Libyan Jew had to stop work on abandoned synagogue

A Libyan Jew who returned to the country after the fall of Muammar Gaddafi in hopes of resurrecting its Jewish community said on Monday that he was forced to stop work on the long-abandoned Tripoli synagogue after a violent threat.

David Gerbi, who went into exile to Italy after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war spurred attacks on Tripoli Jews, told reporters he was trying to resume cleaning at the long-shuttered synagogue that began a day earlier. But, he said he found its door locked and residents of the area warning him to flee.

"I was in the synagogue and they came to me. I started to clean the synagogue this morning and they say to me 'we need to close the synagogue again because the people are coming here with the gun and they want to kill you'," said Gerbi, wearing a t-shirt emblazoned "I Love Libya" and holding a scroll inscribed with "Yahweh," the Hebrew word for God.

Gerbi said he was also told that they were planning a demonstration against him in Martyrs Square. A companion of Gerbi's said four men armed with rifles came to the synagogue as he tried to enter. At the faded peach-coloured Dar Bishi synagogue in Tripoli's old city, the head of the military council for the area denied any such event had occurred.

"He left with his own will and his departure was even filmed. Everything is documented, thank God," said Sheikh Jamal al-Gazaoui. When asked if anyone used force, he replied: "Never. We came here so no one will react and use violence against him. We made sure everything was in a polite and safe way. He left under our protection and journalists were around. When he left he started lying."

Gerbi, who has cultivated ties with Libya's ruling National Transitional Council (NTC) during the uprising that toppled Gaddafi, said the incident would force the NTC to confront anti-Jewish prejudice following its pledges to build a democratic state that respects civil and human rights.

Now that Gaddafi is gone, Gerbi has said he wants to help interim Libyan leaders rebuild the lost Libya of his childhood and foster the type of religious tolerance between Jews and Muslims that exists in other parts of the Maghreb such as Morocco.

The issue of Jews returning to Libya and of Gerbi's inclusion in the NTC are likely to be sensitive issues in a Muslim country whose former leader had for decades been one of Israel's most outspoken critics on the international stage.