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DIPLOMATIC AFFAIRS |The inside story of peace talks between Israel and Tunisia post-Oslo in the 1990s.
By ALEX WINSTON JANUARY 9, 2025 18:25
TUNISIAN PRESIDENT Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali maintained low-key relations with Israel during the 1990s, before breaking ties during the Second Intifada. Here, he poses for an official picture in front of the Tunisian flag in 1998.
(photo credit: AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES)
Tuesday, January 14, marks 14 years since the fall of Tunisian president Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, which sparked one of the most monumental chain of events ever seen in the Middle East.
Ben Ali, who seized power in Tunisia in 1987 in a bloodless coup d’état, ruled for 23 years with an iron hand until his downfall as the first dictatorial casualty of the Arab Spring.
His tenure was marked by strong ties to the Palestinian cause and Arab nationalism while maintaining ties with the West. His public anti-Israel stance aligned with the general Arab attitude toward the Jewish state, although his government did maintain clandestine talks with Israel and established low-level diplomatic relations.
Ben Ali’s nuanced view of Israel and its role in the modern world reveals the multifaceted levels through which modern Arab nations tried to come to grips with Israel’s existence and powerful position in the region.
Unlike other countries in the region, Tunisia has yet to fall under the sway of an Islamist extremist government. It is regarded in the West as a moderate Arab country, focused on political, security, and economic issues rather than ideological battles with the West. Since independence from France in 1956, Tunisia has maintained ties with the United States and, in the 21st century, maintains strong trade links with the European Union, especially France.
Tunisia has also been home to one of the oldest continuous Jewish communities in the world – the Djerba island community has claimed its existence since the destruction of the First Temple in 586 BCE. The expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492 led to a second wave of Jewish immigration to Tunisia, introducing Sephardi customs and Ladino into the country and bringing the total number of Jews by the early 1950s to 95,000.
During the period of French colonialism, between 1881 and 1956, the French granted citizenship to Jewish community members, and by the time of Tunisian independence, the community stood at around 105,000 strong.
Several waves of aliyah occurred (as well as immigration to France), most notably after the creation of Israel in 1948 and in the wake of the 1967 Six-Day War. Antisemitic riots following Israel’s stunning victory in the short conflict led to around 40,000 Jews leaving Tunisia for the Jewish state between 1967 and 1968. Today, it is estimated only a couple of thousand Jews remain in the country.
Tunisia’s opposition to Israel – a country it is separated from by more than 2,000 km. – has consistently been rooted in the broader Arab nationalist movement, which emerged during the colonial era. As a former French colony, Tunisia’s anti-imperialist ethos dovetailed with opposition to Zionism, seen by its enemies as a colonial project in Palestine. These sentiments solidified during the Arab-Israeli wars of 1948, 1967, and 1973, positioning Tunisia as a staunch supporter of the Palestinian cause.
The Bourguiba legacy
Habib Bourguiba, Tunisia’s first president, who ruled from 1957 to 1987, adopted a pragmatic approach toward Israel. Contacts between the two countries had been made as early as 1956 when Tunisians approached Israeli officials at the United Nations for support for their independence bid. In a 1965 speech in Jericho, Bourguiba controversially proposed Arab recognition of Israel in exchange for territorial concessions, aligning with the United Nations resolutions.
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“As for the policy of the ‘whole or nothing,’ it brought us to the defeat in Palestine and reduced us to the sad situation we are struggling with today,” Bourguiba stated.
This stance, although widely criticized throughout the Arab world, reflected Tunisia’s more moderate approach to the conflict.
Tunisia’s moderate stance appeared to pivot in 1982, when, during Israel’s invasion of Lebanon to combat Palestinian terrorists, the PLO, with leader Yasser Arafat and 4,000 terrorists, fled the Levant and moved its headquarters to Tunisia. Hosting the PLO further cemented its status as a supporter of Palestinian resistance.
The bombing of the PLO headquarters in Tunis by Israel in Operation Wooden Leg in October 1985 killed dozens of Palestinian terrorists and Tunisians, although Arafat escaped harm. In 1988, a second Israeli operation in the country, led by the Mossad, succeeded in assassinating Khalil al-Wazir (Abu Jihad), then head of the PLO’s military wing. These clandestine operations, without the knowledge of the Tunisians, reiterated the fraught nature of Tunisia’s stance on the Palestinians and relations with Israel before Ben Ali’s rise to power
Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali
Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali was born in 1936 in Hammam Sousse, the fourth of 11 children. After Tunisian independence, he joined the newly formed Tunisian Army and was sent to France for training.
After returning to Tunisia in 1964, he began his career as a staff officer in the Tunisian military. Between 1964 and 1974, he was the head of military intelligence. He later served as director-general of national security from December 1977. He also served briefly as a military attaché in the Tunisian embassies in Morocco and Spain.
In April 1980, he became the ambassador to Poland, a position he held for four years, after which he was named defense minister. Following the Tunisian bread riots in January 1984, he returned to his role as director-general of national security.
Subsequently, he became interior minister on April 28, 1986. In October 1987, president Bourguiba appointed him as prime minister.
Just one month later, on November 7, 1987, Ben Ali made his play for power. Doctors declared Bourguiba unable to fulfill his presidential duties due to medical incapacity. As prime minister, Ben Ali removed Bourguiba from office and took control of the presidency.
Although initially appearing to promise a more democratic and free future for Tunisia, Ben Ali’s rule soon regressed into the autocratic regime that would control Tunisians’ lives for the next two decades. Under Ben Ali’s leadership, Tunisia faced significant human rights challenges, particularly concerning press freedom. By the early 2000s, Ben Ali’s government was widely regarded as one of the most oppressive in the world, and Tunisia was frequently ranked among the lowest countries in global assessments of human rights and press freedom.
Israeli relations
Upon taking power, Ben Ali reaffirmed Tunisia’s commitment to the Palestinian cause and its alignment with Arab League policies. He consistently condemned Israeli actions, particularly during major upticks in violence between Israel and the Palestinians. These public declarations aimed to appease domestic and regional audiences while maintaining Tunisia’s leadership role in the Arab world.
However, despite taking a strong, public anti-Israel stance, Ben Ali’s relationship with the West, and the US in particular, would also help shape his desire for some form of ties with the Israelis. His strategy aimed to secure economic aid and bolster Tunisia’s international standing.
There were whispers, in the wake of the 1991 Madrid Conference to revive the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, of Israel normalizing ties with several Arab countries, including Morocco, Oman, Qatar, and Tunisia, and clandestine talks did take place. The real breakthrough, however, came after the signing of the Oslo Accords in 1993 by prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO leader Arafat.
The Oslo I Accord was signed in September of that year, and by October, high-level talks were already under way between the Israelis and Tunisians to establish diplomatic relations.
“It was immediately after Oslo, and options were open,” then-deputy foreign minister Yossi Beilin told The Jerusalem Post this week. “I went to Tunisia to meet with Arafat in October ’93, immediately after the signing ceremony of the Oslo Accords, and met with some Tunisian officials.
Beilin also met several times with Tunisia’s then-foreign minister Habib Ben Yahia and remembers enthusiastic anticipation over where the talks could lead.
“It was quite unbelievable. First of all, they were very pro-Jewish. They were proud to speak about the Jewish community, and I was taken to Jewish sites such as the Alliance school. They were very glad to speak, to meet, and to share ideas. What I found was admiration, sheer admiration [for Israel]. I also saw some reservations from their side when speaking about the Palestinians.”
The focus of talks between the two countries was not specifically security or the Palestinians but other avenues such as trade, tourism, and investments. The signing of the peace treaty between Jordan and Israel in October 1994 and the agreement with Morocco to open liaison offices in September of that year further strengthened the optimism that Israel could make peace with its Arab neighbors.
Talks with the Tunisians had progressed enough since October ’93 for telephone links between the two countries to be established, and Israeli tourists began arriving in Tunisia in larger numbers. One particular cause to visit was the anniversary of Rabbi Shimon bar Yohai’s death, and hundreds of Israelis and thousands of French Jews would travel to Djerba to celebrate.
“This is an agreement we will pursue until we attain a full agreement on relations,” foreign minister at the time Shimon Peres told Israel Radio after news of the deal with Tunisia was announced. “At this point, we have some sort of relations with three North African states – namely, Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia.”
One particular moment Beilin remembers is the response of the Tunisians when Arafat and the PLO packed up and left Tunis for Gaza in July 1994 – it seemed that, behind the scenes, they were not sorry to see the Palestinian leader leave the country.
“The Tunisians said to me one time, ‘Today is a very important day,’ so I asked what it was, perhaps a birthday or something,” Beilin told the Post. “But no. They said they were having a big farewell party for Arafat. I didn’t smile, so they thought I might have misunderstood. So one of them told me, ‘No, no, no. It’s a very, very big party.’
“This was the level of intimacy and a kind of friendship. The attitude was very friendly and open with the Tunisians.”
Talks between Israel and Tunisia, whilst occasionally taking place in Tunisia itself, mostly took place in neutral Brussels, with the idea that Tunis and Tel Aviv would open interest offices attached to the Belgian Embassy in the respective cities.
“We negotiated mainly in Brussels and went there frequently,” Beilin recalled. “I came with the delegation; my counterpart was the Tunisian deputy foreign minister. The idea was that both the Israel office in Tunisia and the Tunisian office in Israel would be part of the Belgian Embassy. This was the idea that the Tunisians demanded.
“At the beginning, we suggested it should be a separate embassy, but we did not debate it. We saw for [the Tunisians] it was important to be under a Belgian umbrella. Belgium was present in our negotiations.”
The interest offices officially opened in Tunis and Tel Aviv in 1996, highlighting the peak of Tunisian-Israeli relations.
End of relations
Tunisia’s population overwhelmingly opposed normalization with Israel, driven by solidarity with the Palestinians and historical grievances. Islamist movements like Ennahda capitalized on this sentiment, framing any engagement with Israel as a betrayal of national and Islamic values. The domestic opposition constrained Ben Ali’s ability to pursue overt diplomatic ties.
Regionally, Tunisia also had to balance its policies with those of its Arab and Maghreb neighbors. While countries like Egypt and Jordan pursued peace treaties with Israel, others, like Algeria and Libya, remained staunchly opposed. Tunisia’s smaller geopolitical footprint further limited its ability to shape the Arab-Israeli discourse independently.
Unfortunately, the promise of normalization was not fulfilled during the ’90s. The outbreak of the Second Intifada in 2000 changed the landscape, and all the hard work of Israel’s foreign officials to maintain ties with Arab nations was nullified.
By 2002, the interest offices in Tunis and Tel Aviv were closed, and any hope of establishing official diplomatic ties diminished. During this period, Ben Ali reverted to his previous public persona of backing the Palestinians and demonizing Israel.
“The Palestinian issue continues to be our most important cause,” Ben Ali told the opening session of the 2004 Arab League summit in Tunis. “It is a source of great concern for us because it is tied to issues that have a bearing on the security, not only in the region but also throughout the world, especially after the increased levels of aggression by the Israelis, which has left behind numerous victims.”
This status quo was maintained throughout the rest of the decade as Ben Ali maintained his grip on power.
During this period, the US State Department defined Tunisia as “dominated by a single political party.... Elections are regularly characterized by notable irregularities, including voter intimidation.”
Ben Ali’s human rights record remained poor, and his regime continued to commit serious abuses in many areas, according to the State Department, including significant limitations on citizens’ rights, torture, intimidation, and physical abuse.
The department stated that the Tunisian government was “intolerant of public criticism and used physical abuse, criminal investigations, the court system, arbitrary arrests, residential restrictions, and travel controls (including denial of passports) to discourage criticism by human rights and opposition activists.”
The restrictions, harassment, and economic difficulties eventually led to a boiling point, and on December 17, 2010, Mohamed Bouazizi, a Tunisian street vendor from Sidi Bouzid, set himself on fire in protest, dying of his injuries. Public anger erupted, and spontaneous demonstrations spread throughout the country, eventually reaching the capital, Tunis.
Ben Ali attempted to quell the protests with brute force, but the use of violence by the Tunisian police only incensed the crowds further. By January 14, his position had become untenable. Ben Ali declared a state of emergency and dissolved the government, promising new legislative elections within six months. “I have understood you, I have understood you all,” the strongman told his people.
However, events quickly escalated, as the armed forces and key government members appeared to lose confidence in Ben Ali’s leadership. With his power diminishing, prime minister Mohamed Ghannouchi announced he would serve as interim head of state during Ben Ali’s “temporary” absence. By the time Ben Ali fled, some 338 Tunisians had died in the protests, with thousands injured.
Ben Ali and his close family hastily departed for El-Aouina military airport. The military permitted Ben Ali’s plane to take off, and shortly afterward, Tunisian airspace was closed. The presidential plane then headed to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia accepted Ben Ali and his family on the condition that he refrain from political activities.
Secret recordings from Ben Ali’s last few days in Tunisia and his arrival in Saudi Arabia reveal his attempts to fly back to Tunisia to regain power. The gradual realization – as security officials tell him they cannot guarantee his safety against the crowds – that he has fallen from power sweeps over Ben Ali.
The new Tunisian government formed after Ben Ali fled issued international arrest warrants for the Ben Alis for financial embezzlement, and in June 2011, just six months after fleeing, Ben Ali and his wife were tried in absentia for business irregularities, for which they were both sentenced to 25 years in prison. Ben Ali never returned to Tunisia and lived the remainder of his life in exile in Jeddah, until his death in September 2019.
An opportunity missed
Perhaps the shadowy world of Tunisian-Israeli relations can be best summed up in one anecdote told by Beilin about that period.
During one of the former minister’s trips to Tunisia to deal with officials, the former mayor of Safed and MK Aharon Nahmias expressed interest in joining the delegation despite not having an official role, which was permitted.
While in Tunisia, ahead of a breakfast meeting with foreign minister Ben Yahia, Nahmias asked to attend. Although initially hesitant to bring up the request, Beilin asked, it was granted, and Nahmias joined the breakfast. During the meeting, Nahmias requested a photograph with the foreign minister, who agreed, and security personnel were asked to take the photo.
However, following the breakfast, Nahmias encountered an unexpected situation. As he prepared to leave, security personnel approached him, asking for the camera containing the film of the photograph.
“He claimed it was already packed and en route to the plane, and they knew it was not the truth,” Beilin related.
“They insisted, and they insisted in a tone which could not be misinterpreted. Nahmias was afraid, so he went to his luggage and found the camera. One of the security men took the camera, opened it, took the film, saw a picture with the minister, and put it in his pocket, leaving Nahmias without his photo.
“The minister allowed him to participate, allowed him to take the picture, and then he sent his people to come and retrieve it,” chuckled Beilin. “It’s a bitter memory because it is not a contradiction, but it was just to remind us that Tunisia was what it was. It was a kind of a souvenir from the Tunisians. Don’t forget who we are.”
English (US) ·