Tunisians protest murder blamed on Israel
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Tunis, Dec 20, 2016 (AFP) – Hundreds protested in Tunis on Tuesday over the murder of a Tunisian engineer last week that Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas has blamed on Israel.
Mohamed Zaouari, 49, was murdered at the wheel of his car outside his house in Tunisia’s second city Sfax on Thursday. He was hit by 20 bullets.
Waving Tunisian and Palestinian flags, more than 200 protesters walked up a main thoroughfare in the Tunisian capital, an AFP correspondent said.
“With our soul, with our blood, we will avenge you Palestine,” they chanted.
Protester Mohammad Ammar said Zaouari was “a martyr with a capital M” and his murder was “a loss not only for Tunisia but also for Palestine and the Arab nation”.
Al-Qassam Martyrs Brigade, the armed wing of Hamas that controls the Gaza Strip, told AFP on Saturday that Zaouari was a drone expert and was killed by “Zionist treachery”, referring to Israel.
It said Zaouari had worked for the “resistance” for 10 years.
Tunisia’s prosecution has said 10 suspects, all Tunisians, have been detained for questioning, including a female journalist.
The interior ministry has said police are looking for at least two foreigners in connection with the killing.
Interior Minister Hedi Majdoub said on Monday the murder had been planned as far back as June in the Austrian capital Vienna and in the Hungarian capital Budapest.
He said it was possible a foreign service was implicated but there was not yet “any tangible proof”.
Israel has not responded to the allegations.
In 2012, Israel for the first time admitted assassinating the second-in-command of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, Abu Jihad, in a raid on the movement’s Tunis headquarters in 1988.
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