A Tunisian naval guard shot and killed a colleague and two civilians Tuesday near the El Ghriba shul on the island of Djerba during the community’s Lag BaOmer event, the Tunisian Interior Ministry said. The attacker was killed by security guards seeking to prevent him from entering the shul, the ministry said in a statement. Ten people were injured in the attack near the 2,500-year-old Ghriba shul. The assailant, a guard affiliated with the National Guard naval center in the town of Aghir on Djerba, first killed a colleague with his service weapon and then seized ammunition and sought to reach the Ghriba shul, the ministry said. When he reached the area, he opened fire on security units stationed at the shul, which was then locked down and those inside kept secure while authorities investigate the motives for the attack, the ministry said. The community’s Lag BaOmer event attracts thousands of visitors from around the world to one of Africa’s oldest shuls. A truck bombing killed 20 people in 2002 at the entrance to the shul during the Lag BaOmer celebrations in Djerba. Al-Qaida claimed responsibility for that attack. The El Ghriba synagogue is located in the former Jewish village of Harah Sghira and, according to one tradition, was established by a group of Kohanim, from the Bais Hamikdash, who supposedly settled on the island immediately after the destruction of the first Bais Hamikdash. (The tradition holds that the refugees brought a door and a stone from the destroyed Bais Hamikdash with them.) (AP)
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