the Tahrir party wants muslim nations to be united under the one caliphate - and the new government’s just legalised it in Tunisia. | Tahrir’s banner - Islamic flag above the world. |
09.51” Its spokesman tells me they and the salafists are stigmatised by a biased local media which indiscriminately lumps pious muslims, and trouble-making thugs together as one
10.03” He says the true Islamic caliphates of history have a better record of protecting minorities, than democracies | Ridha Bel-Haj coversing with my stringer, sitting at desk.
Islamic flag on desk. |
10.11 RIDHA BEL HAJ HIZB UT TAHRIR (ARABIC) ‘So those who are afraid of that, they are in fact afraid that their dirty colonization and almost, Satanic interests will fade away. Historically, under the Islamic state, Muslims and non-Muslims lived in peace and there is no fear from applying rationale Islamic laws as we, Hizb Ut Tahrir and other wise parties advocate.’ |
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10.44” He brushes aside conversion from Islam as an anomaly - but he’s clear when I put to him the tradition of saints and shrines. | Shots of Riadh speaking to saint’s tomb/spirit. |
10.53” RIDHA BEL HAJ HIZB UT TAHRIR (ARABIC) Visits that have become a worshipping of the shrine itself is not accepted; so we just tell people it’s not. But we should not impose anything on people; |
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11.06” Yamina Thabet wants all Tunisians to face up to the question of minority freedoms....and like many secular people here, she wants the government to take action for the sake of the country | Muslim family sits relaxing in park where interview with Yamina is held. |
11.19” YAMINA THABET ASSOCIATION FOR THE SUPPORT OF MINORITIES ‘The government has to make decisions concerning their existence here in Tunisia. It can’t continue avoiding this problem...and now that we’re moving to democracy we have to face all the problems we have in our society.’ |
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11.40” USPOT tram noise UPSOT music score The new government has its hands full fighting economic stagnation.
But the head of the coalition-leading Islamists denies his party is neglecting the issue while it focuses on poverty and a new constitution. |
Tram travels past big gate to Medina, rougher market area.
Man selling individual cigarettes by the road. |
11.57” Nor is it soft on extremists who would do minorities harm- but he says Tunisia is in the process of building a real democracy. | People walk through small archways in Media. |
12.06” RACHID GHANNOUCHI ENNAHDA LEADER (English requiring subs) ‘We have to dialogue with them, to convince them that Tunisia is not a country for one party, Islamist parties, it is a country for all citizens whether Islamists or not.’ |
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12.25” He says the recent threats to emerge, are a blip which can be overcome | Quiet alleyways in Medina, silhouette of man. |
12.32’ RACHID GHANNOUCHI ENNAHDA LEADER (English requiring subs) Tunisia is an open country and the minorities in Tunisia are living peacefully |
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12.43” USPOT birdsong UPSOT music score Tunisia has been home to empires and peoples which have come and gone. From carthage and the romans, to the Berbers, ottomans, french, and of course Arabs - each group has left is mark on this small corner of North Africa. |
Shots of ruins at Carthage, close up of weeds, flowers, bee....Cathedral in background.
Cathedral by the water. |
13.01” Now, it’s Sunni Muslim identity, is likely to be further enshrined by democracy | Woman in full cover passes the water. |
13.07” Those swimming against the tide, whether born a religious minority, or drawn to be one, will have to readjust to new realities. Despite everything, Mehdi, is optimistic.
UPSOT music score. | Boats and fishermen on the water, mountains in background. |
13.19” ‘Mehdi’ Jewish convert We’re going democracy! I think that we have to respect each other. We’ve lived together with Jews, Muslims and Christians...finally we are Tunisian! |
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13.36” UPSOT bird song UPSOT music score
Just outside the capital, the ruins of ancient Carthage show how truths and certainties can so quickly end.
And now, in turn, the society that was before last year’s revolution is also gone... | Carthage ruins.
Cut to large stone gate to Medina, shoppers pass by. |
13.54” Like the Tunisians who voted them in, the new government and the modern Islamists at its fore are aiming to show their progressive, tolerant side | Tunisians including covered women go about their business in the souk. |
14.05” But to do that, they’ll need to keep a lid on the few, that would like to spoil the party
UPSOT music
UPSOT street noise
14.14” FADE TO BLACK
Credits
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Pans up from group of men at side of road into busy out-of-focus street.
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